Topics: Remembrance Day, 50^th anniversary of the Whitlam Dismissal, net zero, Liberal Party

 

E&OE

 

MARK LEVY:

 

Angus Taylor, the Shadow Defence Minister, he's here in the studio with me. Angus, good morning to you.

 

ANGUS TAYLOR:

 

Great to be with you, mate.

 

MARK LEVY:

 

You've got your poppy on your lapel today, one of the most important days on our calendar.

 

ANGUS TAYLOR:

 

It sure is, and it's a great day to salute the service of those many Australians who have served our country in uniform and continue to, of course, and particularly the 103,000 who made the ultimate sacrifice for our great country, and at 11am I really encourage everybody to take a moment, take that minute, to remember those great people who've defended our freedoms, defended our democracy, and stood up for what is right in a world where there are always people who are against what is right, and that continues to be the case at this time, and that's why I'll also continue to fight hard for a strong defence force in this country.

 

MARK LEVY:

 

I know how proud you are as an Australian. You're a patriot and one thing that I talk about on this programme is how proud I am to be Australian and one thing that really strikes me when, and I've been to the War Memorial a couple of times, and I'll speak to the Director a little later in the show, is the age of the people who died fighting for this country. We're talking about a generation of young men who fought and lost their lives.

 

ANGUS TAYLOR:

 

Yeah, that's absolutely right. It's a special day for me. My grandfather fought in the First World War on the Western Front. He was badly wounded. His brother was killed on the Western Front, and he was very young, he was 19 when that occurred, which is extraordinary. I've got a 19-year-old son, and to think that in that era, he would have been fighting on the Western Front and with a real risk of losing his life or being badly wounded. It's pretty extraordinary. But these people stood up for us, and many of them made that ultimate sacrifice. We should be very proud of them, but most important, we should remember them for the great people that they were and the great Australians they were.

 

MARK LEVY:

 

And I'll catch up with Sir Peter Cosgrove, who's probably one of the most well-versed people when it comes to defence in this country and such respect, a former Governor-General as well. Speaking of Governor-General's this, today the 50th anniversary of The Dismissal. First question to you, what were you doing?

 

ANGUS TAYLOR:

 

Well, you know what? I was at an event that night. I was on the polling booths at Nimmitabel, the great metropolis of Nimmitabel, during that day, handing out as it was, for the Country Party. My father was a member of the Country Party, and we went to a big event that night with a lot of local farming families. It was bit like Don's party. Don's party actually happened in 1975! I think I'm right in saying that, but it was extraordinary watching the votes come in and this was, for me, a formative moment in why I became interested in politics, because I watched this and we were out all day saying, you needed to ‘turn on the lights’. Good slogan. That was, that was actually what Malcolm Fraser used against Gough Whitlam, who used ‘it’s time’ back in 1972. Whitlam used ‘shame Fraser shame’ and I think the reinvention of history going on by the Prime Minister right now about what happened in 1975 is, I think, completely wrong. This was a government that was in crisis. It had blown the budget, it had spent too much money, it had made loans which were seriously dodgy, and so Malcolm Fraser blocked supply. It was a constitutional crisis. The Governor General had to step in and deal with it, and he did. And it was the right thing to do, difficult thing to do, but the right thing to do. And of course, the people agreed with that, with a landslide election in 1970 at the end of 1975 and the rest, of course, is history. But what an extraordinary event. I do think we're seeing a really one-sided version of the history of what occurred at that time.

 

MARK LEVY:

 

He raised a few eyebrows with his comments last night, the Prime Minister, look, I'm not surprised. He's a Labor Prime Minister, sticking up for a Labor Prime Minister, but I think you're right when you reflect on what happened leading up to the dismissal and what happened in the election following a landslide to Malcolm Fraser.

 

ANGUS TAYLOR:

 

Yeah, and you know, this is what Labor does at its worst. We saw it with Whitlam. I was there. I remember it very well. I was a nine-year-old, but as a nine-year-old, you couldn't miss it. It was such a big thing at the time, double dissolution, constitutional crisis, but it was Labor at its worst, Labor with economic irresponsibility, you know, red lights going everywhere, for how bad it was and sadly, I think there's a lot of that going on now.

 

MARK LEVY:

 

I was about to say, is there similarities to what we're seeing at the moment with the government?

 

ANGUS TAYLOR:

 

You know, it's not surprising that Albanese is out there defending Whitlam, because he's doing the same stuff. Seriously.

 

MARK LEVY:

 

Maybe a knock on Sam Mostyn’s door, maybe Angus? Hey?

 

ANGUS TAYLOR:

 

I did see her on the weekend, but I didn't mention this one.

 

MARK LEVY:

 

Will it ever happen again? Do you think?

 

ANGUS TAYLOR:

 

Who knows? You know, we have an incredible Constitution. Our institutions are strong, and I think they worked as they should at the time. It was controversial, obviously, and remains controversial, but I think we can deal with these things. That's the incredible thing about 1975 and on this the Governor-General, and I strongly agree she's made this point recently is that the country got to the other side of it, backed in Fraser as the new Prime Minister, and we moved on and that is incredible. That is what a great country we are, that we are capable of doing that and I think that is worth celebrating.

 

MARK LEVY:

 

Yep. Well said. You've got a fairly big week. Well, the Liberals do. Are we going to sort out this net zero thing tomorrow or what?

 

ANGUS TAYLOR:

 

Yeah, I think we will and most importantly, I think we're ready to reject Labor's bad Net Zero plan, which is driving up prices, which isn't bringing down emissions. Chris Bowen is out of control, is turning the economy backwards. Our standard of living is going backwards, and Australians are really feeling the pain and it's time to move on from that bad plan and move to an approach which reflects Liberal values. Our belief in the fact that if you allow technologies to improve and people to make choices, you bring down prices, you bring down emissions and that's exactly what we saw when I was Minister - four years, 10% reduction in prices, 10% reduction in emissions. In the near four years Chris Bowen's been Minister, prices have gone through the roof, and emissions have barely moved and that's what you get with Labor. They don't understand how the economy works and they don’t understand how energy works.

 

MARK LEVY:

 

What about the Liberal position though? I know you've made your position very clear. Is there overwhelming support within the party to ditch net zero or not?

 

ANGUS TAYLOR:

 

I think there is absolutely overwhelming support to move the emphasis to affordability of energy as we bring down emissions in a sensible way, in line with Liberal values, which is not big government, not telling you what kind of car to drive, not driving up the price of electricity, not sending industry offshore, and that means leaving it to the private sector to use technologies and people to make choices, to adopt those technologies that suits them.

 

MARK LEVY:

 

Would you concede, though Angus, you took net zero to the last two elections and it was a dismal failure. Would you concede that?

 

ANGUS TAYLOR:

 

Yeah, well, there's no question the last two elections were dismal failures. There's no doubt about that whatsoever and I think part of it is that we didn't attack Labor hard enough on their energy failures and I think we absolutely need to do that. I think there is a better way. We have an incredible track record. I mean, you know, 10% down in my four years, both emissions and energy. I mean, Chris Bowen couldn't dream of those outcomes, Mark, so we know how to do this, and sometimes we don't get out there and yell loudly enough about our achievements, but we have a demonstrated capacity to get this right, and it does mean being pragmatic. It doesn't mean being ideological like Chris Bowen, and it absolutely means putting faith in the Australian people to make the right choices and deploy technologies at the pace that suits them.

 

MARK LEVY:

 

One last one before you go, Angus, you had a Thai feed with Andrew Hastie. I spoke to Andrew last week about it. He tells me, the Massaman beef is beautiful down there. Are we reading anything into that or not?

 

ANGUS TAYLOR:

 

Look. We catch up regularly. We always have. Nothing's changed on that and you know, we talk about the policy positions that the party needs to take to the next election in order to win and take away a bad Labor government and we'll continue to do that. We're good mates as are others who were at that dinner, it was a dozen people who meet pretty regularly and you know, that's what you do in Canberra. You work together to try and make this country better and that's exactly what I'm going to continue to do every single day.

 

MARK LEVY:

 

And just before you go, this party room meeting, right, can you take the listeners behind the scenes? Like, is it all happy go lucky? Are their handshakes or do certain people sit in certain positions and snarl across the room? How does that all work?

 

ANGUS TAYLOR:

 

You know, people are a little bit like cats. Once you've got a seat, you never give it up, but no one moves but, but I tell you what, what's been striking to me about the party room when we get in there and we start debating these things, is they are good discussions. Every single time, people speak their minds. That's important. They're representing their electorates or their states, and it's important they speak their minds and represent those people and thrash it out and I'm confident we can, whenever we've had these debates in the past, we've always been able to settle on a sensible position. I'm sure we will this time, and I am sure it will mean taking it up to Labor on their bad and failed policies.

 

MARK LEVY:

 

Alright, well Angus Taylor, thanks for popping into the studio. I know you've got a busy day on this Remembrance Day. Thanks so much.

 

ANGUS TAYLOR:

 

Good to be with you.

 

 

ENDS.