SUBJECTS: Visit to Cairns; Sydney lockdown; need for the Morrison Government to fix vaccine rollout and national quarantine; Queensland tourism; Labor’s Housing Australia Future Fund; regional Australia; women in politics. 

MURRAY JONES, HOST: Welcome to Cairns. 

ANTHONY ALBANESE, LEADER OF THE AUSTRALIAN LABOR PARTY: Good to be here.

JONES: And wonderful to talk to you. And I am keen to find out a bit more about the reason for your visit. We're very pleased to see you. I trust you that it's got nothing to do with the Cowboys and the Rabbitohs game?

ALBANESE: They are playing on Friday nightin Sydney. So I'll be still in Queensland, I think. I've been to Toowoomba, Brisbane, then from here we go to Mackay, then the Gladstone. And so we're getting out and about here in the great state of Queensland. I've stayed in Canberra for 15 days in order to be able to travel to Queensland. 

JONES: That's a bit rough.

ALBANESE: I haven't been home for quite a while, so I am missing my son and my puppy.

JONES: It's pretty tough, certainly in New South Wales, at the moment. And it looks like Gladys is going to have to announce further lockdowns. You probably heard about that this morning. But I am keen to talk to you a little bit more about regional Australia. Now, CoreLogic has come out with some more details in the last 24 hours. Parts of regional Australia, 17-21 per cent of an increase in house prices. And look, that is a concern. $10 billion for the Housing Australia Future Fund has been announced by Labor for the next term if they get across the line. Is it going to be enough? Because the bottom, the level has become a lot higher in the last 24 hours with this data that's come out.

ALBANESE: Indeed, well, it will be the largest ever investment by Commonwealth Government in social housing - 20,000 new social housing units and 10,000 affordable housing units. And we'll also address issues like $200 million for the repair and maintenance of Indigenous housing in remote communities. That is a real issue out there. We have just terrible conditions in parts of remote Australia. So it will make a substantial difference. The good news is that it won't cost taxpayers anything by putting $10 billion into a future fund, investing it and then spending the interest on investment. It makes a lot of sense and will create jobs at the same time. And we know that with the social housing units, we know that in particular women and children escaping domestic violence is a major issue. They've got nowhere to go. And that includes in parts of regional Australia. So providing them with a place to go so that they don't get turned away, which happens every single night in Australia, it will make a big difference. It's a start. It's not going to solve every issue. But it is, as I said, the largest ever commitment to public and community housing ever made by a Federal Government or Opposition.

JONES: And certainly, a lot more pressure on those projections, because of the details that have come out. In a lot of ways, we've always talked about capital city housing prices being overheated. One would have hoped that maybe that that would have actually calmed down as a result of this, I guess, this country change, this tree change, that's happening in Australia. But it is a bit concerning unless you're a seller, of course, in the market, that we've had this flow-on effect where it's actually increasing regional prices. That was probably not part of the plan long-term, though.

ALBANESE: It is having a huge impact. One of the things we've seen, particularly with COVID, is that people have been reminded that regional Australia is a great place to live. And with people working remotely, I met someone yesterday here who's working basically from Brisbane but living here. And that makes a lot of sense. It makes a lot of sense that you can do that, enjoy this wonderful lifestyle while continuing to log on to your workplace, be it a couple of thousand kilometres away.

JONES: And certainly, COVID has been one of the unexpected things. And I think in a lot of ways, it's certainly good, because, as we know, workplaces can be difficult places. So if you can do it from home, it's a really good thing. Let's change tack, because I know that housing is something that certainly is going to be an ongoing issue. And certainly, some concerns that the Coalition hasn't got some strong plans there, but that Labor at least has put forward this $10 billion Housing Australia Future Fund. I do want to talk a little bit more about the revelations that came out from Julia Banks, quite fiery. And I must admit, she was very credible, and she was very, very compelling. For men that have got daughters, granddaughters, nieces that are thinking about moving into politics, and at the end of the day, some of these issues are on both sides of the house. It seems that certainly the Coalition, at the end of the day, we heard Josh Frydenberg saying, 'She's out there trying to sell some books and she's just on a media tour at the moment'. But it is a concerning issue and it dovetails back into this issue of quotas in Parliament. What's your response to the Coalition's position with respect to the revelations that Julia Banks has made in the last few days?

ALBANESE: The Coalition have a real issue with women and with gender issues. We've seen the reported sexual assault of Brittany Higgins, a young staffer in a ministerial office for goodness’ sake, 50 metres from the Prime Minister's office. The ministers knew, staff members in the Prime Minister's own office knew, people in Parliament knew, but allegedly no one told the Prime Minister for two years. It lacks credibility. And we've had ongoing inquiries established that haven't reported. Why do you have to have an inquiry into what the Prime Minister's office knew? His own staff? Why doesn't he just ask them? Simple as that. And then you have Julia Banks, a credible person, someone who came from business, made the decision to enter public life to make a difference. She is a very decent person of integrity. And she just found her experience was terrible, as she's given accounts of, including being harassed in the Prime Minister's suite by a Cabinet Minister. These are shocking revelations. And they come out one after the other after the other. And I think that the real difference between Labor and the Coalition is we have pretty close to 50 per cent female representation. We will have 50 per cent after the next election, added to by Elida Faith, I hope, becoming the Member for Leichhardt here as part of that contribution. And I have 50 per cent of my Shadow Cabinet are women. Half my leadership team in Penny Wong and Kristina Keneally, two really strong women. And if you change the composition of the Parliament, make it more representative, then you make a difference. It's made a difference having Indigenous representatives like Pat Dodson and Linda Burney and Malarndirri McCarthy as members of our Caucus, as has Ken Wyatt being a Liberal minister has made a difference to the Coalition Party room, no doubt. We need a more representative Parliament. And we need one in which women feel safe. Women should feel safe in all workplaces. Simple as that.

JONES: What would you say to people who say that there's no glass ceiling and it should be on the basis of merit? Is there a fundamental understanding of just some of the systems and how much it is swayed in favour of men? And unfortunately, it seems a lot of men don't seem to understand that. Is that a fair comment?

ALBANESE: Well, I think when you have more women as part of your team, when you take advantage of the full talent, the 100 per cent of talent in the community, you'll get a better team. It's as simple as that. And I'm very proud of my Shadow Cabinet members, not just Penny and Kristina, but Tanya Plibersek, Terri Butler, Michelle Rowland, Catherine King, Amanda Rishworth. These are really serious contributors. Katy Gallagher will be the next Finance Minister of Australia if we're successful. She's the former Chief Minister of the ACT. The idea that there are no mediocre blokes. There are mediocre people, men and women, and some of them go through. In Queensland here, the LNP have a real problem. I mean, you had Andrew Laming who's had to resign and not recontest. You had five people in that preselection, including a local mayor who was a woman, and they selected the one boke. And the one bloke has some of the similar problems that Andrew Laming had. Andrew Laming 2.0. You would have read about some of his comments about women online. I mean, what is it? What does it take to get the message through to these people that we need to do better? They need to do better. We've got Donisha Duff, a really strong Torres Strait Islander woman running in that seat of Bowman in Queensland in the Redlands area of Brisbane. And she will be outstanding. And I think that her chances of success have just increased as a result of the LNP selecting this bloke. I just think people in that community will say, no, enough is enough. We had Andrew Laming taking photos and hassling people on Facebook, and then they've selected this bloke who has this this massive cloud over him. They will send a message.

JONES: I think more than 51 per cent of the electorate are women. So I guess they'll make the decision in the long-term in relation to that. So much we could talk about and I am keen to focus on the reason why you're here in Cairns. We could talk about vaccines. We could talk about the NAIF and, I guess, the lack of funding going out to the regions. But before we wrap up this morning, I’m keen to talk a little bit more about the reason for your visit to Cairns today?

ALBANESE: Well, I will be with Elida this morning talking with tourism operators about the ongoing impact that the failure on vaccines and the failure to have national quarantine facilities are having on this region. Until we fix the two jobs that Scott Morrison had - rolling out the vaccine and fixing national quarantine - we will continue to have these lockdowns. And when you have lockdowns, you have people in New South Wales who can't come here. And that means jobs. That means less money to the community. And it's having just a massive impact. And this is Government incompetence. We are the last in the developed world. And the Government, with its so-called four-point plan they came up with, four-stage plan they come up with last Friday, I mean, for goodness’ sake, we're 18 months into the pandemic and they came up with a four-phase plan. And guess where we are, Murray? We're at the beginning of stage one. The beginning of stage one. And we need those international borders open. This community relies upon international visitors.

JONES: And look, you know, also the concerns that have come out this morning, even places like Israel that have had the highest vaccination rates in the world, the Delta variant is causing some real concerns. So we need to at least get to that first base. Anthony Albanese, it's been great to talk to you. I'm going to let you go. It is World Chocolate Day so I'm going to check your pockets before you go just to see what you've got for me this morning.

ALBANESE: Have a look at me, mate. I'm not eating. I'm off the chocolate. 

JONES: There should be more for me. 

ALBANESE: I am off the chips. I'll give you the big tip. If you don't want to eat chocolates, don't buy them and have them in the fridge. That is the big tip out there for the listeners.

JONES: And keep that jogging up. And hopefully your jogging styles are a little bit better than my friend, Bill Shorten's. Because that was one of the things that certainly went a bit against him last time. Great to talk to you. Some interesting times ahead. Anthony Albanese, welcome to Cairns. I really enjoyed our chat this morning.

ALBANESE: It is really good to be in the studio with you, mate.

ENDS