SUBJECTS: Federal election; Labor’s policy agenda; Morrison Government’s failures during the COVID-19 pandemic; cost of living; WA borders; state and international borders.
 
GARETH PARKER, HOST: We are joined in our Sydney studios by the man who would be Prime Minister, Opposition Leader, Anthony Albanese. Good morning.
 
ANTHONY ALBANESE, LEADER OF THE AUSTRALIAN LABOR PARTY: Good morning. Good to be with you in strange circumstances.
 
PARKER: In your town.
 
ALBANESE: I was headed to Perth on Saturday on the first flight. So, I had lined up a PCR test. I did that this morning. So, I've had that and a RAT.
 
PARKER: So, you're another one who's travel plans have been disrupted?
 
ALBANESE: Of course, as they have been all for the last two years, really. It's been a difficult period. But I think that Mark McGowan is making sure that West Australian stay safe.
 
PARKER: I want to ask you about that. Because you've had a big couple of weeks. You were in Queensland last week. You and I were both in Melbourne on Sunday morning. And then you did some other things as well on Monday. We're now both back in Sydney. You've been able to travel the eastern seaboard freely to do your job. Shouldn't Western Australians who need to travel to do their job be able to do so as well?
 
ALBANESE: Well, there are restrictions. And there have been restrictions on me doing my job over the last couple of years. For a while there, I couldn't come to Sydney. If I came to Sydney, I wasn't going to be able to go anywhere else. So, I used Canberra as a base. I went to Queensland and Tasmania, which were the only two states I could go to.
 
PARKER: But we've now moved on, haven't we? I mean I think we are now up to 97 per cent single dose over 12 in Western Australia. The country, the rest of the country, has moved on.
 
ALBANESE: But in WA, of course, we know that particularly in some of the remote communities, unfortunately, it's nowhere near that figure. And we know as well that once you do open up, you get an increase in cases. And we certainly have seen that in New South Wales in particular. New South Wales' deadliest day was last Friday. Its second deadliest day of the pandemic was on Saturday. So, we're continuing to see substantial numbers of people lose their lives tragically. So, it's not surprising that Mark McGowan has taken a cautious approach. That's something that he's done throughout the pandemic. And the other thing that's really important is that, unlike in Sydney, this town, you go to my local community and you've got shopfronts that are empty because businesses have shut, they haven't been able to survive the pandemic, in WA, people have been able to go to restaurants, pubs, their kids are able to go to school, people are able to go to work.
 
PARKER: People are going to pubs and restaurants and schools in Sydney, though. I mean, I've been here for three weeks. And I'm sure it's not the height of busyness that would ordinarily be in a pandemic-free summer. But I went to a pub for dinner last night and it was chockers.
 
ALBANESE: There are a lot of businesses, though, that have really struggled.
 
PARKER: Sure.
 
ALBANESE: Because people have, essentially, self-imposed restrictions on their activity. You look at the roads around Sydney around Christmas and the beginning of January, I've never seen it so quiet, ever.
 
PARKER: The Reserve Bank Governor, very upbeat on the economic recovery yesterday at the National Press Club. He says unemployment could go below 4 per cent. Interest rates are an issue. Is the economy being managed well by the Prime Minister?
 
ALBANESE: Well, people are really struggling. And one of the things that I find remarkable is the, 'She'll be right, mate' attitude of the Prime Minister. People are not getting enough work. And one of the things that's happening out there with insecure work and the growth is that people who were doing three or four casual jobs might be now doing just one or two. They are struggling to get by, struggling to pay their rent, struggling to pay for the increased costs of the essentials of life, be they meat or veggies or petrol or other essentials. And they hear a Prime Minister saying how well it's going. And the truth is that what we need is more secure work, more permanent jobs, more full-time jobs. There are two million Australians who are underemployed, who say that they would work more hours if they were available. And that's meaning that there's real pressure on working families out there.
 
PARKER: You've been very critical of the Prime Minister's handling of COVID, particularly over summer. What would you have done differently? Would you have told Queensland and South Australia not to reopen their state borders? Would you have told New South Wales and Victoria to close their international borders? Would you have done any of that differently?
 
ALBANESE: I haven't lectured any of the state governments. What I haven't done is what Scott Morrison has done, which is to pick out WA and Queensland in particular, and be critical of them, even though South Australia, Tasmania and other states, which have Liberal governments, have done exactly the same thing by and large.
 
PARKER: But what would you have done differently?
 
ALBANESE: What I would have done is to make sure that the vaccine rollout occurred earlier. That would have meant that the boosters occurred earlier. I would have prepared and listen to the experts about rapid antigen tests. I would be making rapid antigen tests available freely through the Medicare system. What we have now is that there's a crisis in aged care. That's something I would have done differently. The aged care system is under enormous pressure. And I just find it inconceivable that Richard Colbeck yesterday denied that there was a crisis in the system when you have an increasing number of people losing their lives, when you have 20,000 active cases of aged care residents or workers, when you have aged care residents, some 80,000, haven't had their booster shots yet. How is that possible when we're in February 2022, in the third year of the pandemic? They were supposed to be the priority, you might recall, when the Prime Minister said that they would receive their vaccinations as category 1A early in March. But it simply hasn't delivered. So, I would have listened to the health experts and acted, not waited for issues to become a crisis. And that's a pattern of behaviour for this Prime Minister.
 
PARKER: Anthony Albanese, do you reckon anyone in your Cabinet, or any of your colleagues, have ever sent a disparaging text message about you to each other?
 
ALBANESE: Nothing quite like what we've seen from Gladys Berejiklian and the unnamed Cabinet Minister. But the real problem there, Gareth, is that you had the Premier of New South Wales, who in the context here was people losing their lives, people losing their homes, communities under siege during that bushfire crisis, you had a Prime Minister who went missing. And then when he came back, according to the New South Wales Premier, who was working her guts out each and every day, was more interested in the politics than he was in people, and having an exchange with a Minister about that. And him responding, as we know, that the Prime Minister, in his or her words, was a 'psycho' and various disparaging remarks going back. To me, the critical thing isn't the personal insults, it is Gladys Berejiklian's statement that this guy cared more about the politics than he did about people.
 
PARKER: Hopefully the next time you and I do this, it will be in Perth.
 
ALBANESE: I certainly hope so, mate. I'm looking forward to getting to Perth.
 
PARKER: Me too.
 
ALBANESE: I'm sure you are. It's tough on people. I certainly acknowledge that. But it's been so tough on a range people. Remember the Prime Minister saying that the international borders would all be opened up by this stage as well. And of course, he's made the decision to keep those borders relatively closed.
 
PARKER: Anthony Albanese, thank you very much. Appreciate your time.
 
ALBANESE: Thanks very much. See you in Perth.
 
PARKER: Good on you. Anthony Albanese, the Opposition Leader.
 
ENDS