SUBJECTS: Labor’s $300 vaccine incentive proposal; vaccine rollout; need for national quarantine facilities; next Federal election; Qantas standing down workers.

LEON BYNER, HOST: Anthony, thanks for coming on this morning. 

ANTHONY ALBANESE, LEADER OF THE AUSTRALIAN LABOR PARTY: Good morning, Leon.

BYNER: Tell me about your offer of a cash incentive of say $300. I guess there are those who would say, 'Well, shouldn't personal responsibility play a part?' What do you say that?

ALBANESE: Well, of course that's the case. And people need to get vaccinated to look after their own health, the health of their families, their neighbours, their community. But we know that economic incentives can work. That's why they're operating in Europe. That's why Joe Biden is supporting it in the United States. That's why various states in the US have a whole range of incentives there. And that's why the Chief Medical Officer, early this year, said that we needed to 'look for incentives' to quote him, 'as many incentives as we can' for people to become vaccinated. Now that was the Chief Medical Officer, Paul Kelly. We know that the national plan released by the Prime Minister last Friday included measures, to quote the plan, 'encouraging uptake through incentives under phase B'. So there's nothing remarkable about the idea that you would put an incentive there. And what's more, hard-working Australians deserve a reward after a tough two years. They've borne the burden of this pandemic. And they've been magnificent in their response. And rewarding those who do the right thing means we'll be protecting our health and our communities, but also will help our economy at a time where it's really struggling.

BYNER: Look, the feds have rejected your payment idea saying that it's wasteful spending, but they're not opposed to incentives. What's your response to this? Because I would have thought one of the best incentives is cash, surely, right?

ALBANESE: Absolutely. The Federal Government don't seem to recognise that a plan that doesn't pork barrel and allocate things with a colour-coded marginal seat chart, but goes to everyone, is a good idea. That's probably why they're alien to it. But this is put forward constructively. And for goodness sake, Leon. We saw billions of dollars go to companies that were profitable, that increased their profits through JobKeeper. And here we have a modest proposal that will provide $300 in the pockets of your listeners who get fully vaccinated. And guess what? They'll spend it. They'll spend it in their local small businesses. They'll spend it in their local communities. And it will help economic stimulus at a time where we know the lockdowns, when South Australia joined Victoria and parts of New South Wales in a lockdown, that was costing $2 billion a week. It's now costing almost that for the parts of New South Wales and southeast Queensland that are locked down to our economy. And we know that the key to getting back to life as usual is the rollout of the vaccine and the quarantine. Now, the Government has stuffed up both. But we need to look forward and look forward in a positive way. I've put forward this positive idea. And I'm just stunned that without even examining it, without looking at it in any detail, asking for advice from their departments, they just come out with this knee jerk opposition. Well, they did the same thing when we put forward wage subsidies. And only when the queues formed outside Centrelink offices did they adopt JobKeeper.

BYNER: Now look, there's a story running around the media suggesting frequent flyer points and vouchers are being considered. Would you back that?

ALBANESE: I back any incentive that's there. But let me tell you, if you want to have an impact, and what I want is for people at the Modbury Bowling Club to be discussing, 'Have you got your 300 bucks?' 'No, not yet, but I'm getting vaccinated next week'. I want those discussions to take place. And if you want something really simple, then a $300 payment to every Australian who gets themselves fully vaccinated is an effective way that gave consideration to how you provide incentives. The advice is that this would be an effective way forward. And I just hope that the Government don't continue with the negative attitude that they have here.

BYNER: Speaking of which, the Chief Health Minister in Queensland, Jeannette Young, has been criticised for undermining AstraZeneca. Do you kind of get that this sort of rhetoric doesn't help you improve the vaccination rates? Because after all, it was used to vaccinate a fair chunk of the globe and helped reopen the UK.

ALBANESE: Well, I support people being vaccinated with whatever vaccine is available, subject, of course, to their doctor's advice. I'm not a doctor. People spend a long time studying to do that, and they should do it. So I want people to get vaccinated with either AstraZeneca or Pfizer. Unfortunately, we don't have more vaccines like in other parts of the world. The big handbrake, of course, was the Prime Minister did a press conference late at night. I don't know why he didn't wait for the next day. But when Australian saw an urgent press conference after the TV news, so it was broken into whatever program they were watching on TV that night, with the changed advice from ATAGI, obviously, that had a major impact as well.

BYNER: What's your take on the fact that, this has only just recently been announced, Qantas have stood down 2,500 workers for a couple of months? Do you want the airline to guarantee there'll be no job losses?

ALBANESE: I certainly don't want to see job losses. And workers are doing it really tough. I probably have more Qantas employees in my electorate than any electorate in Australia. And I have seen the impact there that it has had, these stand downs last year. And it's a tragedy that we have another 2,500 stand downs. They will be covered by the disaster payment. In terms of that, that's available. But they'll be doing it tough today. But while we've stuffed up the rollout of the vaccine, we are last in the developed world, Leon, and we're not in the top 80 of countries in the world, we are doing really tough and we still, of course, don't have purpose-built quarantine facilities. And the latest outbreak in southeast Queensland is again a failure of hotel quarantine. And I note our sporting teams are coming back. Guess where they're going? Howard Springs. Purpose-built quarantine facilities to keep them safe. Why don't we have them around the country? This is just stubbornness on behalf of a Government that had two jobs this year. They failed on both of them. They need to change strategy. They need to listen to people, listen to the advice, get purpose-built quarantine and adopt every way possible to increase the rollout of the vaccine.

BYNER: Is that going to be a promise you're taking to the election that you'll build these facilities?

ALBANESE: Absolutely. And it was in my Budget Reply in May. The facility that was put forward that I've visited at Wellcamp in Queensland, just next to Toowoomba Airport, was put forward last October. Last October. We're now in August of 2021. And we've had no advance on the things. I mean, state governments, including the South Australian Government, have made tough decisions that are right decisions to protect their communities. They've been supported, the South Australian Government, has been supported by Peter Malinauskas, the Opposition Leader, working together. That's what people want to see. But we're going to continue to have problems while we don't fix these two issues.

BYNER: Anthony, thanks for coming on.

ALBANESE: Thanks very much, Leon. 

BYNER: Pleasure. That's the Federal Opposition Leader, Anthony Albanese.

ENDS