CHRIS BATH, HOST: Prime Minister, good afternoon.
 
PRIME MINISTER: Good afternoon, Chris. Good to be with you.
 
CHRIS BATH: You've been in Melbourne today, but we're a Sydney radio station, so I'd love to talk about Sydney first. I want to talk about -
 
PRIME MINISTER: Well, I have been in Melbourne and Burnie. So, it's a bit like that song, “I've Been Everywhere, man” when a campaign is on.
 
CHRIS BATH: Well, you kind of have been for the past six days or so, haven't you. So, in Sydney, how are you going to maintain safe Labor seats in Sydney where a lot of people are really struggling with the cost of living and a lot of those seats look like they might be in play?
 
PRIME MINISTER: Well, we will be campaigning very hard in Western Sydney and indeed right throughout Sydney in areas like Bennelong, where the fantastic Jerome Laxale got elected last time, Sally Sitou next to me in Reid, these people who won their seats, Andrew Charlton in Parramatta, we’ll be campaigning very hard. And today, of course, we've announced that we will put forward to the Fair Work Commission a submission that says that wages of low paid workers, those people on the minimum wage, or on award wage, there's 3 million of them, they should get a real wage increase in an economically sustainable way. And we'll put that submission in, we already are doing that. We will back it up as a government submission if we're elected because it's due to hand down in June. There's been real wage increases in the minimum wage for the last three years as a direct result of the submissions that my Government has put in. We've reversed, real wages were going backwards five quarters in a row before we came to office, now they've gone forwards five quarters in a row. And of course, those same people will get a tax cut topping up the tax cut that we put in place in the current financial year. So, to be $2,500 better off.
 
CHRIS BATH: Prime Minister, though this wage increase that you're talking about in real terms, if it's accepted by the Fair Work Commission, ends up being about 60 cents a week, is my understanding?
 
PRIME MINISTER: Well, 60 cents a week is the inflation rate. We want a real - an hour, not a week, importantly. And people don't work one hour. So, it is important going forward. Remember during the last election campaign, Chris, me holding up a $1 coin consistently, I was asked during the election campaign, indeed, by the ABC's Tom Lowrey, would we support the Fair Work Commission if they decided to maintain real wages? And I said yes, absolutely. And the Coalition at the time, the Morrison Government, said the sky would fall in and that it was a mistake. Well, it went ahead. They not only got the dollar, they got a bit more than that. And then the year after, and then the year after that. We have seen the minimum wage increase by $143 a week under my Government's watch this term, in the last three years. Certainly, nothing like 60 cents a week. And that has made a difference. We know that low-income earners are doing it tough, but that's why we changed the tax cuts as well, so, that they got a tax cut -
 
CHRIS BATH: Well, not for a year, Prime Minister.
 
PRIME MINISTER: No, that's not right. They've got it in their pockets right now. They were due to get exactly zero. We intervened. This time last year we changed the tax cuts so that those under $45,000 a year did get a tax cut. And those average workers earning an average wage of around about $75,000 got more in terms of their tax cuts. Indeed, 83% of Australians got more tax cuts, and that was taken off the top in order to -
 
CHRIS BATH: Sorry, Prime Minister, I thought you were talking about this new tax cut announced in the Budget.
 
PRIME MINISTER: The new one is a top up of that where there'll be not one, but two, additional tax cuts making a difference of $2,500 a year to an average worker. And that does make an enormous difference. We want people to earn more, but we also want people to keep more of what they earn. So, it's that combination of lower taxes, higher wages. Peter Dutton is calling for lower wages and higher taxes. They'll say not only did they vote against our tax cuts, they will introduce legislation to increase the income tax of all 14 million Australians.
 
CHRIS BATH: Prime Minister, we saw Mr Dutton visit Fowler. We've seen him putting in some hard yards in a couple of multicultural electorates here in Sydney. Are you confident the Chinese Australian electorate will support Labor this Federal Election?
 
PRIME MINISTER: I am. Well, he's got a bit of make up making up to do, doesn't he? I mean, this is someone who, in a choice between vision and division, always goes for division. And the communities know that. You can't your whole life, your whole political career, seek division and try to turn Australians against each other and then turn up at election time and pretend you're a great supporter of multiculturalism. This is a guy who has made a career out of being divisive.
 
CHRIS BATH: We are expecting an announcement from President Trump, we think, at around 7am our time tomorrow about tariffs. If tariffs are imposed, how are you going to help businesses and farmers in Australia who may be affected? We had a beef producer earlier on in the program who's very worried about the impact of reciprocal tariffs and what that potentially could mean for beef prices here in Australia because so many of our abattoirs now are foreign owned.
 
PRIME MINISTER: Indeed. Well, we are prepared for it. Of course, it doesn't make a difference to prices here in Australia. What it does is increase prices for American consumers. That's why tariffs are an act of economic self-harm. But we have been working hard on a range of measures to prepare if there is a negative result. We'll wait and see if President Trump pursues his position, which is to punish essentially the imports that the United States has from all over the world, like he did with steel and aluminium. That hasn't resulted in any change of purchases of our steel or our aluminium, because you can't change the production rates in the United States instantly. All it means is that our goods are more expensive like other goods right around the world, and that is punishing US consumers. One of the reasons why we launched, as part of our Budget strategy, as well, is our Buy Australian Campaign. We want to strengthen local content requirements, government procurement practices. We want to encourage more Australians to buy Australian at the checkout. But what we won't do, what we won't do, or even negotiate over is damaging our biosecurity rules that are so important for our primary producers. What we won't do is give up our Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme or give up our Media Bargaining Code and other things that make us Australian.
 
CHRIS BATH: Prime Minister, sorry, we've heard that you're preparing to take the US to the World Trade Organisation if Australia is swept up in these Liberation Day tariffs. Could there potentially be security implications if we pick a fight with President Trump over this?
 
PRIME MINISTER: Well, we're not picking a fight with anyone. What we're doing is supporting our US Free Trade Agreement that says that goods and services between our two nations should be tariff free. That's what we're doing, supporting our agreement, holding to our word, standing up for Australia's national interest, and calling for the United States not only to stand up for that agreement, but to stand up for their own interests as well.
 
CHRIS BATH: Are you going to go to the World Trade Organisation?
 
PRIME MINISTER: Look, I'm not pre-empting the decision and announcement that may be made at 7am tomorrow. We've seen some level of unpredictability in the decision-making process in the United States. We'll await that decision and then we'll have a calm, considered, calibrated response which is in Australia's national interest.
 
CHRIS BATH: Prime Minister, thank you very much for calling in. Lovely to chat.
 
PRIME MINISTER: Thank you so much, Chris. Have a great day.
 
CHRIS BATH: You too.

ENDS