From the Skying Center. This is Paul Murray Live. Oh you wait, Oh you wait. We're going to Cannsa this weekend. Do I do it in the man caved or do it in cans Something will happen. Thank you so much for watching, Thank you Caleb, and thank you for joining us tonight. There is a lot to get to, but of course let's start off with a focus of what is happening in and around the mid north coast of New South Wales. Thousands of people still nowhere near their homes.
Huge issues that are happening there in and around the floods. Thankfully, in and around some of the areas we were talking about last night. The water is starting to subside, excellent, but the rain that's been pounding away is continuing to move. This time it's starting to move a little bit to south the next couple of days. Really again more communities having to deal with things, let alone everyone who is
dealing with what they are right now. So as you can see the areas that are affected, Coughs, Harbor, Kempsey, Mount Seaview, Port Macquarie, tare little places like war Hope, William Town, in and around Newcastle. To give you an idea again Mount Seaview. This is a place where I think I went on I did. I went on school
camps there any decades ago. That is six hundred and sixty two millimeters that they have copped in the past of the while beautiful Port Macquarie four hundred and sixteen Carrey's Peak six hundred and fourteen, basically a month's worth of rain in the best part of twenty four hours. Now, sadly, we have had reports and confirmation not just to people missing, but of people who have lost their lives. Here is the latest on those.
So so far we.
Have recovered three bodies by emergency service as a result of the plot operation, while the.
Search for a man missing in Nimbo the year is.
Continuing bloody, awful and sadly, given that some homes are unavailable to be inspected, we hope that that number does not increase. But until the water subsides everyone able to go back, we're able to check that everyone's safe. Then our fear is that these things get much much worse. Strength and love, of course to all of the families who are deeply disrupted. The expectation from the sees. So when we were talking to them last night was get ready for a few days in and around some of
the emergency accommodation. About five thousand and nine hundred evacuation orders currently are all over different parts of the Mid North Coast and in and around New South Wales. There are ten six hundred people who are currently under the emergency warnings. As for the key locations, and again it's lots of places. If you're watching us on sky News Regional, listening to us via the apps, places like Manning, Gloucester, the Hastings and Maclay River, you've known that for the
past couple of days. Prepare to isolate. That is the message that is coming from government officials about Tarre, Gloucester and Wingham. Wingham, of course not too far from Tarre evacuate now settlement Point again not too far from Port mcquarie, kemc Smithtown and the Nambuca region, specifically in and around Maxville. Anyone who remembers a drive through there knows the post office on Maxwell that you can see from the highway. Yep,
that's exactly the area that we are talking about. There's more detail, much more specific at hazard watch dot gov dot AU. That's a federal government site that also feeds through to the state government information. If you need help, please write the number down one three to five hundred if you need the sees there's lots of people doing lots of work everywhere, and please Triple zero is for
scenarios where someone's life is in danger. So if it's about flooding and things to do with your house and a need for a tarp or all of that, one three, two, five hundred, if someone's life is in danger, that's the only time to be calling triple O. Here are some of the people that have been dealing with the worst of weather of the past couple of days.
Spratt, but I feel sorry for everybody is.
The sheer amount of local rain has just inundated all of the towns, all of our storm water, and there's currently nowhere for that water to go.
Not interested in empty big promises of emergency declarations and then nothing happens. So we need people on the ground. And that's all the way through from obviously rescuing people through to making sure that people have accommodation and then food and clean water to drink.
Yeah, that is the case. Of course, it's not just people in those evacuations centers, but trying to move from those evacuations centers somewhere, but the roads cut in lots of different ways and lots of different places, meaning that it is very difficult to be able to get somewhere, to be able to find a place to put your head down, or more importantly the rest of the family, kids, grandkids, Strength and love to everyone who's dealing with this. This
is not just pictures on the TV. This, of course real life and real matters of life and death, and also huge amounts of trauma that are going to be playing out over the next few days. That's why at the start of the show, I'm trying to do the breaking news information only stuff. We're getting too opinion, politics, and the rest of the days other things in a
couple of moments time. As for the actual path of the weather here, the great thing about being at sky News is that, of course we have sky News Weather twenty four to seven, and you can see that on Foxtell Flash, or you can see it many times on sky News Regional. You can also get all the information at sky news dot com dot au a team at the Weather Channel. The latest for you is this.
Over the next six hours, we're still looking at the potential for rainfall totals in this area between sixty and one hundred millimeters after midnight. This is forecast to ease pulling southwards on Friday, though the risk shifts towards parts of the central Coast, the Blue Mountains, the Illawarra, and then down towards the ranges of the south coast. Twenty four hour totals here could exceed one hundred to one hundred and fifty millimeters.
Now again, lots of people watching us on Sky News Regional to the south of Sydney. When you have a look at areas like Bateman's Bay that we did in our town show just a couple of months at remember part of that story was five years ago. When it comes to fires, lots of little places in the rumor, you name it, All of those places Sussex in all of those places are going to be part of the
ongoing front of the next few days. I've got to say, I don't you know, I'm in total admiration about how emergency services deal with things as they are happening, as well as try to get ahead of themselves. But the job of what has just happened a couple of days ago and is still happening in and around tai Well, that of course would be many, many weeks of work that needs to be done, let alone as that all
starts to move around. I also want to say thank you to so many people who are so loyal to what we do here and who have been so kind to our reporters, our camera crews, and all of our producers in the newsroom. Because you trust us to tell your story, We've been able to tell stories in ways that others haven't who may just be rolling into town. Thank you so much to the emergency services people who have helped our reporters and camera crews get from one
side of a river to another. Thank you to people that have lent boats. And again, thank you to people who are telling their stories. You know that it's not just about these days, but it's about the recovery, and once the emergency part of this starts to move we're going to keep on the conversation as we did with Liz Moore, as we have when it came to the potential of what was going to happen with the tropical cyclone and extropical cyclone Alfred. Well, there's questions around things
like insurance, all of that. We will talk about it on this show. If you've got concerns, if you've got issues, send me emails. Obviously we're not an emergency service, but if we can yell at someone on your behalf happy to do it. All right, Paul, It's gonews dot com dot au. The premiere of New South Wales is Chris Mins. Fresh from dealing with the natural disasters that he's had to deal with in his two years as being premier, he is saying this tonight.
It's really incumbent upon you to listen to emergency services to make sure that you're making decisions in the best interest of your family and your community.
All right. The Assistant Commissioner of the SEES in New South Wels is Colin Malone. Let's get back to talking to him.
Colin.
Where is the focus particularly tonight?
Good evening, Paul, and good evening to all the viewers. The focus tonight continues from Kempsey all the way down and as you reported earlier, we're seeing the weather system move in through metropolitan Sydney and it'll move down the
South coast overnight. O advice from the Bureau is it's going to move a bit quicker as it gets through the night, and what we will see down on the metropolitan Sydney and the South Coast, we won't see that lingering rain that hung around for a long time, so it should move through there within the twenty four hour period, hopefully not causing the same level of problems we had up on the mid North Coast. But as you mentioned, we're not out of the woods up in the Kempsey
down to that Dungog area. We've still got quite a bit of water around. We've still got people out of their houses, so we're going to be with them for the long haul as we move into the recovery side of the activity.
Yeah, we're deliberately putting the map up so people are able to obviously work out where they are, work out where family and friends are as well. So Colin, again, the messaging that you're getting from the Bureau of Meteorology is yet a lot of rain. There certainly was a lot of rain in and around Sydney today, a little bit more intensity as you say, starting to move south, but the expectation is not going to be like a
month's worth of rain in one day. Heavy falls in lots of different places, or is the expectation that what dropped on Taree now moves down the coast or does it weaken as it moves down the coast.
The advice where you have from the Bureau just before I come into this hookup was that it is not going to be like what we've had up in the Tari area. It will definitely have some heavy rain and
it's going to be quite widespread. But as it gets to the weekend, we should see that going out to sea off the south coast, and that will allow us to continue to watch those rivers go down, because, as you mentioned, particularly in those areas are still well flooded, and all the viewers know that they're living in that area with the highway shut, it's going to take a few days for that to reced properly and for us to be able to properly get in there and do
all the right assessments and help with get ready as we lead into that recovery effort. Now we're already providing all of our information we have to the other agencies and we'll work together.
Now, Colin, believe me, every word you have to say way more important than anything I'm going to say for the next hour, So apologies for interrupting. Now we know that say in relation to the lis More floods of a couple of years ago, was that one of the problems people start to talk about is once you're able to get home, or after the waters have receded that you thought were coming towards your house, these sorts of
things that the power is not going to come back on. Now, there's lots of reasons for that, but also there's a need for electricians to almost check literally every plug in the house to make sure it's okay. Then you do that house to house, then you go straight to street, then we go suburb to suburb. In the Queensland scenario, they literally are the Energet's company. There was giving absolute details street by street and house by house. That's the
way they do it in Queensland. Give us an idea for those that are on the fringe of it or it goes past how do they check the information about things like electricity and how and is part of what the SEES does to have a bunch of electricians as part of your movement who can help supplement some of that emergency checking.
Yeah, so to some initial advice for your your viewers and listeners is on the SES website for those that can get onto the websites at the moment. We do have a range of guides of what to do before, during, and after flooding. So you're talking one hundred percent about what to do after flooding, and there's some checklists and
guides on things that residents can do themselves. As far as we will work hand in glove with the reconstruction authority and they will lead the reconstructions effort, but we don't stop getting involved the moment that that starts happening. It's a partnership by all the government agencies, so our members and the emergency responders will still be there, working hand in glove to do our best to get people back into their homes as quick as possible. You're right,
utilities are a critical thing. The last thing we want is someone going in and just switching the power on and then because everything's wet, they end up getting electrocuted. There's also gas and the restarting of gas mains and the restarting of gas pilot lights and all of those sort of things really need to be done in.
A control way.
So for a lot of those areas.
We're a little while off that.
And when I say a little while, we're a few days until the water is properly receded and all clears are given. Right now, at this point in time, there's still forty humanity warnings in place for different communities that are under evacuation guidance, and we need them to not be rushing back to their places until the proper clearance is given to go back in. And that's for their safety.
I know they want to get home, they want to make sure their property is okay, and they want to check on things, but we want to do it in a way that doesn't result in them feeling they need to get to their home and perhaps driving through some floodwater to get there and then causing another flood rescue. So we want people to be safe. That's at the heart of our mission.
Yeah, and this is the thing where look, I get it. Everyone's tired. You want to get back to working out how to start to pivot towards normal. But again remember, particularly with the SEES, volunteers are there to help, the organization is there to help, and to understand they are moving as fast as humanly possible, and again, in a scenario that has already taken life, let's make sure that
those numbers are as low as possible. All right, I know you've got plenty of other commitments to be across, but really, thank you so much, Colin, and thank you to our team who've just turned this around here too, which is part of the stuff you can see on the SEES website right now SEES dot NSW, dot gov
dot Au. Also, again, if you're somebody just watching from a little further away, you're not involved in the emergency part of all of this, then again I'll point you in the direction of things like hazard watch dot gov dot au where you can look from afar, study the maps, all the rest of it. And if that takes a little pressure off a website, good and fine and fair enough.
One final time, one three two five hundred one three two five hundred Colin, Thank you mate, Thank you to all of the volunteers and the professional staff of course at the SEES and the wider emergency movement. We really appreciate what you're doing, mate.
Thank you, Paul and all your viewers. Have an amazing night and stay safe.
Good man. Thank you so much. There is really appreciate it, Colin, because you know these moments and I get it right. When you're on the fringe of things, you go hang on. You know, I'm on the fringe of things. There's a reason why you can't go back just yet. Expectation is if you try to set yourself up for a marathon, and nobody knows how long that marathon's going to be.
But if you set the expectation of a multi day marathon, then it does take not some of the stress, but it does help with your way of navigating, say the expectations of the kids, or some of the heightened emotions. But again, to any and everyone who is helping, Thank you to any and everyone who is suffering. Strength and love from all of us here at sky News and obviously myself in particular. If there's any more news, I'll tell you about it the second you need to know.
Make sure your homepage skynews dot com dot A. All right, politics, Well that was quick. A couple of day breakup, thankfully the trial separation. Mom and dad decided nap, probably let's find a way to get back together. Good, excellent, fantastic. A little later, we're gonna have a chat to Kevin Hogan,
who's the deput leader of the Nationals. And I've got to say what I've enjoyed about talking to say David Little proud of the leader or the former leader, and Michael McCormick all looking forward to with Kevin straight shooters. Great thing about talking to a National Party person. This is all about four things, four things that I think are pretty obviously going to be beyond sticking points now
and they will be sorted out. It means that everyone's holding off and there's no need to rush to name shadow ministries. Parliament's not back until towards the back end of July, so there is some time to go through it. But thankfully what seemed just a couple of days ago as the course apart is now starting to chart back together. Good to see. But yet again, and you note this right because we talked to National Party MPs on the
telly all the time. We talk to One Nation people on the telly all the time, to most of the people who work professionally in the press gallery in Cameron and there are obviously some wonderful exceptions, including my colleagues here at skyte News, but you know these are people who Radio National act bubble kind of people, and they don't get the Nats, and they certainly don't understand some of the things that have been behind the events of
the past few days. And I just wanted to show you, just like we did during the federal election campaign, how the media interact with people like David Little Proud. Now there's also a strange little phenomena, and I again like to tell you how the sausage is made. Sometimes not pretty, but it's good to know. Is that, as you know, the press gallery in Camp the physical part of the building. It's part of Parliament House. It's not too far from where the Senate is. It's a couple of levels up.
That's where all the TV studios and all the radio studios are now generally speaking, Say, if David Little Proud is doing an interview with Laura Jays in the morning here at Sky News, he obviously physically goes into that building,
walks out, goes back to his office. But for some reason, this thing has built up over the past many years that rather than just listening to what happened in the interview that was planned, they all basically ambush the person as soon as they walk out of another organization's studio, which is why you often see nonsense like this like we saw today in the corridors of the press gallery.
Do you need firm commitments do.
This in the first place, rather than rush and give it time?
How you prepared to wait though? How much I'm to the Liberals Nation dotate to that process?
Is it too early to say we're going to keep we're not going to get back together?
It gets to know, yes, yes, yes we can, because I can trust Susan.
The thing is, all of those questions had been asked in the interview that inevitably he had done with the ABC or Channel seven or anything else. But we live in this very weird media culture where rather than just going okay, they're doing an interview on ABC Radio, they ask all the questions. Is it because they don't want to show anything of a logo that's not their own? We have to do the same thing over and over and over again, and it makes it all look way
more chaotic. And then there are people who of course make it all about themselves.
What exactly take a question?
I feel like a lot of blokes that have been asking.
Questions, what does that have to do with anything like. Literally it is every media organization in the country all yelling at once. Oh but the gender parts all part of it. Yes, the special angle over there on Channel two fedding anyway, like it's always about them, always about them. And because I pointed out, oh well, I cop it in the neck. Don't care. All right, Let's talk now
about how people are standing up for their communities. Like the new Queensland premiere David cruci Foley had is fed under the desk for a few months, has already put in the adult crime adult time jail laws, particularly for
youth offending or obviously about youth offending. They've now done a couple of amendments without adding more offenses, where somebody that's found guilty of something like a sexual assault will end up serving adult time rather than just basically the version of criminal TAFE, which has been the criminal justice system for young offenders certainly all over the country, but specifically in Queensland under that Labor rule for some period
of time. Well, the United Nations does not like this policy, is SBS telling us two.
Human rights experts calling the laws incompatible with basic child rights, saying it would have an especially negative impact on the lives of Indigenous children who are already disproportionately represented in the criminal legal system.
Well, David Crucifoli when asked about it today, when you know what, thank you so much, wind back, bang over the fence for six.
Here's my message to the United Nations. You don't control me, and I don't answer to you. I answer to Queenslanders, answer to a whole heap of those people back there who've had their lives turned apart.
Good on him. Reminds me of the Chief Minister of the Northern Territory Leo Fanukiaro. Remember when she was talking about all those protesters to bug off back to Melbourne. These are people who are trying to do something for their communities. Because the consequences of youth crime are deeply,
deeply significant. People die in these scenarios. And as I told you before, you know, in the entire youth justice system, about forty thousand people are interacted with police, only about twenty thousand end up going to court and less than a thousand end up going to jail. So laws are needed to be changed to change the choices that are so often the wrong ones. When it comes to the judges dealing with this stuff in places like Queensland. Now,
one last thing about the Victorian budget. But relax, it's not what you think. Obviously, this is not in an endorsement in any way, shape or form of people who speed or drink driving or drug driving or any other rest of it. But of course thousands of people get pulled over each and every year. Thousands people have to
pay a fine each and every year. Now, I don't understand how anyone can predict how many peopeople are going to break the law next year, but apparently that is the case because when you have a look at the Victorian budget put together, of course insitue with the Premier and the Treasurer. You're able to go and if you look deep enough you can find some answers like this. This is from budget pay per number five. I don't know magically how this year they're going to get eight
hundred and fifty seven million dollars worth of fines. That will go up next year, They will go up the year after that, and they'll be getting a billion dollars worth of fines in just a couple of years time. Now the population will not be growing by those huge amounts, but for some reason, they know exactly how many people
are going to break the law. And thank goodness for the way they account for this in the Victorian budget, because have a look at this, they actually predict how much money they will make out of safety camera fines
on the spot finds or toll evasion fines. Nowical, magically, the last budget, which was three hundred and twenty nine million dollars for fixed speed cameras, will now become half a billion, and that half a billion will eventually become three quarters of a billion dollars in just three years time. On the spot finds basically stable, but still about one hundred and fifty million each and every year. How do they know how many people are going to break the law?
Why will there be some outbreak of speeding in the next little while? God forbid if you suggested that any of that meant that there was a quota. Now all of this revenue is revenue that means people broke the law. Maybe he was entrapped into this stuff. People broke the law. But how can you predict how many will break it next year? And how do you assume more of the year. How do you not assume that the safety measures you put in place this year, will bring it down next
year again, revenue raising or safety. You be the judge. All right, Back to the situation involving the Nationals. Their deputy leader is Kevin Hogan. Had the opportunity to have a chat with him a little bit earlier tonight about the situation that has been unfolding in and around all of this, and I put simply asked him that it looks like the couple might be getting back together. The door, ever so slightly has been reopened.
Well, it is a good thing, Paul, and I'm very helpful there. It's a sort of a silver lining that might you know, array of sunshine, which may mean something might happen. So what's happened, obviously is today is Susan Lee has written to David little Proud and said could you pause the transition because obviously we had meetings today with people that we wanted to be spokespeople for us as a stand alone party. But she said, can you pause.
I'm pausing my shadow cabinet appointments because I want to take to my party room, as in the Liberal party room, the four policies that you want a commitment to. So that's great because obviously this time last week, last Friday, reminding everyone Paul that we went to Susan and said, we've just had a party room meeting. What you've proposed by wiping those policies means we will be out of the coalition if we don't get more movement on those
four policies. So that was what our party room decided last Friday, and then obviously things happened between then and Friday and then Tuesday when they couldn't move. So the fact she's taking this to the party room hopefully as a pot of positive signal, that would I guess the movement on those four policies.
So if it is those four policies now again we heard and again whether it's people seeing those smoke signals that of course come through the world of Canberra via the people who report on it, which was, oh hang on, no, you're outside of those four ned zero, outside of those four shadow cabinet solidarity. But put simply as a person in the driver's seat in the negotiations with David and Bridget as well on the behalf of the National Party,
there are only four items on the agenda. There's no secret fifth or sixth or seventh about free wheeling from a national MP if they become a shadow minister.
Paul.
There were four non negotiables. I mean, and usually these things are done in confidence and you do them privately with the person negotiating with, not on television for the whole of Australia. But there are a lot of things in the document, you know, I've heard stories about. It was about just in an image of a price as well. There were only four non negotiables. Everything else that was up for discussion. Some of them were just up to see,
you know, where do you feel about this? What do you feel about this?
One?
Auak with this just discussion points. But the four non negotiables were those four policy positions and why were they non negotiable?
Paul?
Is there really important for us as nationals, as regional MPs. I don't want to pre prosecute them, but just say take one of them. The Regional Australia Future files, the Region Australia Future Farm took us five or six years been working on that. The vestige is important for us. We have farmers who we think get screwed over by the big supermarkets. We've been trying for years to get
those policies through. We got them through, so we got them through the coalition party process in the last parliament. We don't want to lose them. If we lose them, we may never see them again. Really important for our communities and we wanted them as part of the deal.
It doesn't seem like those four things are that hard to work out, and certainly when you were talking about something as fundamental as the team together going forward, right because again that big question that again people talk about that people say on the side net zero nuclear right now, there's a way to negotiate a midway point on nuclear, which is to say, well, we all agree we should
get rid of the moratorium. Right that may be where things land, but in terms of the climate change stuff, because again there'll be people watching us in regional Australia right now who thought this week halleluj. Yeah, finally somebody that's it. They're going to take the hard line of sort of pre twenty twenty on this. But that's not one of the four We need to We need everyone to know that's not one of the four sticking points, is it? No, it's not.
I mean, and the only thing related to that, if you like was the nuclear So when we drank the net zero twenty fifty kool aid, if you like, we straightaway, as Nat said, well we've got to start.
Talking about nuclear.
You can't get to where you want to go without that story. And of course the renewal was that there you know, we won't really prosecute the reckless renewable policy of labor and all the transmission lines and all the things happened in Regional Australia. But we said, well you've got to talk about nuclear. So all we wanted the commitment from with you know, within this agreement was at.
Least agree to lift the moratorium.
We have to talk about where they go and who's funding it and at least be agnostic technologically. But you've got to lift the moratoriy on that. So that was the only ask in relation to that issue. But Paul, you know, this was you know, again as a regional MP, to go back to the regions rade future fun. This is about better childcare facilities, better health facilities, better infrastructure. You know, we worked to have we're going to fund
it within the budget. You know, I couldn't look like community and I and say oh look we signed a coalition agreement. They wouldn't sign up to it, So that's gone for the and may never come back. I good conscience couldn't do that. The twenty MP's in the room couldn't do that. I believe maybe they didn't realize that we were serious. I think maybe they thought we're going to blink. It was a negotiation tactic last Friday. It
wasn't negotiation. It wasn't a tactic. We were all prepared to take pay cuts, We were all prepared to lose resources because of the principle that those for policies are really important to us.
And again, I mean, it's a budgetary commitment, but the reality of three years and returning that again, to me, it feels like these are all quite quite solvable problems, and it seems like we are beginning a process of being on the way to it. But also, you know, I love listening to the lefty media tourney. Wow, this future fun is just a slush fun for the National Party.
Do this, that and the other. Now, hang on, here's the deal, Like, look at what happens in a place like Victoria, where regional Victoria, you know, you drive on the roads you know, in and around Swan Hill, and there are more potholes than there are bits of bitumen to actually drive on at times. Right, that's because all the decisions are made centrally in Melbourne. The assumption is the further away from Melbourne, the less life likely it is to have a labor MP, therefore no need to
take care of them. The reason that fund is so important is because the distances where National Party MPs are to the major cities where the state governments are means that there's basically at times a much closer relationship between
the expectations of federal politics and local politics. And we know that local councils are particularly grossly underfunded, which means yes, you should have a line in the sand about a certain amount of money to make sure that the things that city people take for granted are the starting point of a coalition government. I'm fully in support of that.
And Paul, I'll also remind all your listeners too how it was going to be funded. It was going to be funded by a boost in terms of trader when terms of trade were better than budgeted. Now we sell four things that make up four hundred billion dollars worth of the six hundred and fifty billion dollars we sell overseas every year and those four things are coal, gas, iron, ore and food agg Now those four things are four hundred billion bucks of six hundred and fifty b and
we sell overseas every year. Guess where those four things all come from. Regional Australia. Regional Australia is funding our lifestyle. The royalties, the wages, the company tax paid by those big companies that do those four things are literally funding our way of life. And that was out of when I said when terms of trade were better than budgeted, that's how we were going to build the fund dividend
every year, all budgeted for. And when you're literally creating the wealth of the country, you deserve some of the some of the throws from it in good facilities, good infrastructure.
Bloody earth. It has been a bumpy week, but thankfully some sanity towards the end of it, and certainly it is good for the center right of Australian politics. I do love talking and that's on the TV Straight Shooters. It's great, just as our next guests will be as well, none other than Michael Kroger James Ashby. As straight as they get when it comes to firing up. We'll get to that in a moment or two. Is time here on Paul Murray Lite. Nice to hang out with mates
on a Thursday night. And here are two of our favorites amongst the Paul Murray Lfe family, none of them the wonderful James Ashby, who is not at home very close to an office the studio this evening. Where are you, my friend, great jacket by the.
Way, Perth. Oh yeah, thanks mate, Perth.
I was very lucky to be able to see the swearing in of our two new MLC's here in Western Australia, so Phil Scott and Rod Caddy's. You can see them as welcomed editions to your shope. Paul, if you want to MLC's for one nation in wa.
Happy to help. Well. Straight after you've done this little hit, I'll tell you what. There's a Jordan not too far from Murray Street. Some of the best dumplings I've ever had. I've seen you that in a second. A man who's going what is all of this rubbish? Is none other than, of course ful Kroger, who's doing it from home tonight. You know, little too cold outside, Bugger but he's still dressed up. He might have the pjs on downstairs, but
he's looking business up stair. It's nice to see you mate, all right, So Michael, how do you feel at the end that thankfully, look a couple of days egg on some people's faces, red faces. But who cares if by Monday we're back where we were last Monday. That's a good thing, right when it comes to the coalition.
Yeah, obviously, Paul, there's some.
Bruising that takes place when this type of you know, frakka takes place, So things will take quite a while.
We'll settle around.
To be honest, there's been a lot of meter interviews, a lot of backgrounding, a lot of unhappiness on both sides. So you know the truth is that will take that'll take some months to repair. But look, thank goodness, they're going to get back together. The four policy issues were never the issue, but Susan Lee sort of made it clear that you had to take those things to the
party room. And the big sticking point is we now know was David Little Proud's view that you know, the Nationals wanted the right to or he wanted the right to be able to have National Party MPs, you know, resist shout cabinet and the post shadow cabinet if they didn't feel inclined to follow what they decided. Now certainly quite properly said no. Anyway, that's all in the past. It looks as if they're.
Going to get back together.
And thank goodness, I mean, otherwise, mate, it would have it would have been like Noah's Ark. I mean, you know, two shadow treasurers, two foreign shadows, both people blah blah.
Yeah, it would have been a recipe for disaster.
You know, three cornered contests in every seat, no joint Senate tickets, no joint policies, no joint releases. I mean, it's it's untenable, all right.
And as John Howard and.
Tony Abott correctly said, the Liberals and the Nationals work best together when they're in coalition federally, and that's the way it should be. And thank goodness, sense is going to provail made James.
If nothing else. It means perhaps in three years time they're back on the same ticket and a little bit of that quota. If they don't get it, it may well go back in the direction of one nation, which does seem to be what's happening in terms of preferences, but more practically this week, what have you thought of watching on as people who just a few weeks ago wanted to be a government couldn't work out of how they would be in opposition.
Look, if they're only getting back together again for the kid's sake, it's probably the wrong approach and they're going to have some issues moving forward because you know, Mum.
And Dad have still got their differences.
And we're talking about the National Party here rightfully putting their foot down and saying we want and demand more respect as a party. We've seen for too long the National Party just treated as the accessory to the Liberal Party, the Robin to Batman or you know, the shadow in the dark. And this is the problem for the Nats. They're try and they're trying to say to the Liberal Party stop taking us for granted. But there are deep seated problems within both camps and I don't think the
trust is going to be returned easily here. I've spoken to Liberal Party members just as soon as the election finished who had great concerns over the fact that Barnaby Joyce says things every time he opens his mouth he loses US Liberals, and Matt Canavan loses US folks every time he opens our mouths. You're hardly going to fix that problem by sort of having this little bit of a row and then kissing and making up within a
week's time. So there are some real problems. And I've heard liberals say our greatest defeat or our greatest achievement was actually getting rid of the Nationals in South Australia, and I just think to myself, that's not the coalition partner i'd want if they're still getting around making those
sorts of statements. So they've got to fix this once and for all, otherwise it will be a breakup again in the future and there'll be leadership spills, there'll be blood to pay or blood spilled off the back of this. So it does need fixing, I agree, But they are stronger as a coalition.
But also there's just just as a little thing about center right of Australian politics, right, and you know, let's you know, I certainly didn't go to union political science and all the rest of it, but basically right, we obviously know team red, team blue, We obviously know the concept of left and right, but Also there's sort of subgroupings underneath all of that, right, So you could be like, like in the Labor Party, literally there's the socialists that
are there, there's all these subgroupings that are there, and in the same when it comes to center right, you could have everything from you know, economic populists to libertarians to you know, you name it. Right, The thing is, Michael, the Labor Party has all of these factions, but they also live under one dome, and no one publicly is throwing each under under the bus or is free wheeling
about what they think the collective should be doing. Is a fundamental design error of the center right that the tent might be broad, but everyone's allowed to walk in and out of it and say whatever they want.
Except Fred Husick.
Correct. Very good points, very good point, And I'm not suggesting hard caucus rules, And I'm just saying, like, if people think that the left of Australian politics is not as fractured as the right is, they need to understand that there are those fractions. They're just a lot more obvious to the right. Yeah.
Look, it's a great question actually, and it goes to a lot of how modern politics works. In Australia today. The Labor Party factions have been there forever. They manage those factions incredibly well.
There is extraordinary.
Discipline amongst the factions. If you cross the factions, that has enormous consequences both for your tenure within the Paratry Party and just as importantly, mate, when you leave parliament. If you've crossed the factions, if you crossed the Palacary Party and you leave Parliament, then there are no jobs for you. You're an outcast. Whereas whereas, whereas on our side it's much more free wielling. We allow people across the floor, we allow them to speak out. It's a
much more free wheeling approach. We have to politics, which has its advantages but also has a tremendous, tremendous number of disadvantages too, because then you look ill disciplined. Whereas the Labor Party got rid of two ministers pretty brutally.
It was in the media for a while.
One of them spoke out, one of them didn't, Which means that when Husick leaves Parliament he's not going to be too popular amongst the rank.
But when Dravis leaves parliament.
He will be looked after with a high report something, so you know that describes the difference between the party. They have much more rigid discipline, and it's because they're far more brutal than we are internally.
Yeah, and this is the thing where look, you know that the openness and the freedom of the design, but modern politics rewards message discipline. It rewards you know, essentially kind of the head of the tree saying which way things are going to go. It's fascinating to watch, all right, James.
The parliamentary calendar has come out, and I know that just like you know, a mechanic in the nineteen eighties, you're waiting for the you know, the Samantha Fox calendar to come out, and you want all the easy to see one, you know, with the monkey dressed up as the mechanic. You want the parliamentary calendar. Now, I don't know whether they send you, you know, sort of like a centerfold of albow leaning leaning over the leading over sea one, the old Street and strip ones. Anyway, Okay, great,
we just had an election. But you can almost count on a couple of hands how many days Parliament will sit this year.
It were normally prior to this government coming to rule, there was about eighteen weeks of parliament. Well the last three years that was reduced down to fifteen weeks, and now we're seeing it reduced even further.
And yes, you're right. The calendar only came out today.
I was texted a copy from the Prime Minister's office and I looked at it and I thought, we're not back for weeks. We're not backed until the twenty second of July, which is what six odd weeks away.
But don't worry.
I have no doubt that the Labor Party are working away behind the scenes trying to set up all that tough legislation that they probably want to get through in the first six months so that people forget about it in the last two two and a half years of the term. But yeah, it is a surprise. There's a big gap. And I heard the explanation is so that Albo can do some more overseas trips.
Paul, Oh, what a surprise. You know, of course you see this is but again, but this is the stuff, right, yep, big win, big win, no questions, right, But what is the problem with the big win? A little bit of hubris starts to kick in, right, So they've taken the message Michael inside. You know the DNA of the Labor Party, all that stuff that we've been talking about here, that's all garbage. Cost of living. We nailed that, we you know,
Airbus Olbow and nobody cared. You know, take your pick, take your pick, take your pick, but this stuff will come back to bite you on the barm.
Yeh. Yeah, it's a long break actually, Paul.
Now that I mentioned and now that James mentions that he might be doing some overseas trips, but I hope he's going to the White House.
Yes, wouldn't that be nice? Well, of course, you know.
Yes, addressing like all these other leaders.
Imagine that. Yeah, but you sorta he did the South African president and I imagine it's like albout So while you're here, all right, I'm going to take a quick break. We will resume with that point straight after the break ken. You know, what are you thinking any time? Paul at skynishes dot com dot A you looking forward to Cairns this Sunday as we go around the country with our town thanks to our mates at having them, we'll get to a winner and loser of the week in a moment
or two. Is time you can always check it out on the socials if you'd like to people with that honor. This evening will be James Ashby, of course from One Nation, and Michael Kroger of the Liberal Flock. I did cut you off. There was a little point you were going to make there, Michael. I will give you the moment to talk about it now with more overseas elbow.
Well, I was just going to say, when he gets to the White House and he's sitting there, Trump might he goes on with the pleasantries. You know that his stick now is to have pleasantries for a couple of minutes. You're a good blike I'm a good blake. We love each other, the countryes are great friends. And then he gets into what he really wants to talk about, which we saw yesterday with the porl South African president. You might say, well, you won the election. That's great. It
seems like you don't particularly like America. You said you didn't want the Australian health system too like the American health system.
Your people attacked.
A Liberal National Party she want Liberal National Party front bencher for saying she wants to make Australia great again. You whispered that Dutton was too close to Trump. You know, you basically won your election partly by banging me, and I see your ambassador sitting here.
Mister Radhi called me nuts.
He said I was a threat to democracy, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. It could be an all the time of cracker of a meeting mate. I think it wouldn't bring it on. But the problem is, now you love a crypt of America, Paul So. I think he represents guy News in the oval offers when elbow's there.
Yeah, I'll give I'll give you the tip. I'm not entirely sure I will get the same boosting from this administration that I did from previous. Yes, but that said, you know, the problem is, as we know, will all love it. But then, of course the pole numbers will probably work in our boast favor after such addressing down alas, all right, now I want to talk about it again. All the people who put the effort into the election win.
Now they want the payback. Transfer Workers' Union basically saying they could bring the whole joint to a standstill unless they get what they want from basically every company that they deal with. Of course, this would have been referred to as a conspiracy theory before the election, James. But when you've got that many people who owe you guess what.
Yeah, look, I get it.
There's people struggling out there right across the entire country. And there's some people on pretty good wages too. You know, I've said this before. With a sixth highest earning country in the world, and the average medium salary if you can believe, it's one hundred and thirty five thousand dollars, but do some quick calculations, Paul, and you soon find pretty quickly it's harder and harder to live off it.
In fact, you can't even borrow enough money on that salary with zero dependents, the average credit card limit of ten thousand dollars, you cannot borrow a satisfactory amount of money to buy in every city capital city across this country, all bar Darwin. And yet that's where seventy percent of this country live in capital cities. So if you're earning an average of one hundred and thirty five thousand dollars a year and you can't buy a house with that money, there's something wrong.
And it all comes down to energy.
So you know, it's all well and good for these unions to say that we've got a problem with wages, but if you look at the root cause of why things are going so poorly, it's because energy costs.
In this country continue to go up.
And rather than attack the business owner out there and say it's their fault and they've got to pay more to their workers, or bureaucrats want more from the taxpayer, we have to have a look at the underlying issue in this country.
And until we do that, we are going to.
Continue to see more and more people struggle, less people be able to buy houses, less investment in the country, and of course who hurts everyday Australians. They just become poorer because of this government and policies like net.
Zero and signing up to the Paris Agreement.
Now, Michael, I have no doubt that you are one of the greatest drivers in the history of Victoria. But as I mentioned in my editorial at the start of the show, it always amuses me that every state government around the country can somehow predict more people are going to break the law year on year, and specifically how many people are going to get caught by speed cameras. As I said, before Victorian Budget paper number five safety cameras this year it's going to be five hundred and
twenty seven million dollars. In three years time, seven hundred and fourteen million dollars. Police on the spot fines will basically be one hundred and fifty for the whole time. But isn't it amazing how they can work out how many people are going to break the law over the next three years.
Mate, mate, not really.
I think they look at previous years or the last twenty years, and then they can do an actual era of calculation of what it's likely to be in the next year based on.
Popularly hand a quota to the commissioner.
I presume that's how they do it. But look, mate, you know, I'm glad you talk about the Victorian budget. We're an absolute basketcase down here in Victoria and we've we've got it's a disgrace, right, it's a disgrace. When Dennis Napthlin left office in twenty fourteen, the Liberal premier state debt was twenty billion. It's about to have breached two hundred billion, right. These people have bankrubbed with Victoria.
There's been a cash deficit, right of one hundred and forty four billion from two sixteen to two twenty nine to thirty year period that NOE News gone on the four projected we've spent more than one hundred and forty four billion dollars more than we're earning. I mean, these people are just disgusting.
And also it's ten billion dollars a year to service the interest on the debt, which makes it the third or very close to the third biggest expense of the Victorian government. I've got thirty seconds, say, Gang, give me winn or a loser if you can, and then we're out of here. Michael Loser of the week.
Unfortunately it's our Liberal and National parties in Queensland.
But next week they'll be the winners. And the winner of the week I think would have to be no.
Oh, I'm going to suggest Nigel ferraj after the.
To move his way on immigration.
Yeah, good stuff, all right, James super fast for mem.
But the biggest winner this week is Albow.
He's allowed the Liberal and National Party to act as the distractors and he's got away with blue murder this week.
My loser of the week Sarah Hanson Young. She tried, but just couldn't get there to be the leader of the Greens. Thank you guys. We'll see you again next week. Quick break back, we warre plenty more to say before we're done, and then the late debate is on scone. Hey, good news everyone. You know how it's been financially tough, especially if you're trying to pay off a house. Well,
apparently that's not true. Q Opinion piece thought peace. As they like to say in the Channel Line papers from one of the economics people, the prevailing narrative about high interest rates being a major culprit in the cost of living crisis is no longer passing muster. If anything, the rhetoric is showing major cracks, suggesting that what borrow was perhaps are experiencing is phantom pain. It suggests that ninety percent of people didn't change how much they were paying
back when it comes to their repayments. The final bit here there clearly is a cohort that is experiencing mortgage stress and pain. But the narrative that mortgage stress is crippling most borrowers needs to be amended given much of it seems to have been phantom pain. Oh thank you so much, Elizabeth I mean for those of us who had to go without a little bit for a mortgage. Thank goodness, we apparently didn't seriously have a great weekend see and Cans. Go Tigers, Go Yankees, Go Nicks.