Doorstop - Caboolture QLD
18 May 2021
TERRY YOUNG MP, MEMBER FOR LONGMAN: Thanks everyone. We're here at Taipan Hoses in Caboolture and it's a great story because Allan Sandilands, the business owner here, actually promoted his HR Manager Tianah to what they call [inaudible] Manager. And the idea was that they had a lot of staff here who maybe thought they were never going to get into their own home. And Tianah’s job was to make that happen. So Tianah went through and she helped them with the process of getting a home, getting a HomeBuilder grant. And it's really changed lives. We got how many people got involved in the last four months? 5 staff now who had their lives changed and they got that dream of owning their own home. Allan, what do you think?
ALLAN SANDILANDS, CEO of TAIPAN HYDRAULIC HOSES: It's a great result. So we started out with 14 who were [inaudible] in time and effort. But at the end of the day, to achieve 5 houses out of the whole exercise is great. We're not only working on the houses, we're working on a lot of other stuff, but the secret is surround yourself with people who are a lot smarter than yourself, like Fiona and you’ll achieve a lot. A great initiative.
PRIME MINISTER: Thank you very much Terry. Well, thank you, Allan and thanks to everyone here at Taipan. You know, there are two things that I've always, you know, celebrated - when an Australian gets a job and when they can buy their own home. They are big outcomes in life. You might be training yourself to get the skills to get that job and then go and buy that first home. And then on top of that, to be able to save to support yourself in your own retirement. These are the big achievements. And for Allan, starting his own business here out the back of the truck many years ago, back in the 1990s and look at him now. He's putting not only people into jobs, he's putting the people who he put into jobs into houses into their own homes. First-home ownership now is at its highest level in 11 years. The Home Builder programme has been an enormous success. 120,000 applications, up $2.7 billion being invested to generate, as the Master Builders say, $39 billion in additional investment in residential construction. That is a game changer. And it has been a game changer for our recovery plan out of this pandemic. Our investment in getting people into their first homes, to build their own homes and in particular in this Budget. And our new homes initiatives for single parents, with a 2 per cent deposit, enabling 10,000 of them to get into their first home. The last election, 2 years ago today, we said that we were going to put in place the first home loan deposit scheme. 20,000 of those places already being utilised. Another 10,000 in this Budget. Another 10,000 to get the 2 per cent for single mums. Then there's the first home supersaver scheme and of course, HomeBuilder, which is ensuring that not only are first home buyers and any other home buyers getting themselves into homes that they’ve built, but this has been one of the key supports that we've put in place to secure our recovery coming through the COVID-19 pandemic. So this has been a massive initiative on behalf of the Government, and it's based on one simple premise, and that is we want to back Australians in. So we put $25,000 in, but they’ll put the $300,000 in or the $250,000 or sometimes much more than that. This isn't just about government. This is about government enabling Australians to be able to get themselves into their first home or a home that they've had built for them and their family. And so it's incredibly pleasing to know that not only has Allan here and his business been making use of whether it's the instant expensing and the other lower tax rates that are being applied now for businesses. He's making sure that he's putting people on, he's putting trainees on and he's helping his employees realise their dream of getting into their first home. And so this is an exciting thing to see that the policies that we've put in place to support Australians, to back Australians in through the course of this pandemic, not thinking Government’s the answer. The Government isn’t the answer, Allan is the answer. Allan and his employees here at Taipans, they're the answer because they're the ones who are investing in their future and the HomeBuilder programme backs them in just like the instant expensing programme backs them in. Just like the tax cuts that are already in this financial year. This financial year alone, we've increased the threshold up to $45,000 on that level, those lower tax thresholds. And we've also increased them up to $120,000. So this is already happening in this country. We’re already putting more money back into people's pockets, letting them keep more of what they earn and look what they're doing. They’re building homes, they’re creating businesses. They're employing people. They're getting trained. That's how the recovery plan works, backing in Australians. Now, there's alternatives to this. You'll hear this from the Labor Party. They want to spend more to build less homes. Spending more to build less. We saw them do that before because they thought the Government was the sole answer to this challenge. And as a result, they're going to spend $10 billion, four times as much to build two thirds less homes. Now, that just doesn't add up. The programmes that we've put in place and then supported by things like the National Housing Finance Investment Corporation, which has provided low, low interest loans to community housing organisations that are also getting on with it. Some 2,700 specifically financed through that programme for affordable housing and many thousands more refinanced. And through the housing infrastructure programme, some 4,400 additional dwellings also being supported in their development. So we enable Australians to get into their first home and build their home and support the economy and support jobs in the economy, which this business is benefiting from greatly. But on top of that, we're doing the right thing by working with community housing organisations, enabling them with their dreams to see more people in affordable homes. So that's our plan. Our plan is to enable Australians to keep more of what they earn. The worst thing you can do in the middle, particularly of an economic recovery, is to increase people's taxes or tell them you're going to increase their taxes in the future. That just kills dreams. That just kills the idea of incentive and working hard. And to be one of those people on that picture board over there getting into their first home. You don't get there by putting their taxes up. What you do is you enable them to keep more of what they earn. And keeping taxes low is a key part of our economic recovery plan that we've released in this year's Budget. Happy to take questions.
JOURNALIST: Prime Minister, the Virgin CEO Jayne Hrdlicka suggesting that the borders should open earlier and you should accept the fact that people get sick but do not go to hospital and some people will die?
PRIME MINISTER: Well, I understand that everyone is keen to get back to a time that we once knew. The reality is we're living this year in a pandemic that's worse than last year. I understand that we want to be able to prepare to get us in a place that when it's safe to do so, that we can make changes in there. But right now, it's not safe to do so. And we are working on plans, as I've said many times, working on plans to enable vaccinated Australians firstly to be able to travel around Australia and to be able to move around when states, from time to time, might have to put restrictions in place, but also potentially to travel overseas and have different quarantine arrangements on their return with the sign-off from state Chief Health Officers, and of course look at travel bubbles with other countries like Singapore, but we're some way off from that. And how we can bring others into the country that we need to support our economy. Now, we're putting all the plans in place to achieve that, but only when it is safe to do so. And it's not safe to do it now. During the course of this pandemic, Australia has avoided 30,000 lives lost when you compare it to the average fatality rate of like-countries in the OECD. 30,000 lives could have otherwise been lost had we not had the success we've had as a country working together. And so, I think that has to be understood. And I regret that those comments were somewhat insensitive. Somewhat insensitive and I would encourage people - you know, 910 Australians have lost their lives. Every single one of those lives was a terrible tragedy, and it doesn't matter how old they were. Some were younger, some were older. They were someone's mum, someone's dad, someone's aunty, someone’s cousin, brother, sister, friend. 910 - all felt extremely consciously by those loved ones around them. And so, no, I find it very difficult to have any truck with what was said there.
JOURNALIST: Prime Minister, what is the definition then of “safe”, what do you mean when you say only when it is safe to do so?
PRIME MINISTER: Well, that has always been assessed by the evidence that we have at the time, and it's done by the medical professionals advising both myself as Prime Minister, the Health Minister, the Premiers and Chief Ministers and their Health Ministers. The pandemic is raging. The pandemic is morphing. It's changing every day. When you see the pandemic this year raging through developing countries, then the great risk as we're already seeing is new strains, new variants coming through. That not all the vaccines will be equipped currently to deal with. And so, it's important that we make decisions based on the best medical advice at the time and on the medical advice we have right now, it is not safe to take those paths, but we will know when it is, based on clinical, proven evidence. I'm not going to take risks with Australians' lives. I'm not going to do that and I'm going to ensure that we maintain a regime that has so far avoided the loss of 30,000 lives in this country and has seen more Australians come back into work after the pandemic than were there before.
JOURNALIST: What about vaccination passports? Is that an idea that appeals to you?
PRIME MINISTER: We've seen that operate in other countries and I think they're the types of things that can be used particularly to enable Australians who are vaccinated to move around Australia. That's one. But also, when people are potentially in a position where they might be able to travel. So I do think those things, I've seen that and spoken to many leaders around the world who have been using similar types of mechanisms. But at this stage, we'd have to line those up. I think that the next most achievable step, because Australia, with our international borders up, means that vaccinated Australians would be in a much lower risk position when restrictions were to kick-in on Australians going on public transport or going to theatres or going to the footy, or whatever they might do, family get-togethers. They're all vaccinated and then obviously the risks are a lot less and that's why I'd continue to encourage people to move on making their booking to get those vaccinations.
JOURNALIST: So a couple of major sporting events coming up, Prime Minister, where the players are vaccinated largely. The Australian Grand Prix and the Australian Tennis Open. They seem to be saying that particularly the tennis players, they're operating in an international bubble every day. Could they come to Australia and avoid the 2-week quarantine? Could the GP Drivers Cup avoid the [inaudible]?
PRIME MINISTER: I think it's a bit premature to be making those decisions at this point. What I would note, though, is it's very different coming to Australia, because in most of the countries, they're moving around in, COVID is riddled through those countries. Australia is not riddled with COVID. Most of the rest of the developed world is and increasingly in the developing world. And so, the risk profile there is very different. But those events are still some time away. And I thought that the decision they made on the Formula One previously was a wise one - largely because they were used to operating in countries where COVID was already in. And Australia, we don't have it to the same extent as other countries. And so, that is something that we certainly want to protect. But I think we'll be practical about those things and I think technology and systems are improving each day.
JOURNALIST: PM, just back to housing. Labor’s policy they announced last week targets areas of specific needs, middle aged women who struggle to find affordable housing service providers, who can't live in the inner suburbs in which they service. What is your response to that? Do you have anything in your arsenal to combat that?
PRIME MINISTER: Over $1 billion provided every year to the states and territories to deliver on those tasks. One of the things that I found frustrating working in housing policy over a long time is that every time the Commonwealth invests more in state government responsibilities in public housing, the state governments do less. I mean here, Terry was telling me that they've just sold 4,000 public housing units here in Queensland. So the great risk is, this is where sometimes the states would see Anthony Albanese coming. Every extra dollar he'd spend is a dollar less they'd spend. So nobody goes any further ahead. That's why as Treasurer, I initiated the National Housing and Finance Investment Corporation to work directly with community housing organisations to ensure that we were leveraging what they were seeking to achieve. There are some amazing organisations to do that around the country and we've also already facilitated thousands of new dwellings being built, state-of-the-art, to support exactly the groups that you're talking about. And we've made permanent, that also as Treasurer and Social Services Minister, where we made permanent our National Partnership Agreement on Homelessness. Supporting not-for-profit organisations around the country, supporting people in need. So we invest a great deal when it comes to supporting affordable and social housing initiatives. But, when it comes to stimulating the economy, getting people into their first home, it is at its best level in 11 years, and we've ensured that people have been able to save better for their deposit with the First Home Loan Deposit Scheme. Save better under the first home supersaver scheme. And then be backed into building their own house with those grants. But we put the 25 down and they put the 350 down or the 300 down. Labor's plan is just to spend the lot themselves and put it on the taxpayer. And state governments have responsibilities here and we support them to do that through the National Housing Finance Investment Corporation, and that was an initiative that I pulled together with the state and territory Treasurers to enable that. It was a great piece of cooperation and partnership and I think it's making a really big difference.
JOURNALIST: PM, is it as David Littleproud said this morning, good enough that just 999 people living in disability accommodation have been vaccinated?
PRIME MINISTER: No, we've got to step up the performance there, there's no doubt about that. We’re working with our health officials to achieve that. I'm very pleased that on aged care facilities, we are about just over 85%, particularly by the end of today when we get the numbers, we'll be over 85% of first doses in aged care facilities, which is on track. I think that's very important. And we welcome that. We are really starting to see the daily on a weekday, the doses that are being delivered, but principally the Commonwealth Government through the GPs and through the in-reach services, into whether it's aged care or other facilities. That's really starting to pick up pace and we welcome that and we welcome the support of the states and territories in doing their bit as well.
JOURNALIST: He’s also suggested that there’s been no known coronavirus cases in disability accommodation facilities. Is that correct?
PRIME MINISTER: That's my understanding, that's my understanding. Going through the COVID pandemic and particularly when we went through the second wave in Victoria, that was an area of deep concern for us. And in the area of disabilities, Australia has actually performed extremely well in preventing the virus impacting on those communities. And that's welcome. But we can't be complacent about it and that's why we do need to do more and do better when it comes to ensuring that we're getting the vaccination levels up in our disabled community. And I'll be working closely with Linda Reynolds of course and Greg Hunt to ensure that we achieve that.
JOURNALIST: They are part of phase 1A off the roll-out. When do you expect that to be completed?
PRIME MINISTER: As soon as possible. It's always been our view that we wanted to move through the priority populations. Professor Brendan Murphy has said mid-year, so we're working towards that, so as I said on the aged care population, where over 85% now and that has been the population which was most at risk. We saw that when the contact tracing failed in Victoria and we saw the second wave just wreak havoc in that state. And we saw the hundreds of lives lost there in Victoria. And they were the most elderly and the most vulnerable and that's why we've made aged care such a high priority. But, right here what we're seeing here at Taipan is a business that's benefited greatly from the HomeBuilder programme and the lift in their business, and that has enabled them to keep people in jobs and take more people on, take more trainees on. And through that same program, they're getting their own employees into their first home and there's nothing better than the smile on a small business person’s face when they employ someone, and then even more so than that, when they see them go and have been able to go and buy their first home. And the same smile that's on Allan's face is the same smile that's on my face when I see that every time. Thank you very much, everyone.
JOURNALIST: The Nine newspapers have a poll out today, that the punters don’t want an early election. Can you rule out an election this year?
PRIME MINISTER: I've said constantly, the election is due next year. Thanks very much.
