MG: You said today that you would like to see federal and state levels of government have more autonomy in their respective areas of responsibility, but as I remember you used to have quite centralist ideas.
TA: My views have evolved a bit here. As circumstances change different elements in your own thinking can come to the fore. And let’s not forget that five or six years ago I was a health minister in a Coalition federal government that was perceived to be competent and we were dealing with Labor state governments that were perceived to be less competent, and inevitably people demanded that the federal government to do something to address the perceived failings of state governments.
In more recent times, we’ve had a federal government that is perceived to be incompetent, dealing with state governments which are more likely to be given the benefit of the doubt because they are newer, and they are Coalition governments. As well, I’ve gone from being a senior member of a government to being the leader of the Coalition and the natural orientation of the Coalition is federalist rather than centralist.
So way back when I was the health minister, I wasn’t tempted to a stronger role for the feds because I was a philosophical centralist, I was tempted to a stronger role because there were problems that the state’s weren’t addressing. At the moment I think the states are addressing those problems and I don’t think any pragmatic nationalist, which is where I think I’ve always been, would want to get involved in something which the states are handling more or less well.
MG: Kevin Rudd calls himself an economic nationalist…
TA: Well he never used to, he used to call himself an economic conservative, then he became a born again socialist and now he says he’s an economic nationalist. Kevin’s anything.
MG: Are you and economic nationalist or an economic rationalist?
TA: I don’t like tags and I think markets are very important and we should be reluctant to tamper with them; on the other hand sometimes they fail and sometimes even if they’re not failing there might be some overwhelming national interest that requires elements of non-market decision making.
MG: Turning to climate change, do you think Australians care less than previously about climate change?
TA: I think people are very passionate about the environment. I regard myself as a committed conservationist. I think people are less anxious about climate change, for three reasons.
First, I think they’re more conscious of the fact that the argument among the experts is not quite the one-way street that it might have seemed four or five years.
Second, the drought, which was a fairly severe drought, has well and truly broken in most of Australia anyway.
And third, Copenhagen changed any idea that there was some international consensus on how to deal with climate change.
MG: In broad terms what are the main differences between you and Kevin Rudd in foreign affairs?
TA: The focus would be Jakarta not Geneva. I think I would be less inclined to be presumptuous. Australia has a certain weight in foreign affairs and where we can make a difference and where it’s important to us, we should be more than ready to speak out and do what we can. But, I don’t think we should be getting too big for our boots in these matters.
There are so many areas in which Australians have an opinion and not a capacity, and we have to appreciate that.
MG: If you were prime minister, how you would run the cabinet, what style would you bring to that? The chairman of the board or something more upfront and out there?
TA: I don’t really want to say how I’m going to do a job that I’ve never done before. But I think I’m ready for it, given that I was a senior member of a functioning cabinet for seven years and I was a close student of an effective prime minister, John Howard, for many years before that.
The prime minister is probably a little more than first amongst equals, but any prime minister that tries to micromanage portfolios is going to come unstuck. A, it is impossible to do it with complex modern government and B, your colleagues will deeply resent it.
Most of the time you’ve got to allow colleagues to run their portfolios, it would only be if there was a serious problem that you would yourself get deeply involved.
MG: Do you think most things would go to the full cabinet or is having a kitchen cabinet important?
TA: All the significant decisions of government, where possible, should go to cabinet.
MG: Just reflecting on the campaign, the highs, the lows…
TA: Well, without trying to predict the result, because a lot can happen in five days, so far, there haven’t been any lows. There has been a lot of activity, just about all of it purposeful and productive.
For me, probably the most exciting moment in the campaign was doing that PT session with the first armoured regiment in Darwin.
I loved it for two reasons, first, because it was an honour to be able to muck in with serving members of our armed forces. Second, it was a thrill to be able, more or less, to keep up, so I just loved every second of it. The only slight downside was when the PT instructor, one Corporal Youngs if I’m not mistaken, very kindly told a journalist that I’d done pretty well, but then added the rider: “for someone who is so old”.
So that’s been the highlight.
MG: If you manage to find yourself in the Lodge – you will be living in the lodge not in Sydney?
TA: I’m not getting ahead of myself, my disposition would be towards orthodoxy.
MG: So what about the exercise? Would you still be biking up Red Hill in the morning?
TA: I’d expect to still be going up Red Hill.
Michelle Grattan is a Professorial Fellow at University of Canberra .
This piece was first published on The Conversation.
Michelle currently holds an academic position at the University of Canberra and is associate editor (politics) and chief political correspondent at The Conversation. She was the former editor of The Canberra Times, was political editor of The Age and has been with the Australian Financial Review and The Sydney Morning Herald.
