Swan nods to The Boss and digs at miners


Australian Broadcasting Corporation

Broadcast: 01/08/2012

Reporter: Leigh Sales

Federal Treasurer and Acting Prime Minister Wayne Swan joins us from Melbourne before giving the annual John Button lecture to elaborate on his thoughts connecting Bruce Springsteen to his political views and targeting Australia's mining magnates.


LEIGH SALES, PRESENTER: The Acting Prime Minister Wayne Swan thinks Australia can learn some lessons from the songs of American rocker Bruce Springsteen. Springsteen sings about the struggles of the American working class and the gap between rich and poor.

Tonight, Wayne Swan is giving the John Button Lecture, and in it he claims Labor's current set of economic policies will prevent Australia suffering America's economic and social fate.

The Treasurer also argues that the chief opponents of the Government's mining tax, Gina Rinehart, Clive Palmer and Andrew Forrest, only care about building their own wealth.

Earlier I spoke to Wayne Swan in Melbourne, but first here's a look at part of a YouTube video the Treasurer posted today.

WAYNE SWAN, TREASURER (YouTube video): Well I first started listening to Springsteen's music in the early 1970s. But I guess Springsteen's Born to Run, when it came out in late 1975, was I guess one of those albums that really influenced me for a long time. When I go into work early in the morning and I feel like I want to pep me up, I want to get going, I want a bit of inspiration, I'll put on Born to Run and I'll play it as loudly as I possibly can. ... Sometimes I think those cleaners in Parliament House must think there's something really weird going on in the Treasurer's office.

LEIGH SALES: Wayne Swan, when Julia Gillard went on holidays for a week and said you could be the boss, did you take her a little bit too literally?

WAYNE SWAN: (Laughs) No, I don't think so. I've planned to do this lecture for a long period of time, well before she planned to take a holiday.

LEIGH SALES: Bruce Springsteen wrote his best stuff in 1970s and 1980s America. That's a very long way from 21st Century Australia, isn't it?

WAYNE SWAN: I don't think so and in fact if you look at his latest album, Wrecking Ball, which came out this year, it's all about the impact of the Global Financial Crisis and the recession on the United States and the dramatic impact that has had on the divides in that country, that many people are being left behind, an army of working poor, but also a very, very high unemployment. And he sings about that on Wrecking Ball and I find that quite relevant to the situation here, because here we put in place a different set of policies based on Labor values which have protected our country from the ravages of high unemployment and also from the terrible divides that you're now seeing in the United States and the inequality that arises from that.

LEIGH SALES: In your speech tonight you single out the trio of mining billionaires for having a disproportionate impact on public debate. But let's be honest here: you wouldn't care about their influence, would you, if they were supporting Labor policies?

WAYNE SWAN: Well they're certainly opposing Labor policies, but most importantly, what they are doing is acting in their own interests, in their own vested interest in opposing the mining resource rent tax, a tax which is actually accepted by the great bulk of the mining industry and which goes to the core of why we need to spread prosperity around our country. The mining tax is going to fund a very substantial increase in superannuation and for someone, say, 30 years old on average earnings that'll mean an additional $100,000 a year when they retire. We are spreading the benefits of the boom from the mining tax through additional family payments and so on, and they have been out there publicly opposing this tax, when it's been in their direct personal interest and they've been seeking to have a disproportionate say in the public debate and a disproportionate influence on public policy.

LEIGH SALES: Well in your speech you say, "We have to stand up and be heard because when the massively wealthy buy the loudest megaphones, the voices of people are drowned out." Well given that, would you like to criticise Cate Blanchett, for example, for using her wealth and fame for promote the carbon tax and environmental concerns?

WAYNE SWAN: There's nothing wrong with anyone who has made a lot of money, creating wealth in our country, from having a say in our national debates.

LEIGH SALES: Except if they oppose Labor policies.

WAYNE SWAN: What I'm pointing to is - no, not at all. What I'm pointing to here is three billionaires in particular that have decided to pursue their only personal economic interests at the expense of working Australians and of course they've managed to get the Liberal Party to adopt their policy holus bolus and we're not gonna be able to spread the benefits of the mining boom to all corners of our country and create a fairer and more prosperous society if their views were to prevail. And they are deploying their resources in extraordinary ways. I mean, I don't regret a word I said about those people in the Monthly essay because we've seen play out over the past couple of months those people trying to exert disproportionate influence in our politics. Gina Rinehart trying to take over Fairfax. You've got Twiggy Forrest mounting a challenge to the mining tax. You've got Clive Palmer, who's taken over the LNP in Queensland holus bolus and is out there advertising as we speak.

LEIGH SALES: But Twiggy Forrest mounting a legal challenge to the mining tax, I mean, you don't have to be the billionaire to do that. What about the case of that father from Toowoomba who took the Federal Government successfully to the High Court after your school chaplain's program. You don't have to be a billionaire in Australia to do that.

WAYNE SWAN: No. No, you don't. And people will have views about the actions of that particular gentleman. But the point I'm making is these people have very deep pockets and they're seeking to have a disproportionate say in our public debate, taking out newspaper ads for example, as Twiggy Forrest has done and a whole lot of other activities. They're seeking to have a disproportionate say in our democracy and a disproportionate influence in the policy outcomes which are at the expense of hardworking Australians who deserve to see the benefits of the mining boom spread to every corner of our country.

LEIGH SALES: But, OK, if you talk about deep pockets and influence then what about the millionaire property developer Maurice Schwartz who - you write for his magazine, The Monthly? His wealth allows him the megaphone of having his very own magazine to promote his hobby horses.

WAYNE SWAN: And I would criticise people like that if they were out there opposing important public policy which is in the national interest, trying to do it in the national interest, but really doing it in their own vested interests.

LEIGH SALES: But that's a subjective view though.

WAYNE SWAN: They're not the only people in Australia ...

LEIGH SALES: That's very subjective ...

WAYNE SWAN: Of course it is!

LEIGH SALES: ... because you say, "They're my policies and they're great and they're in the national interest," but others beg to differ.

WAYNE SWAN: Yes. That's right. That's right.

LEIGH SALES: And they're allowed to.

WAYNE SWAN: But these people have disproportionate - yeah, and - well, take Gina Rinehart: she's worth $30 billion. She doesn't need a very big tax cut from Tony Abbott. That's what she's gonna get. And that's coming at the expense of ordinary workers, coming at the expense of their super, coming at the expense of investment and infrastructure, coming at the expense of increases in family payments for people on low and middle incomes. And that's a legitimate point to make. That's why I wrote the essay in The Monthly, and since that period their behaviour has justified everything I said back in March.

LEIGH SALES: In that John Button Lecture tonight you say that, "Labor doesn't talk nearly enough about our party's broad traditions and political culture, certainly not in ways that are appealing to young people." But is the problem more - it's not that you don't talk enough, but perhaps you're talking about things that young people don't connect with, for example the Prime Minister's opposition to gay marriage, which is an issue that a lot of young people support.

WAYNE SWAN: Well I think what I'm trying to do tonight is to speak very candidly. That's something that John Button did. It's something that I'm doing tonight, but I'm trying to do it also in a different way, because, you know, music really fuels the passion. Music fuels your imagination. John Button said that his inspiration was literature. I've just said that my inspiration tends to come more through music. And each to their own. But I'm not in any way ashamed that I find in music the sustenance that I need to pursue my energies in public life and to pursue the policies that I think are good for the country. I think that's a pretty logical thing to do.

LEIGH SALES: Wayne Swan, thank you very much for making time to speak to us tonight.

WAYNE SWAN: Thank you.