Doorstop Interview – London | Prime Minister of Australia
PRUE FREEMAN, DIRECTOR OF DAISY GREEN: Good afternoon everyone. Welcome to Bondi Green I am delighted to be here with our Prime Minister. For a little bit about Daisy Green; I founded Daisy Green just over 10 years ago. I moved here for a year and 10 to 13 years later, I’m here with 14 amazing Australian-inspired cafes. We serve Australian brunch, great coffee. And then over the years, our tiny cafes have gone a little bit bigger into more full-scale restaurants – although we still refer to them as cafes – going into the evening with lots of great Aussie wine and cocktails and craft beer. We’ve always been focused around the true ‘Australian spirit’ in terms of our foods: Mediterranean inspired produce, great fish, great meat, and then big pops of Asian flavour. I think for 10 years, I’ve been trying to get some great Australian product over here, that would really just take our food a step further. So there’s some things like Meredith’s Goat Cheese, it’s actually made on the farm next to mine in Victoria. We tried to import it a couple of years ago. So really excited to finally get that over here. I grew up in a little town just outside Ballarat called Buninyong. And a childhood friend of mine is doing an amazing business doing native spices called Saltbush Kitchen. I’d really love to get some of her things over here. And we started to get some, but hopefully in the near future, we might be able to get a lot more: wattleseed, lemon myrtle, pepper berries – something which everyone at home is enjoying but you haven’t seen a huge amount of it here in the UK. So, delighted to have the Prime Minister here.
ANTHONY ALBANESE, PRIME MINISTER OF AUSTRALIA: Thank you so much to Prue to Tom and everyone here at Bondi Green. This is a great Australian success story. Prue, who travelled here with a different objective in life; a former lawyer, former worker in the finance sector, who came here and met Tom and is still here, here creating literally hundreds of jobs and enormous economic activity. And literally is, with due respect to our High Commissioner who is here, a great ambassador for Australia, for Australian produce, for Australian wine, for Australian ingenuity and innovation. We live in the great country of Australia, which has taken in the flavours from all around the world, as one of the great byproducts of our multiculturalism, and produced an Australian product that is, in my view, the best in the world. And what the FTA between Australia and the United Kingdom is about is getting greater access to this market for Australian products: greater access for our beef, for our sheep products, for our wine, and for other products right here. And here you can see the incredible lamb, toothfish, other products, pavlova, lamington. We’ll ignore the debate at the moment about New Zealand and Australia over some of those things, we’ll just claim all of it. Because here at Bondi Green, we are giving people as well, the potential for, not just for coming to this product if you are a UK citizen or a local Londoner, but as part of the FTA we will change some of the labour market, so that instead of being 30 years of age to get that temporary visa, it will increase it up to 35 in both countries, and extend it to three years so that people can come here and get that real experience over a longer period of time and work at places like Bondi Green, to be able to have Australians here. The other thing that it will do is, having come here, sampled the food, the coffee and the wine, they’ll go away and think ‘I wouldn’t mind coming down to Australia if this is what Australia can produce’. So you are indeed an ambassador for Australian tourism as well. Now, the FTA is, I think, are a very exciting one. It is one of the best FTAs that Australia has done. I’ve been working closely with the UK Government and I want to pay tribute to the High Commission and their work in making sure that this work has been completed in time for the Coronation. You always need a deadline. And this afternoon, literally today, some of the processes in the UK Parliament are being completed so that tomorrow when I meet with Prime Minister Sunak at Number 10 Downing Street, we will be able to complete the FTA timetable so that this month it will come into force on the 31st of May. That will be a date at which people can pencil in – Australian companies – to really push for greater benefit with more wine, more sheep products, more beef, more seafood, more spices, more products from Australia to be present here. That means more jobs in Australia. It also means more economic activity and growth for Australia. And also, might I say, something beyond the economic, something not quite tangible in dollar terms, is more pride. When I walked in here today and see the incredible work that Prue’s done, including this wonderful display behind us, it gives you a sense of pride in Australia and what it means to be Australian. I first came to London like many Australians backpacking, staying on a floor of someone I knew in West Hampstead and using it as a base for six months as so many young Australians do. What they’ll be able to do with this FTA is see more of Australian products while they’re here, and also be able to work and make that economic contribution, and then go back with that experience, with the benefit that comes from experiencing different cultures. So this is a great day. Thank you so much Prue for what you’ve done. It is quite amazing that this extraordinary business has been built from nothing from the ground up. What the FTA will do is allow this business to thrive, and for others to be created.
JOURNALIST: You talked about jobs yesterday. You talked about jobs, and today as well creating jobs in Australia. We’ve got a labour shortage in Australia. I mean, I think what we need to do is find people to fill those jobs, right?
PRIME MINISTER: Well, one of the things that it will do, of course, is the labour changes are two-way so that Australians coming to the UK will be able to work for three years, but UK citizens coming to Australia will be able to work for three years as well. And that will provide an enormous benefit for Australia going forward. But I make no apology for being concerned about jobs. I want to see Australian jobs and Australian economic activity created. When you look at, for example, the wine industry, the truth is that the wine industry have had bumper crops. When you speak to the wine industry in Australia, they have product that’s ready to go to market. What this will do is expand that market and expand the profitability of those businesses, which will allow for more investment, which will then have a multiplier effect.
JOURNALIST: Congratulations on all of this. How is the European Union trade process going? And will this make scotch whisky cheaper in Australia as well?
PRIME MINISTER: Within two years, you’ll see a removal of tariffs from goods from the UK to Australia and vice versa. Products becoming cheaper is also deflationary. So the imports that we get from the UK, if you cut the taxes and cut the tariffs, then they are by definition cheaper and that will have a positive impact on our economy. The European agreement is a very important one. I will be having discussions while I’m here. Tomorrow afternoon, the representative, Ursula von der Leyen, will be present. I’ll be having a pull-aside with her about the EU Free Trade Agreement. We’re continuing to work very hard because we want that to come into effect as soon as possible as well. It’s not as advanced, of course, as the UK one was. The UK one got approved by our parliamentary processes at the end of last year. But now that this has been finalised, we can really hone in on the European agreement. And that’s something that my Government intends to do. I had a discussion last Friday with Chancellor Scholz of Germany, where I reiterated the importance of the EU agreement for Australia. And of course, I will be seeing leaders at the G7, which is been held in Japan this month, and then attending the NATO Summit, European leaders, of course, will be present there in Lithuania in July. So we really are stepping up that. We’ve also invited the EU to Australia in coming months. And we’re hopeful that will happen as well.
JOURNALIST: This afternoon you will be having a meeting with people who will be representing Australia at the Coronation. Can you tell us why you chose those people and what makes them so special?
PRIME MINISTER: I think if you look at the quality of people who are coming. First of all, Sam Kerr, pretty handy footballer. Sam Kerr scored a goal again for Chelsea a couple of days ago. She is quite an extraordinary athlete. And in the lead-up to the Women’s World Cup that Australia and New Zealand are hosting in coming months, that will be important. If you look at the other people who are coming, they go across a range of walks of life: Yvonne Kenny, a great artist. You have Ms Coe, who runs an Indigenous art gallery here in London. you have Indigenous students as well. You have Nick Cave, a great writer and a great musician, and a great ambassador for Australia. You have Dr Nour, who runs an outreach program, providing medical facilities for the homeless and people in Sydney and Daniel is a former Young Australian of the Year. You have an extraordinary breadth. So together with the High Commission and the Governor General, we wanted to make sure it was really a representative group of Australians. In addition to that, of course, we have three VC winners. And that is very important. We’re honoured by their presence here. The Governor General and all of the Governors of the states in Australia will be present as well. So it’s a substantial Australian presence here. And it’s a presence that reflects the extraordinary capacity of the Australian people. The Palace particularly asked that there be Indigenous representation. And we have made sure that has occurred as part of the delegation.
JOURNALIST: Last year, just before the election contest, Rishi Sunak said the UK-Australia trade deal was bad for British farmers. Was he wrong to say that and has he changed his mind?
PRIME MINISTER: It’s not up to me to speak on behalf of other people. With respect, I’ll treat Prime Minister Sunak with the respect that his office deserves. I have a good relationship with Prime Minister Sunak. And I have had two meetings with him to discuss the Free Trade Agreement. And he’s very supportive of the agreement going forward And tomorrow, I look forward to having another constructive discussion. The relationship with Australia and the UK is very important. The discussion that I had with Defence Secretary Wallace yesterday was very constructive. I hadn’t met him before. He’s a great friend of Australia. And we are working together, not just on AUKUS, but we’re working together on our economic relationship. And of course, that friendship may be disrupted for 25 days during this year, during the five days of the five tests. But our competitive spirit as well, between us, is something that brings us together.
JOURNALIST: Similar question on farming, British farmers have concerns. Have you had any reciprocal concerns from Australian businesses and is there anything you can say to ease those concerns for Australian businesses?
PRIME MINISTER: This is a good thing for both countries. This is a win-win. This is a win for Australia and a win for the United Kingdom. When you take off tariffs of goods, what you do is you make them cheaper. Cheaper goods in Australia, cheaper goods in the United Kingdom. More goods in Australia, more goods in the United Kingdom. More diversity of products in both countries. This is an outstanding agreement that will bring benefit for both of our economies.
JOURNALIST: The date has been moved forward to May 31. Does that mean that businesses like this one will reap the benefits immediately?
PRIME MINISTER: They certainly do. And we were very keen to make sure that this agreement was brought to fruition. And we did concentrate the minds on the Coronation, on the date, the fact that I would be here and we would have a meeting between myself and the British Prime Minister. And it will have benefit from June 1. It is game-on for Australian businesses, game-on for UK businesses. For a business like this that showcases Australian projects, I can see what has been enormous growth up to now being even greater in the future. And for the existing businesses here, it will just mean products are cheaper. The quality wine that Australia has, for the price that Australian wine comes from, compared with our competitors, in my view, if you have a level playing field, Australia will win. And that is a win for Australian business. But it’s also a win for consumers in the UK.
JOURNALIST: Prime Minister, another prominent Australian attending the Coronation is Julie Bishop. Has your Government sounded her out about taking on, potentially, an ambassadorship to Paris?
PRIME MINISTER: No. Thank you.