Interview with Andrew Clenell, Sunday Agenda

23 March 2025

ANDREW CLENELL: But first joining me now is the Shadow Finance Minister, Jane Hume Jane, thanks for joining me. Will you support the energy bill relief announced by the Government?

JANE HUME: Andrew, the Coalition will not stand in the way of much needed relief from these high electricity prices, high gas prices that are caused by Labor's failed policies. You know, there's over 130,000 Australians now on financial hardship packages with their energy companies. But let's face it, this is now what was supposed to be a temporary feature of Labor's Budget has now turned into a permanent feature of Labor budgets because of their failed energy policies. Australians have paid the price for these.

ANDREW CLENELL: It's not permanent. They're taking it off after two quarters.

JANE HUME: Well, that's I think, what they might have said the first time they delivered subsidies for energy relief, and the second time they delivered subsidies for energy relief. And now, once again, this is now $6.8 billion that the Government has spent giving subsidies out to Australians because their energy policy has failed. That's not good enough. Now a Dutton Coalition will not stand…

ANDREW CLENELL (interrupts): Why are you not in the way of that energy relief?

JANE HUME: We will not stand in the way of that energy relief. But the aim of the game has got to be to sustainably bring down energy prices.

ANDREW CLENELL: I understand Jane Hume but why are you, I think I know the answer to this, it's called an election. But why are you standing, not standing in the way if you don't support the policy?

JANE HUME: Andrew, do you remember three years ago, Anthony Albanese said 97 times. 97 that he was going to bring down energy prices by $275? Well, he's failed. Many Australians out there are now seeing rises of up to $1,000 in their energy bills. Nothing like a $275 reduction. They are crying out for help in Labor's cost of living crisis. That's been driven by their bad decisions and poor policies and wrong priorities. We will not stand in the way of those Australians getting the relief that they need. But the most important thing is an energy policy that fixes the broken system. It must start with more gas into the system, because the only way that you are going to relieve energy prices is by putting more supply in. Labor have been ideologically opposed to putting more gas into the system from day one, but we will fast track approvals for new gas exploration, new gas into the system, and in the long term, as those coal fired power stations retire, we will replace them with zero emissions nuclear power, which has brought power prices down and stabilised the grids right around the world. That is the way to sustainably bring prices down. We can't simply keep providing these band-aids on bullet holes over a failed energy system.

ANDREW CLENELL: That is true I think. You can't have subsidies forever, but nuclear would be some time off. You and I both know that. What is your plan if you hit government in terms of lowering power bills immediately, or is that not achievable immediately?

JANE HUME: That's why we've said that we will immediately fast track more gas into the system. Now it's going to take at least a year to get that through because as we know, power prices are forecast to increase over the next 12 months. That's why we won't stand in the way of Labor's subsidy for their failed policies, because it's going to take some time to get coalition policies working into the system. We'll get gas immediately into the system as fast as we can to bring down prices sustainably. But economics hasn't changed, Andrew. It's still a function of demand and supply. We need to make sure that we get more supply of gas into the system to bring prices down, but in the long term, we need to stabilise our grid, make sure that we have a clean energy system and when coal fired power stations retire, that's when we'll replace them with zero emissions nuclear energy.

ANDREW CLENELL: There's been criticism of both sides of politics during this Pre-campaign campaign, if you like, around the spending by both sides. Your ambition is to become Finance minister. Are you going to list a series of savings that the Coalition will seek to make during the campaign to pay for some of the promises? And will you be seeking to bring down deficits?

JANE HUME: Well, Andrew, we've already opposed more than $100 billion worth of Labor spending initiatives. We've done that throughout the last three years, and we've said that we will immediately, on returning to government, cut the wasteful spending of this government wasteful spending. That includes things like $13.7 billion in production tax credits for miners to do what they were already going to do, things like an additional 36,000 new public servants. That's 40 that have been appointed by this government every single day since they came to office. And yet there is hardly an Australian out there that would feel better served by their public servants, by their government, from those 36,000 new public servants, things like…

ANDREW CLENELL (interrupts): So you're axing 36,000 public servants?

JANE HUME: …you want to talk about, okay. Well, do you want to talk about wasteful spending? Because I can give you a litany of things that we would not do in government that this government has done. In fact, there is an entire website dedicated to it. Andrew, if you look at underlabor.com.au, under labor.com.au there is a list of this government's waste.

ANDREW CLENELL: Jane Hume, let me just get back to this point. You say we didn't agree with them hiring 36,000 public servants. Does it follow logically, then, that you will be sacking 36,000 public servants? Because that's been unclear.

JANE HUME: So we have said from the very beginning that we will make sure that we guarantee essential services, that we guarantee those frontline workers. But let's face it, there has been such an extraordinary growth, an extraordinary bloat in the public service under this government that something has got to give because it is continually costing more and more. On top of that, they've paid these new public servants and the existing ones an 11% pay rise. Now that is entirely unsustainable, that's not even accounted for appropriately in the Budget. The Budget shows that, the MYEFO Budget shows that public sector wages are flat lining. But here's the deal. This growth in the public service hasn't actually corresponded with better public services. So, for instance, the size of the Health Department has grown around 40%, yet bulk billing rates have collapsed. The size of the Energy and Environment portfolio has nearly doubled. And yet emissions have gone up and environmental approval times have blown out. Services Australia…

ANDREW CLENELL: But Jane Hume, I'm sorry. Jane Hume.

JANE HUME: Services Australia has seen a massive increase and yet we have seen a blow-out in the time it takes to get an aged pension five times as long to get a low income card. If you ring the Parenting and Families helpline you spend an hour on hold.

ANDREW CLENELL: Jane Hume I understand all that. I'm sorry…

JANE HUME: This isn't good enough.

ANDREW CLENELL: I'm just trying to get an answer to the question. I just want an answer to the question. How many public servants do you think you will be cutting? Will you be cutting 36,000, cutting 18,000, cutting 10,000?

JANE HUME: We think we can bring down the number of public servants to where it was at the end of Covid. That was at the back of the, at the beginning of this Labor government, when the public sector started expanding exponentially.

ANDREW CLENELL: So how many less public servants is that?

JANE HUME: Well, we think that the 36,000 public servants that have been brought on haven't demonstrated that the improvements to the services to the public have been corresponding. We think we can bring it back down to levels that were at the end of Covid, not the beginning of Covid, I might add, at the end of Covid and still deliver on the expectations of the taxpayer. Because let's face it, the services haven't improved, but the cost and size of the public service has expanded and bloated exponentially. So that's what our intention is, to make sure that we bring the rain in that size of the public service, but make sure that we deliver on frontline services. We make sure that we deliver on essential services that Australians expect and deserve.

ANDREW CLENELL: Sure. Do you have an intention, if elected, of returning the Budget to a surplus position within the time of the forward estimates or within a decade? Do you have any sort of time frame on when you'd like to see a surplus if elected?

JANE HUME: Do you know that objective of returning a budget to structural balance has been entirely removed from Labor's budget papers? It's been a feature of Budgets for decades past and has served Australians really well. We managed to bring the Budget back into balance by 2019. That was one of the reasons why, under the Coalition government, we went into Covid in such a strong position, but because that objective was removed, because that Budget guardrail has been abolished, Australians are worse off and now we can only see red ink as far as the eye can see into the future. A coalition government will restore that objective to bring the Budget back into balance. And look, is it going to be able to happen in the first year of a coalition government? I very much doubt that because there is so much Labor baked in spending, it's going to be very, very difficult to unwind. We've said that we will guarantee essential services. We've said that we won't unwind those frontline positions. That's really really important. Australians should take great comfort in knowing that a Coalition Government will not be making cuts to frontline services or essential services. But at some stage, those hard decisions about where we're going to make changes have to be considered. You know as well as I do, Andrew, that the NDIS, for instance, is one of those areas in the Budget that has run out of control. It was growing at 14%, 14% per annum. Now, when we went into opposition, the Coalition said to the government that we would work with them to rein in that spending and get it under control. It's been brought back to around 8%. It actually looks like it's going to be much higher than that this year, but it's been brought under control somewhat. We think that there's more that can be done. We would hope that when Labor goes into opposition, that they would work with us to try and rein in that, profligate spending, that, runaway, those runaway programmes that have gone out of control under this government.

ANDREW CLENELL: And frankly, that seems pretty critical to the Budget reining in the NDIS. Do you have some sort of target in mind in terms of the growth that you'd like to see in it, or even cuts to it?

JANE HUME: Well, I think the most important thing, Andrew, is in the long term, that all government spending doesn't grow faster than the economy itself. And bringing in those Budget guardrails is so important, whether it be a tax to GDP ratio, to make sure that you don't continually grow the envelope from which governments can spend, that's a really important guardrail that we will set, that we've said that we will restore the moment we return to government, whether it be that objective of bringing the Budget back into structural balance, not windfall surpluses, structural balance in the medium term, that's going to be fundamentally important to delivering a stronger economy, more economic resilience. And let's face it, in these periods of global uncertainty, when the world is changing at a rapid pace, the most important thing that an Australian government can do is deliver economic resilience, so that we have the ballast to be able to weather the storms.

ANDREW CLENELL: There's widespread expectation, fuelled by you and others on this show. Before that, you'll promise tax cuts, income tax cuts at the election. When will we see the detail around that? And does getting this Budget handed down this week put you in a better position to come up with some tax cuts that you see as affordable?

JANE HUME: Andrew, you will always have lower and simpler and fairer taxes under a coalition government. We've already announced that we would oppose Labor's tax on unrealised capital gains. It's profoundly unfair and totally unworkable. That we will increase the threshold of the instant asset write off to $30,000, and that we'll also make that a permanent feature of the tax system, so that small businesses can better plan for productive investment. We've said that we will reduce the red tape and burden of FBT reporting and make for small businesses meals tax deductible so that we can not just assist small businesses, but also assist our flailing hospitality sector, that sector that's been at the front line of Labor's cost of living crisis. So these are tax changes. Income tax that we have already announced that we have already announced. And while I know there is enormous appetite for income tax relief because let's face it, this is the highest taxing government that we have seen since the years of Whitlam. This is such a high taxing government that Australians are paying thousands of dollars more in taxes every single year. At the same time, we need to be able to see what state the Budget is in. We want to be able to return people's income tax to them because, let's face it, Australians work hard and they deserve to keep more of what they earn. But unfortunately, because of Labor's spending, because of those baked in measures that they've already put into the Budget, we have to make sure that first and foremost, that we rein that Budget and we get control of the Budget, get that spending under control, because that's the only way to sustainably bring down inflation. And inflation, as we know from the last three years, is the most insidious thief in the night that erodes your savings, eats away at your purchasing power and makes you poorer, brings down your standard of living…

ANDREW CLENELL (interrupts): Jane Hume.

JANE HUME: And that's what we've seen under a Labor Government. Australians have been just poorer under Labor.

ANDREW CLENELL: Just finally, do we really need another referendum in this country? How many dual citizens does Peter Dutton want to deport?

JANE HUME: Well, Andrew, the most important job of a government is to keep the economy strong and keep its citizens safe. Peter Dutton has made it very clear that as a last resort, in a break glass measure, we will do anything that we possibly can to keep Australians safe. Now, of course, it's not policy. We want to make sure that we have legislative fixes because we now have criminals roaming our streets, over 150 of them roaming our streets, because Labor have failed to manage the borders, to manage their migration policy, and to manage law and order. This is a priority for a Dutton led coalition government, and that shouldn't come as a surprise. Australians expect that their government will keep them safe. If Anthony Albanese won't do that, that's up to him to explain.

ANDREW CLENELL: Jane Hume thanks for your time.

JANE HUME: Thanks, Andrew.