Interview with Ali Moore, ABC Radio Melbourne Drive

16 January 2025

ALI MOORE: Well, Jane Hume is a Senator for Victoria and the Shadow Minister for Finance, and joins you in the studio. Senator Hume, hello.

JANE HUME: Good to be with you, Ali.

ALI MOORE: And let's actually start on that. That is, those employment numbers. A bit of good, a bit of bad. It's not always easy explaining why the numbers end up doing what they're doing. But do you think that it does mean less of a chance of an interest rate change prior to the election?

JANE HUME: Well, we know that Michele Bullock has been looking for real changes from some of the data that the RBA consider, labour force figures, of course, one of them, in fact, the labour force figures today show that the unemployment rate hasn't changed since, since May 2022. In fact, it was 3.9% back in May 2022 when the government changed, and now it's 4% so it's interesting to see that…

ALI MOORE: But you’ve got to look at the participation rate as well.

JANE HUME: Yes, but you've also got to look at the size of the population. We've had a massive increase in migration over that period of time. So, there's more people in Australia, and there's more people being employed, but the unemployment rates stay the same, and actually it's slightly higher.

ALI MOORE: How big is the Coalition reshuffle going to be that Peter Dutton is?

JANE HUME: You're asking the wrong person. That's definitely a decision for Peter Dutton.

ALI MOORE: He hasn’t sat you down and said Senator Hume, what would you like?

JANE HUME: Look, Simon Birmingham and Paul Fletcher have very big shoes to fill. They were important roles, Foreign Minister, obviously, Government Services is one, and also Manager of Government Business in the House is a really big portfolio too. Digital Economy is another one. Look, the good news is we have so many very qualified members of parliament on the Liberal Party and the National Party sides, just on the back bench or in the outer ministry that can fill those roles, but they are very big shoes to fill, and that will be decision that the leader makes.

ALI MOORE: And you're staying where you are?

JANE HUME: Well of course, you serve at the pleasure of the Leader, whatever, wherever he would like you to go, but he's asked me to be the shadow finance minister with a view to becoming the finance minister. And it's a job that I love, and it's a job that I hope to take on.

ALI MOORE: We've talked about it a bit this week on this program, the fact that both parties have been out of the starting gates pretty early in 2025 in the lead up to the election, actually, can I just ask you, what are you, what are you tipping? The fifth of April? The 12th of April? I reckon. I've heard more people say the 12th of April than any other date. What do you reckon?

JANE HUME: Look, I tipped the 12th of April the other day, and I got into trouble in my office because they don't think that that is the case. But…

ALI MOORE: What do they think?

JANE HUME: …We should be running a book, quite frankly, but I'll say that I've already got it wrong once I actually thought that the election was going to be in December, but there was so many missteps by the Government at the end of last year, starting with Cococabanas and Qantas and then the sort of CFMEU debacle, there was no way that the Prime Minister was going to call an election when all of that was hanging over his head, so I can see why he has waited for the new year.

ALI MOORE: And the 12th makes sense to you?

JANE HUME: It's certainly an option. It's a live option on the table, and it wouldn't mean that they wouldn't have to go to another budget. And of course, this is a budget that is almost inevitably going to return a deficit. That's not something that the government wants to say. I mean, the last two surpluses have been windfall surpluses caused by high commodity prices and inflation kicking up bracket creep, and so there's been a high income tax take, but there hasn't really been any cut to spending. So the surpluses that we've had haven't been real surpluses. They've been windfall surpluses. They're not going to be able to sustain that. And you don't need to look too far into the budget books to see that there's already a $7 billion black hole that's cropped up in the MYEFO Budget. That's the budget update that we have in December, because the number of public servants is blown out by 36,000 and the Public Service have also been given an 11% pay rise, but the Treasurer and the Finance Minister failed to account for that in the budget numbers. So when you see the public sector wages, they actually flatline. The growth flat lines over the next four years. Now that is impossible. If you say you're not going to cut the public service, but you're also giving them a pay rise. How can it flatline? So there is at least $7 billion we think that is missing somehow from those budgets.

ALI MOORE: Would you cut the public service?

JANE HUME: Well, the public service, as I said, has grown by about 20%. It's grown by 36,000 and Australians expect and deserve an effective and efficient public service. There is no doubt about that, a world class public service, and we'll be looking very closely to make sure that we have a public service that delivers on its promise to Australians.

ALI MOORE: But does that mean the public services are too big?

JANE HUME: But a big government, big Australia, big government, big spend is not the coalition's approach to managing the economy.

ALI MOORE: So is it too big? Is the public service too big?

JANE HUME: Well, there is a tipping point at which point the public service, the public sector crowds out the private sector and actually becomes a handbrake on growth. We want to see a thriving public sector. If you overtax, if you overspend, you can actually put a hand break on growth.

ALI MOORE: But what does that actually mean? Does it mean that, in your view, currently, where the public sector is sitting, it's too big?

JANE HUME: Well, it's very hard to speak of in a macro sense, but you do want to look at it in a micro sense. Let's go through each department and see whether they are delivering on the services that Australians expect and deserve, because there are plenty that don't. Just because the public service has grown doesn't mean it's delivering a better service. In fact, when you look at things like the Department of Social Services under the Coalition, you had to wait around 35 days if you applied to get a pension. Under Labor, even though they've increased the size of the public service and we're paying so much more for it, that number blew out. Well, it blew out to more than 70 days at one stage, it's come back to 48 days. But it's still more even though the public service is bigger. If you apply for a low income card, you have to wait five times longer now than you did just a few years ago. So bigger public service isn't always better. We want an efficient public service.

ALI MOORE: Couple of texts here just asking, When will coalition policies be made obvious? I know that you were there with Peter Dutton on Sunday when he did his, I don't know, would you call it a campaign launch?

JANE HUME: Well, we call it a campaign rally, rally.

ALI MOORE: So at his rally, but he has a 12 point plan, a list of ambitions, but no detail at all. So when do we get numbers, timelines, real ideas, if you want to cut red tape, if you want to streamline government services, all these sorts of things, you actually put some numbers and some some detail around it.

JANE HUME: Well, we've actually been announcing policies since the first few weeks of opposition. You'll recall that we announced a pension work bonus, allowing pensioners to take on extra days or hours of work without eating into their pension. We did that, I think, about six weeks after we hit opposition. We've announced a nuclear policy, which is a game changer in our energy sector. It's a fundamental shift and such long term thinking, which we know people are looking for. They want to get past the short-termism of electoral cycles, and that's exactly what this policy does. We've announced 10 additional Medicare funded psychology sessions. This has been going on for a long period of time. Even on Monday, we announced increased funding to Crime Stoppers. So the policies are there. They are coming. They will be fully costed by the time we get to the election. There'll be plenty of time for Australians to consider the genuine alternative to get the economy back on track.

ALI MOORE: Do you like that slogan? It’s not exactly original, is it?

JANE HUME: But doesn't it, it rings true. I think that's what people are worried about now. They're worried that the Government has lost its way, that they've stopped representing the interests of the people that voted for them and started just dealing with their own interests. We want to make sure that you know that the government is entirely focused on growing the economy, growing the pie, so that all Australians can prosper in the future. We want to make sure that we get inflation down, getting cost of living under control, get affordable homes available for particularly…

ALI MOORE: There is a 12 point plan that Peter Dutton put out on the weekend. Jane Hume is with you. Senator Jane Hume, Victorian Senator, Shadow Minister for Finance, a couple of just quick questions before I let you go Senator Hume. In Victoria, we've got a new Liberal leader, Brad Batten, he was with you. Nice photos that you posted of the two of you together on Sunday. What do you make of him?

JANE HUME: I've known Brad for years. I think he's a terrific fellow. I can remember when he was first pre-selected, and was talking about his time running a bakery, which, you know, it's fantastic of someone with that small business experience, I think.

ALI MOORE: Better than John Pesutto?

JANE HUME: Oh, I love John, too. I've got to say I've known John for just as long and they're both very, very dear friends and great liberals with a fantastic liberal compass. I think that…

ALI MOORE: Are you disappointed, though? I mean, do you understand why John Pesutto needed to go?

JANE HUME: That's not a decision for me. That's a decision for the Victorian parliamentary team. And in the same way that I, you know, the Victorian parliamentary team shouldn't meddle with the Federal parliamentary team, I don't meddle with them. But I can say that Brad's a terrific fellow. I heard him on your radio show a couple of days ago, I think it was Monday.

ALI MOORE: Monday.

JANE HUME: Monday, and I think he's going to make a great leader.

ALI MOORE: Social media, you're quite big on social media, and you post quite a lot of videos and that sort of thing, including the odd cocktail, should you wish to look it up. Do you make and post them yourself?

JANE HUME: Yeah.

ALI MOORE: You do. And I'm curious, is that sort of where you see in the lead up to an election, is that where your focus will be in terms of the communication? It's a direct form of communication. We talk about that a lot.

JANE HUME: Yeah, look. I mean, I think it is really important to be able to speak directly to people. And yes, some of those social media posts are quite frivolous, and that's fine, but some of them are quite serious as well, and often it's about getting both messages across at the same time. There was one that I did in the office in Canberra, where I was talking about the economy, but cutting a mango at the same time. Well, I couldn't believe how bananas people went about this way that I'd cut a mango. It was very strange.

ALI MOORE: Actually I saw that, and it was very unusual. It was a very unusual way of cutting a mango. But I will leave that for people to work out.

JANE HUME: It's really important to be able to speak on all forms of media and social media included.

ALI MOORE: And to learn to cut a mango too, I might even say. Final question, though, unofficial history of the Australian Open. You are a Victorian.

JANE HUME: Yes.

ALI MOORE: You got a memory?

JANE HUME: I look, I do. I can remember going to the Australian Open when it was at Kooyong tennis club, but back in the day, and there was a hole. And this is terrible. I'm about to, I think I'm about to confess something to your there was a hole in the fence, and I was after school, because it was during school weeks, in those days, and a group of us in our school uniforms all snuck through this hole in the fence and got in for free. Isn't that terrible?

ALI MOORE: I don't know, there's no name on this text, so I can't ask you whether or not you went to the same school, but it says went to school next to Kooyong, Glenferrie Road. Used to jump Gardiners Creek, scale the fence to watch the games at lunchtime. One day, officials and police asked a big group for tickets, rounded them up, put them in a police truck to present to the principal. We saw this and we took off.

JANE HUME: I wasn't one of those but if I had of known, I was such a goody two shoes. If I hadn't known that that was even a possibility, I would have stayed home.

ALI MOORE: Thank you very much for joining us.

JANE HUME: Thanks Ali.