Transcript: Interview on ABC Central West, 17 May 2019

EO&E

Journalist:
… most Australians will be heading down to their local school or town hall to cast a vote for the next government. So we're taking a last chance to take a look at what candidates are offering you in this election and we are headed to the electorate of Riverina today, which covers Forbes, Parkes, West Wyalong, Grenfell, and Cowra.  Yesterday we heard from Labor’s Riverina candidate Mark Jeffreson and today we're joined by the incumbent MP, Nationals member and Deputy Prime Minister Michael McCormack. Good morning to you Mr. McCormack.

Michael McCormack:
Good morning from Cootamundra pre-poll.

Journalist:
Thank you for your time this morning. First things first, I mean, how concerned are you by the reports so close to election day that Labor is leading the public opinion polls?

Michael McCormack:
Well, opinion polls are one thing, election polls are another and we have seen in the New South Wales, the recent South Australian, and indeed the Tasmanian, the last Tasmanian election that the opinion polls just got it wrong. The news polls were wrong. Punters, they knew what they wanted when they went into the ballot booth there and they re-elected Coalition governments, that hopefully, I'm really counting on them doing the same tomorrow.

Journalist:
Okay. So, you are not paying too much attention to those public polls?

Michael McCormack:
I never do. Even when they are in our favour, I never do and I have always been that way, there's only one poll that matters and that's the election day poll.

Journalist:
One of the biggest projects affecting your region right now is the Inland Rail, Labor says that it is supportive of project but wants to hold an inquiry to ensure it is being planned to be as effective as possible. Are you confident that the project will stand up to that scrutiny?

Michael McCormack:
Look, I am and well the fact is the scrutiny has been hell. We have been holding 10 years of consultation and that is why I also put in place even further community consultative committees, to ensure that the community was being listened to, but the fact is we have got to get on with this project.  Another inquiry means another delay and we can't afford to keep delaying this project which has been required and asked for, you know, for decades indeed, right back to 1900s where the first plans were drawn up for the Inland Rail. We are getting on and building it. We have dropped the last 14,000 tonness of steel off at Parkes-Narromine, that particular section, not that long ago. We are getting on and we got to build it, and it is going to be a very, very exciting project.

Journalist:
Yesterday you also announced some money for the Parkes Bypass if re-elected, which would allow heavy freight avoid the town centre. I mean, how will you help bring that project to fruition if the Coalition is not returned to government but you are returned to your seat?

Michael McCormack:
Well, yes that is right, it is an election commitment, but you've got to have a vision, you've got to have a plan one truck a minute going through the CBD of Parkes is perhaps one too many. We need to make sure that yes, heavy vehicles do have access to the Central Business District of this very vibrant Central West town, but we need this bypass, desperately need this bypass and that's why I was delighted to announce the $100 million for it yesterday in Parkes as we officially opened the airport upgrade, which we funded to the tune of $1.55 million. So Parkes is, quite frankly, the centre of a real economic resurgence in the Central West and it is going to drive the way through Inland Rail, through the regional airport and through all the economic activity that it's doing it's going to be boom town.

Journalist:
Yesterday on the program we did hear from Labor’s Riverina candidate, Mark Jeffreson, who pushed the point that they want to be spending more on schools and hospitals with assurances from him that the Riverina would be seeing its share of spending. What do you offer the electorate when it comes to education and hospitals?

Michael McCormack:
Well every one of the 125 schools that I represent throughout the Riverina Central West is getting record funding from the Federal Government, and the fact is Labor wants to take over all the state responsibility, but the fact is, you want to make sure that your kids have the best start in life and you want to make sure that you have healthy, healthy services and good E-health services, good hospitals, and we're doing that. Record 60 per cent increase in health and education, but the fact is we can't take every bit of responsibility away from our states too, that's why we partner with them, to make sure that we get the best healthy outcomes, the best education outcomes, we're doing it particularly right across the regions.

Journalist:
We are talking to incumbent Riverina MP, Nationals member, and Deputy Prime Minister Michael McCormack, on the program here on ABC Central West ahead of the Federal Election tomorrow.  Mr McCormack I have to ask you, your leadership role has come under the spotlight in the last year or so, do you remain committed to the role of Nationals’ leader?

Michael McCormack:
Absolutely, and I've only been the leader for a year or so, so yes there has been a lot of leadership speculation, often just conspired by journalists but I appreciate that there is always going to be healthy competition around these places and I know there is an obsession with leadership amongst the media, whether is the Nats, whatever party it might be, and I'm sure that's only going to intensify after tomorrow because obviously there's going to be winners, there's going to be losers, but I stand by my record of what I've done through The National party leadership. I stand by the infrastructure that we've been able to roll out, I stand by the fact that I've been a regular visitor to all of my members and others besides their electorates to make sure that regional people have that voice in the parliament, to make sure that regional people are listened to and then their wishes, their requests, their demands, their expectations, are, you know, I do my best to try to meet them.

Journalist:
Mr McCormack we've got about 30 seconds before we head to the news but, more broadly, I just wanted to quickly ask you, are you prepared or are you thinking that your party will take some hits tomorrow more broadly across the country?

Michael McCormack:
I'm not expecting them to, no, we've delivered. We've delivered mobile phone towers, more than 1,000 right across the nation, we've delivered in health, in education, we've delivered in water infrastructure, the National Water Grid that I've established is going to make such a difference taking the politics out of building more dams, and weirs, and pipelines. I've got on with the job with the $100 billion record amount of money that we're spending on infrastructure and I'm really looking forward to tomorrow, to meeting as many people as I can at the various polling booths around the Riverina.

Journalist:
Mr McCormack, thank you for your time today.

Michael McCormack:
Thank you so much.

Journalist:
Thank you, that is Deputy Prime Minister Michael McCormack, incumbent MP, Nationals MP for the Riverina.