TRANSCRIPT – 6PR Perth
5 December 2024
E&OE
Topics: Albanese’s $20,000 Flowers for ASEAN Summit
Gary Adshead
Now then, having been to a few of these kind of occasions where you turn up at something that maybe the government's got a role in, and you might be a sit down dinner, right, for example, and there's usually these big floral arrangements that are there. Do I ever stop and think about how much they cost if it's a taxpayer funded event? No, probably not. Maybe I should. But some figures have emerged in terms of, under the Albanese government, how much they're paying for flowers, and they've come out through FOI so let's go to James Stevens as the Shadow Assistant Minister for Government Waste Reduction. And James, you think that Albo is wasting money on flowers?
James Stevens
Gary, good to be with you. I certainly do. I didn't know you could spend $20,000 on flowers, actually. But now I know you can, because Anthony Albanese pulled off something quite remarkable here, in my view, which is, racking up $20,000 worth of flowers at a dinner he held in Melbourne.
Gary Adshead
What? One dinner?
James Stevens
Yeah, one event.
Gary Adshead
It must have been a huge event. Was it?
James Stevens
Look, it was an ASEAN event that Australia was hosting. And I fully appreciate that you've got to put some resources into those things. I just don't think that 20,000 on flowers is reasonable. And I'd be pretty surprised if anyone came out of that saying, 'gee I'm glad we had $20,000 worth of flowers at that event. I've got a much enhanced view of Australia thanks to that important investment they made.'
Gary Adshead
Well, there might have been wild flowers, there might have been natives. Of course, that's one thing. But okay, now on that, you would have to agree, though, that this is not particularly the one side of politics. Is it the sort of that kind of expense that we don't really stop and think about too much?
James Stevens
Well, I'd argue we should stop and think about it. Particularly as people are doing it so tough right now. I mean, the average Australian is making difficult decisions, sitting around talking about what they can afford this Christmas that wouldn't be the same as times gone by, and government could be setting an example. Now, maybe there are other examples in the past of spending like this, but I think it needs to come to an end. And $20,000 on flowers is just not what we should be doing with taxes that are paid by by you and I.
Gary Adshead
It's good for the flower producers, though, that obviously have the contract.
James Stevens
Well hopefully, because someone needs to do well out of $20,000 worth of flowers. But I'm sure even the humble florist listening right now, would be pretty surprised to get an order of $20,000 worth of flowers from the government so we can bring an end to that sort of expenditure and put some of those dollars back in everyone's pockets. I'd like to see that.
Gary Adshead
Okay well, there's an election not far away. I mean, are you making pages around this sort of stuff in terms of expense? Because, as I said, I mean, and I'm pretty sure I'm on safe ground by saying that Anthony Albanese himself wouldn't have signed off on the flower arrangements for the tables, but, but clearly, you know, when these kind of events are being organised, there's a machine. A machine of Government and Public Service that, you know, tick off the boxes, right? We need flower arranging. We need this. We need that. Might be a gift, whatever the case may be. Are you saying you'd knock that on the head?
James Stevens
Absolutely, I think we need to send a message into the bowels of the bureaucracy that they need to start setting a better example with the judicious use of Australian taxpayers money. Now, of course, we need to have events like this dinner. Did we need to spend $20,000 on flowers? I think the dinner, yes, the 20,000 of flowers, no. And Peter Dutton has made it very clear, and part of him appointing me to this role is that we know that every dollar that the government spends is $1 out of the pockets of Australian taxpayers, and we shouldn't spend a cent more than is absolutely necessary. In this case, $20,000 on flowers was completely ridiculous.
Gary Adshead
Now you also did turn up the fact that was it the same event where a particular entertainer had been paid a considerable amount of money to entertain?
James Stevens
Ms Mauboy, yes, she got more than $40,000 for one night's work, which is, again, you know, good for her, but maybe a little bit extreme when you think about all these things adding up. And that's the point I'd make. You know, flowers here, Mauboy there, all these things add together to be quite a lot of money. And it's money out of your pocket and mine.
Gary Adshead
So just to clarify, you would actually take a policy to the next election, which says that you would promise to cut down on this kind of, what you call waste. Would you put a figure on it, though? I mean, how do you define it? Because I would imagine, you know that the floral arrangements are pretty commonplace in terms of government functions.
James Stevens
Look, I think Peter Dutton will send a very clear message if we're lucky enough to be elected, that he expects the bureaucracy to make very judicious decisions when spending money. And these are the sorts of examples that he and I and others will be giving to the department and say, in the future, we don't want to see this kind of excessive expenditure. Now, yes, we're not going to make every decision about every event and sign off on every individual invoice, but we can certainly say to the leaders of these government departments, we'd like to see you find some ways to be more judicious with taxpayers funds. Let's save some money, put it back in people's pockets. Government is very big, but we'd love to see it a little bit smaller, and particularly we'd like to see some of the unnecessary waste trimmed away.
Gary Adshead
Are you looking or have you already looked at travel? Because, of course, that's probably one of the biggest budget items that goes in terms of government, the amount of travel that Ministers do.
James Stevens
It's not just Ministers now. I mean, look, we've just had the COP conference over in Azerbaijan, nearly 100 bureaucrats went to that and we really wonder why it is necessary for more than 100 people on the taxpayers' dime, to fly to Azerbaijan for the COP conference. It's important for Australia to be there, probably not with 100 people, though, and that's one of many examples where there's a lot of excess expenditure going on, lots of travel, as you point out, other things that meaning that, you know, taxes are higher than they would otherwise be if we didn't have all that kind of waste. So my job from Peter Dutton is to zero in on this stuff, point it out. And obviously, if we're lucky enough to win the next election, cut it out.
Gary Adshead
All right. Well, you're going to have to practice what you preach. I'll keep this media release somewhere tucked away for for next year. If you do win the next election.
James Stevens
Gary you can hold me into account on that absolutely.
Gary Adshead
I'll be checking out the flowers on your table at your first function. James, thanks very much for joining us.
James Stevens
Thanks so much, Gary.