Webdiary - Founded and Inspired by Margo Kingston

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G'day. Barnaby did a doorstop with journos at the press release boxes this morning after an ABC interview. Feral, some called it. Noone in the Government handed out a transcript, so I transcribed a colleague's tape.

Q: Will you be making a recommendation to the Queensland Nationals with regards to Telstra, or do you simply provide them with the information and the package and let them tell you what they think you should do?

A: I think what's gunna happen there is that that decision's going to go back to Queensland. It's there now. There are 47 members of our state management committee. They come from every corner of our state and from every section of society, from housewives to the solicitors to the captains of industry.

And what I've said to them is `you must think about this one as carefully as you possibly can'. I wish it was not a good deal so that we could just not sell it, but we have extracted as good a deal as we're gunna get.

It's now, 'You must go forth and talk to your people'. That's what your job is on management - to reflect the view of the people of Queensland. And once you have reflected the views of the people of Queensland, then you must convey to me what you wish us to do.

And that's the job of a political party. In Queensland, my job is to represent my State, to represent the people of Queensland, and I don't believe I have the ability while sitting down here to do that unilaterally.

And so we have a political party and the purpose of the party is to represent views from a wider group of people, and they're doing that now and I'm watching the emails foo backwards and forth as they try to flesh out where we are on this issue.

Q: Senator, the government seems to think you're committed. They think you're committed. How do you explain that perception?

No, we didn't vote in the joint party room for the sale. We've always said that we'll take this job back to Queensland. It's an iconic issue for the National Party. And in the last week, of course, we've had the situation where we don't have a joint Senate ticket with the Liberals. The Liberals will be running their Senate ticket; we'll be running ours.

Unfortunately that means - and we don't have a Coalition in Queensland. We don't have it at the state level. We don't have it in the Senate at a federal level. That means we have to be able to represent the views of the National Party in Queensland.

So it's really an extremely important issue to them, so we've sent it back to our state management committee and they're happy with it. Now they might say it's right - they're happy with it, that we've fulfilled the criteria - or they may say we haven't. But I will certainly be listening to them and seeing what their views are.

Will you follow its recommendation?

Yes.

When do you expect to know?

Oh, I dunno. When they all are - we haven't organised a meeting as such as yet. Everybody's still coordinating, lobbying each other, going backwards and forth, I mean -

How would you characterise the emails that are going to and fro? Are they favourable towards the deal that's out there?

They're all sorts.

Just a couple of weeks ago at the Brisbane conference when Mark Vaile asked for a $2 billion trust fund you indicated that that wouldn't be enough, and you were talking about up to 5. What makes you think now that a $2 billion trust fund is a pretty good deal?

Well it's not - we've got $2 billion, plus we've got another 1.1 so that's 3.1 billion, and we'll just get this point correct. There is public/private partnerships investment in that, and there are some major contracting firms out there who have said that if we tip in a certain amount of money they'll tip in up to 2 to 3 times that amount of money as part of a package, so that really makes the offer a possible $6 billion package.

That's why it must be considered. That's why people have to look at the deal that we've got on the table and decide whether they're going for it or not.

But this is, as everybody acknowledges, this is one of those decisions that can take our party forward - if we get it right - or take our party backwards if we get it wrong. And it's far bigger than what I can make sitting down here, because as you all all know down here there is only one view on Telstra, so we've got to go to another place where it has a more encompassing -

Are you getting encouragement out of the fact that the Prime Minister says that he encourages members to go back to talk with their parties and go back to talk to people? Are you getting any encouragement out of that, because other Coaliton members have been pretty critical.

Well my job under the Constitution has been to represent my State, and therefore I must represent the mechanism that says what that State thinks. I mean that is the obvious position. There is a position if you just want to follow a strict party political line - it's called the Lower House. The Senate has always been the House of Review, it's always been the House that represents the view of the States.

I don't have an omnipetent view of the world that I can garnish what the broader repercussions of the decision are while sitting in an office at the end of a corridor in Canberra. I've got to get back to the people of Queensland, and and I've got to utilise the organisation that's built there to assist me to that decision, and that is the National Party in Queensland.   

Barnaby, you're meant to represent all of Queensland - is there enough money there also for outer metropilitan areas?

Well, that's a question that also will be dealt with I s'pose by the State Management Committee. They will be looking at it, and one of the key issues that is coming back is, 'Do we have enough information at this point of time to make the decision?".

Is there going to be a Management Committeee meeting on this and when would that be?

Well they're talking about a link up, but I think, ah, there's people up there at the moment, and I'll jump on a plane this afternoon and fly up myself and go have a yarn to a few of them.

So when will that committee meeting be and will Mark Vaile be involved in that directly?

Mark Vaile certainly has an observer right on the Queensland Management Committeee, and I'll get up to Queensland this afternoon, because it is absolutely crucial, and sit down and start talking to the key players and see what they say.

So when would it be finalised? When would the meeting be?

We haven't set down a concrete date. I think it's a case of everybody's quickly running around trying to find out what is the best decision. And the key thing I'm saying to people is, "Don't worry about what's happening down here, walk down the street and talk to the people in the area and see what they think."

What do you say to people within the government who suggest that the fact that that National Party now has the balance of power in the Senate had nothing to do with the extent of the largesse the government has offered to sell Telstra?

Well, I'd say that you'd have to reflect on the decision that went through the Lower House - that was the position of the Government - and you'd have to reflect on the decision we've got now. There's only one reason that it's gone from there to there, and that is because the National Party has extracted that deal, because otherwise, obviously, it would have followed the form of the legislation through the Lower House. The only reason that legislation was changed from the Lower House to where it is now is because of the National Party.   

But when Mark Vaile went to the Queensland National's Conference he did proopose a $2 billion trust fund, didn't he. That had already been stitched up.

No, the resolution reads 'a significant and permanent trust fund in its ability to provide parity of service, parity of pricing into the future'. That is what it says. It doesn't mention an amount. 

On another issue, what would make the government's VSU legislation acceptable to you...?

Our position is on the record there. There are two different issues between amenities fees for universities and compulsory student unionism. Compulsory student unionism is over. It's finished, it's going out the door, but amenities fees at university for sporting infrastructure is something entirely different. And how they've managed to box these two issues up is a little bit strange. These are two completely different issues and they should be treated as two issues.

Do you accept now that you'll be told by a group of unlected faceless people in Queensland how to exercise your democratic right and vote in the Senate?

No, that is not correct. You have to get a more encompassing view of what the views of your State are. You cannot get that by sitting at the end of a corridor in Canberra. It's blatantly ridiculous, and it's one thing I have worked out that the views of your state do not come by people knocking on your door. The views of your State have to be achieved by having a far wider net on what the issues are. And it's only when you get out of this place that you start to actually see what those views are.

How would you sum up the first two weeks"

... pause... Unreal.

No regrets coming to the Parliament? No regrets?

No regrets? Of course you have some regrets. Everytime you go home and meet your family you've got a serious regret about what you're missing out on. But, you know, that's the ticket we bought. The reason there's been so much attention ... is that we've got some terribly contentionous legislation right up the front end of the Parliament. I'nm sure if we were passing laws on more work on building sites noone would be interested in it. But we've got some iconic things bang smack at the front end of this term, and so that is what is attracting people's attention.

(What have you learned since you've been here, Barnaby?) I'm learning them every day. I'm learning them right now. I think it's a case of you've always got to go back and recalibrate yourself back to where you came from, and not get so involved in the -

Would you do anything differently if you had your time again? If you could reverse the last two weeks would you do anything differently?

Ummm, possibly.

And what were they?

I'd just manage the process a little bit better.

Senator, how do you feel about Alby Schultz, who was early on in the piece giving you the needle and then he got on the program and said he wouldn't be supporting the sale of Telstra?

That is disappointing to me. It's - Alby seems to go on with a whole litany of derision about me. I've never met the man. I don't know him. But he's got something very personal against me, and I suppose I have to live with that. You know, one day he might actually come over and say hello. That would be a nice experience, but I'm not gunna get dragged into a personal attack about someone I don't know. He's got a problem with me. I don't know him.

This process of going back to Queensland about the Telstra sale, is this a process that you're going to follow with all sorts of other legislation?

No. This is something specific. Just by the fact that all you ladies and gentlemen are here right now, you know that his is an absolutely iconic issue. If we get it wrong it has ramifications for my party, which has no Coalition in Queensland, and I must realise that and I must deal with that.

It is not a case on other issues, and I can't conceive another issue that carries the weight - the gravitas - that this issue does. This issue is unique, has been unique, has an iconic substance about it that really means that the ramifications of my decision affects my whole party, the party that I represent. Whether it goes forward. Whether it survives or not.

And to be completely frank, if the National Party was not to survive, the Australian political environment would become a very much poorer place. It would become very bipolar. You'd really only need four people in the chamber and everyone else could go home. And that is one of the issues here. We have to make sure we get this right, not just for Queensland, not just for the future of the National Party, but for the future of a broader view in the political scene in Australia's future.

So do you think this is as dangerous an issue for the National Party as the GST was for the Democrats? Is the feeling in Queensland, do you think, that people really believe you're coming here to stop the sale of Telstra, not to bargain it or put a figure on it?

"No. We put down that resolution which was unanimously supported. The point is now - have we attained what's in that resolution and do the people believe that we've attained what was on that resolution. At the end of the day this is politics and my job is to represent the people of Queensland -

Could the Queensland Nationals be wiped out if you get an issue like this wrong?

Well just look at what some of the implications of that are. We don't have - in this week the Liberal Party have come out and said they're gunna run their own Senate ticket against us, again, you know? The smart money would have been on them having a joint Senate ticket to limit the implications of the fallout of this decision. But we don't have that. We have two Senate tickets - again. So you do end up in a campaign of product differentiation.

And that means we have to be completely careful about anything - especially a decision like this. And it's in Queensland, because as anyone who's been to Queensland knows, the politics of Queensland is different. It is different to other states.

The last time, in the gun debate, where it was perceived - even though we hadn't rolled over - it was perceived by the electorate that we had rolled over on the gun debate. And instead of attacking, ar, senior Coalition colleagues, they took it out on the National Party. In fact the National Party lost 13 seats to One Nation - 13.

That is how Queensland works. It has its own dynamic. And I - believe you me - not everybody owns a gun, but everybody's got a phone on their wall.

The PM says that you're a good bloke and you're his bloke. Are you? Are you his bloke?

Look, every vote this week we voted with them, because we work in a Coalition. And knows under the Constitution my role, and so did Alexander Downer the other day. Everybody who's read the book knows that my role is to represent my State and there's nothing peculiar about that. They'd expect you to do that.

And especially on an issue that's as iconic as this. And he's the best political operator in the game, he's won four elections, he's no fool. He knows that ultimately he must make a decision that takes people with you, not leaves them behind.

So what's your betting on how it will go in Queensland? At this point what's your betting?

Ar, well, we'll wait and see.

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