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Speaker 1: Good morning.
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Speaker 2: Welcome to the show.
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Speaker 1: This November the 11th, Remembrance Day in Australia, observed annually, a national day of commemoration to honour all Australian service personnel who have died or suffered while serving in wars, conflicts and peacekeeping operations. I don't know if you're listening to breakfast with Will and Stacey this morning on 5AA. Listeners called in with their recollections and memories of family members and friends who served their country. I think it'd be a nice idea to continue that this morning. If you have a story that you'd like to share with us, Please give us a call on 8223 0000. Well, Peter Malinowskis has laid bare the crisis facing aged care in South Australia. At a specially convened meeting, the Premier revealed damning new data predicting 700 aged care patients would be stuck in South Australian hospitals by next winter without urgent federal government action. And that, he said, is the equivalent of taking almost three South Australian hospitals offline. All the invested parties were there, except the person who could do something about it. Although invited, Aged Care Minister Sam Ray was a non-starter. His office said he only had four days' notice to attend, so obviously he had something more important to do with his time, although what that is hasn't been revealed.
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Speaker 2: Now, hang on a minute.
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Speaker 1: He's the Federal Aged Care Minister. This was a crisis meeting about aged care, but he didn't think it enough of a crisis to bother to attend. Parliament isn't sitting this week, so there were no parliamentary duties or question time commitments in Canberra. And although Sam Ray's office said there was a scheduling conflict, he didn't say what it was. Is his non-attendance symptomatic of how the Labor government dismisses the elderly and at a time in life when they need and deserve support? If Sam Ray had found time to attend the crisis meeting, he would have heard Premier Peter Malinowska say the state's health system is at breaking point, warning people will wait longer for an ambulance in life or death situations and of elective surgery delays. But Sam Ray wasn't there. He had something better to do. Mind you, Federal Health Minister Mark Butler didn't even get an invitation. The state government shouldn't get off lightly either. This is the government that promised to fix ramping in 2022. Four and a half years later, not only did they not fix ramping, it's in fact much worse. It's disingenuous of Peter Malinowskis to now blame aged care patients stuck in South Australian hospitals for a ramping crisis. So is it just now that the state government realises that South Australia has an ageing population? What's changed since 2022? When I promised to fix ramping, it was already obvious the federal government was underfunding the aged care sector, yet the Premier promised to fix ramping. Yes, the Albanese government must carry most of the blame for the lack of aged care beds, but the Malinowskis government isn't blameless, coming to power on a promise to fix ramping, a promise it had to know it could not keep. Shortly, we'll speak with Health Minister Blair Boyer. Also on the show today, lots to talk about, a We'll talk actually with Graham Corns, Vietnam veteran, about Remembrance Day and its significance. Overseas, impeachment charges have been filed against US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth. We'll speak with Seven News correspondent Rob Scott about that. We'll also speak with 5AA Canberra correspondent Michael Packie. Chris Bowen is at the COP conference in his role as President of Negotiations. and his spending spree at our expense. We'll speak with Michael Packie about that. The Prime Minister, meanwhile, has jetted off. He's heading for the conference too and other points around the world. And the AI guardrails have been announced. What are they and what will it mean? An interesting subject to the hearts and minds of many 5AA listeners. What if retirement isn't 20 years anymore? What if it's 35 or even 40 years? Australians are living longer, but are we financially prepared for it? New research from Challenger and Stanford University suggests traditional retirement planning needs a rethink. An Australian couple aged 65 now has a 43% chance that at least one partner will reach 95. Not good news today for those battling power bills. Electricity prices could nearly double by 2029 as delays to major renewable energy projects threaten to leave the country without enough power generation to replace our ageing coal plants. According to modelling by energy consultancy firm Reistad Energy, wholesale prices could rise from about $ 60 to $ 110 per megawatt hour, which raises fresh questions about Labor's promise that its renewables transition will deliver cheaper electricity. Reistad senior analyst David Dixon warned the pace of coal closures was outstripping the construction of replacement renewable energy. He says we're exiting coal at double the rate at which we're building renewables. And because we're not installing enough wind, prices will be squeezed. So there it is, folks. If you didn't think power prices or you thought power prices were too high already, it appears that wholesale prices could rise from about $ 60 to $ 110 per megawatt hour by 2029. A frightening thought indeed. It's 13 past nine, 5AA. Well, 700 aged care patients could be occupying beds in South Australian hospitals by next winter without urgent federal government action. The grim prediction from Premier Peter Malinowskis at an aged care crisis meeting in Adelaide today. South Australian Health Minister Blair Boyer was there. Minister, thanks for your time today.
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Speaker 3: Good morning, Graeme.
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Speaker 1: Just how dire is the situation?
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Speaker 3: It is dire.
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Speaker 4: The number of people in a South Australian public health bed, most commonly a hospital
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bed, who are there because they are awaiting an aged care bed but can't get one. In October of 2022, that number was 60. That's when the counting started because basically before then the number was zero and that number has grown and grown to get to 500 now. And the projections that we released yesterday, Graeme, show that if nothing is done about it and we have the same level of growth in the next 12 months that we've just had, that figure could get to 700, which is the equivalent of all the beds at Modbury, the QEH and Norlunga, essentially offline, because they're occupied by an elderly South Australian who doesn't want to be there and their doctor says they don't need to be there, but they can't get themselves a residential aged care place.
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Speaker 1: That number of 700, is that a worst case scenario or a realistic prediction?
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Speaker 4: Well, it's actually just if we had the same level of growth in the next year that we've just had. So it's not even assuming that the possibility of the growth being larger in the next 12 months than it has been in this 12 months. And the figure is 698 in that scenario. So it is not by any means sort of, you know, a fanciful figure, unfortunately.
00:06:59
Speaker 3: It is a real possibility that we get there.
00:07:03
Speaker 1: The Commonwealth said it's offered substantial additional funding, including a $ 2 billion reform package, which the state's rejected.
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Speaker 2: Was that a mistake?
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Speaker 4: I mean, we're talking about two different things here. The federal government talking about health funding, and it is right that the last agreement with the federal government increased that to states, but that is separate to aged care funding, which is a federal responsibility. In the breakup of state-federal relations, it is a federal responsibility, and it has been now more than a decade of a lack of investment in it, and to put a bit of context around it, The number of new beds that Australia, the nation, needs every single year for years now is 10,000 new beds. It's a staggering figure.
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Speaker 3: Australia last year.
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Speaker 4: Graeme, got 800, 800 of the 10,000.
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Speaker 3: So we are going backwards.
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Speaker 4: And it's true of us in South Australia, particularly because we're the oldest mainland state.
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Speaker 3: We have the longest wait time.
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Speaker 4: But every other state and territory is now feeling the same increase, every single one.
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Speaker 3: Exponential growth in the number. The number of new beds.
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Speaker 4: For residential aged care being opened, particularly memory support beds for people who might have dementia, and that is a growing figure, not keeping pace with.
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Speaker 3: The actual demand.
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Speaker 4: And that's leading to the situation where the 700 new beds that this government has brought into the system since election in March 2022... that will get to 1,000 new beds. But if we get to this 700 figure next year of people waiting for residential aged care, it's essentially all those new beds are occupied and that extra capacity absorbed by people who are in a bed who actually don't want to be there and don't need to be there.
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Speaker 1: Now, Federal Aged Care Minister Sam Ray wasn't there yesterday. His office says you gave him just four days' notice. Was this sufficient?
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Speaker 4: We gave them six days' notice and there was plenty of people there, I can tell you, who I think probably had less notice than that who managed to get there.
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Speaker 3: I think that's plenty of time.
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Speaker 4: It was a packed room and everyone there managed to drop everything and get there, including the Premier. So I don't accept that there wasn't enough time.
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Speaker 1: There will be further opportunities. Why wasn't Federal Health Minister Mark Butler invited?
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Speaker 3: Well, Sam Ray is the Minister responsible for aged care.
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Speaker 1: But he's answerable to Mark Butler.
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Speaker 3: Yes, yes, no, you are correct.
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Speaker 1: So wouldn't it be ideal to go straight to the top?
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Speaker 3: Well, we have already done that.
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Speaker 4: I mean, the health ministers' meetings, which is the regular sort of meeting we have with the Commonwealth Minister and all state and territory health ministers, has had this on the agenda and talked about it on a number of occasions. The next meeting of that is actually in Adelaide on the 11th of December. So that will be another opportunity because that's on the agenda for us to talk about the very same issues again with Minister Butler there.
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Speaker 3: But it was also an opportunity for us to try to engage more closely in this.
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Speaker 4: Sam Ray is the Minister for Aged Care, but it's not as though we have not been having conversations with Minister Butler or that he's not aware he understands the extent of the issue. He absolutely does. But what we were saying in the purpose of yesterday's crisis talks, Graeme, was Short of the long-term solution that's needed around Australia getting the beds it needs for now until the next 30 years, until our population ageing kind of finally plateaus, what support is there going to be for states like us and every other state and territory to actually get through winter demand periods next year where we've potentially got the equivalent of three of our metropolitan hospitals offline because they're full of people who are waiting for a residential aged care bed? The flow-on effect of that He's quite incredible. You know, if beds on the ward are occupied by people who need aged care, then people will wait longer in the emergency department, which means people will wait longer in the back of the ambulance on the ramp, which means ambulances will wait longer to go back out after they've offloaded a patient to pick up someone else who's called
triple zero. And then you also get the flow-on effect on some occasions to elective surgery. So people who are desperately waiting for a hip or a knee to be done or something like that who can't because of the pressures within our public hospital system.
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Speaker 3: So it just washes through absolutely everything.
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Speaker 4: And it's not just a now problem and it's not just a South Australia problem. Our population over 65 in our state will go from 226,000 where it is now to 441,000 in the next 30 years.
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Speaker 1: Minister, this has been a known quantity. Let's wind it back a minute. You're laying the blame totally at the feet of the federal government. Your government came to power promising to fix ambulance ramping when it came to office in 2022. That's a failure of state planning. You knew back then that there was an ageing problem, that South Australia had this crisis situation evolving, and yet you still said, we will fix ramping.
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Speaker 2: You didn't.
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Speaker 4: No, I understand that we didn't deliver on that, but it was not because we didn't think that it was possible. We did it with the best of intentions, with the commitments that we made in terms of staff and beds.
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Speaker 1: But you knew the population was ageing. You knew that South Australia was getting ever older. and they would need beds, and those beds weren't available, and those beds would be occupied by aged care people, you know, you really shouldn't have made that promise, should you?
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Speaker 4: Well, let's just look at that for a second. That is true. We knew about the ageing profile.
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Speaker 1: But you still thought you could fix ramping?
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Speaker 3: Well, I mean, what we did, Graeme, was add hundreds of extra beds.
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Speaker 4: 700 and it will get to 1,000.
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Speaker 3: So we did build capacity. It's exactly what we did.
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Speaker 1: But you didn't fix ramping. You said you would fix ramping. What changed? Why couldn't you fix ramping when you said you could?
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Speaker 4: Because we've seen growth that wasn't predicted by anyone here or elsewhere in Australia.
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Speaker 1: The growth wasn't predicted? We knew the ageing population.
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Speaker 3: Not just ageing.
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Speaker 1: Where did they all come from?
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Speaker 3: Not just ageing.
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Speaker 4: Presentation is separate to ageing to emergency departments. That's also what has grown really considerably.
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Speaker 1: I'd like you to quantify those. What sort of presentations are they? What for?
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Speaker 2: What conditions?
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Speaker 4: For everything that you might go to an emergency department for. The increase in presentations to emergency departments in our state alone since 2012 is gone up by 54%. Over the same period, the population's grown by 15%. Calls to 000 have gone up by 70%. And call-outs by the ambulance service have gone up 30%.
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Speaker 2:
So population is.
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Speaker 1: Down, is that an issue because we're allowing too many people into the country?
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Speaker 4: Well, no, my point is that the 15% doesn't account even for a third of the increase on... presentations to emergency departments. That number in terms of presentations over 14 years has been 54%.
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Speaker 3: Only 15% of it accounts for population.
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Speaker 4: So yes, of course, population growth adds pressures like that, but it doesn't account for all of it. And I'll just reiterate that when we did come to government in March of 2022, the number of people waiting for a residential aged care bed then, which is now 500, was zero.
00:14:10
Speaker 2: Yeah, but you knew that was going to grow. Well, not like that.
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Speaker 1: Where did they come from? Where did they come from? I mean, ageing population, people getting older, where did all of a sudden this great influx of ageing people come from? You must have known they were there or moving to old age groups.
00:14:29
Speaker 4: Indeed, but is it not the federal government's responsibility to build them the beds they need?
00:14:33
Speaker 2: Well, then you shouldn't have claimed you can fix rent.
00:14:36
Speaker 3: Right, but I'm a bit confused.
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Speaker 4: Are you suggesting that The state should just take over aged care.
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Speaker 2: Personally, I'm suggesting you shouldn't have said you could fix ramping. What does that do for state debt and things like that? I understand that.
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Speaker 1: You should have suggested you shouldn't have said you were going to fix ramping when you patently knew you couldn't.
00:14:53
Speaker 4: But we didn't patently know that we couldn't. That's not true, Graeme. We thought we could, and when the commitments we made around new beds and extra staff didn't deliver what we promised, we went over and above that, and then we went over and above it again. And you're right, it still didn't reach the commitment that we made.
00:15:09
Speaker 3: I accept that.
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Speaker 4: But this sort of suggestion that we did it knowing that we couldn't achieve it is not right.
00:15:15
Speaker 3: It's not right.
00:15:16
Speaker 4: We made the commitment around ramping in the honest way belief that we could achieve it. And when the initial commitment we made around the extra beds we'd opened, that'll end up being 1,000. The extra staff above attrition that we have employed, that will be over 4,000. The budget going up from 7 or 8 billion a year to 11 billion a year, when that didn't do it, we kept increasing it to try to get there, and we haven't been able to.
00:15:42
Speaker 2: Minister, I'd suggest you were badly advised.
00:15:45
Speaker 4: Well, I mean, hindsight is a great thing, but, you know, and I've been honest and frank about the fact that we didn't meet that commitment.
00:15:53
Speaker 3: I'm not suggesting otherwise. But, you know, I.
00:15:57
Speaker 4: Will contest the suggestion that the commitment was made in the knowledge that we couldn't do it.
00:16:02
Speaker 3: That wasn't the case.
00:16:03
Speaker 4: And, you know, the federal government, whether people like it or not, is responsible for aged care. And the reason that we have 500 people in our hospital beds is because they haven't built enough beds. Now, what's the state government done? Record investment in beds, staff and budget. Record investment in all those three things. We have come to the party and tried to do our bit and we are asking the federal government at a minimum just to do their bit.
00:16:29
Speaker 1: So what commitment can you give that elderly patients will have a bed in the years to come?
00:16:37
Speaker 4: Well, the federal government needs to be building 10,000. But we have also, I might add, We have built hundreds of transition beds where we can, you know, at the Pullman, at College Grove, at Hampstead Rehab, which are kind of a step-down bed so that people who are currently in an acute bed at a hospital who don't need to be there have somewhere more suitable for them to go as they wait for that residential.
00:17:02
Speaker 3: Aged care bed.
00:17:03
Speaker 4: And then we can free up the hospital bed that they were in for someone who, you know, is coming in an ambulance or waiting in the ED or something like that.
00:17:11
Speaker 5: So.
00:17:12
Speaker 4: You know, there are heaps of aged care people waiting for an aged care bed who are actually in those transition beds at the Pullman, at College Grove, at Hampstead that have been funded and built by the state government.
00:17:24
Speaker 3: So we have absolutely stepped into that space.
00:17:26
Speaker 4: We've just closed applications on $ 250 million of no-interest loans to aged care providers.
00:17:32
Speaker 3: From which we hope that we can.
00:17:33
Speaker 4: Generate 650 new beds here in South Australia that wouldn't otherwise have come online. And we've said that we'll set aside a big chunk of the existing women's and kids for aged care when that switch happens in 2031. And we think we can do 600 to 650 aged care beds there as well.
00:17:52
Speaker 1: Minister, thanks so much for your time today. The Minister for Health and Wellbeing, Blair Boyer.
00:17:56
Speaker 2: There it is, folks.
00:17:57
Speaker 1: Despite all the things the government has done, they've said it themselves, 700 aged care patients could be occupying beds, South Australian hospital beds, by next winter without urgent federal government action. Has the state done enough? They have done a lot. There's no question about that. But it goes right back. I mean, how far do you want to go back when they built the new Royal Adelaide Hospital? It was never big enough. It was one of the most expensive buildings on the planet. It was originally budgeted, what, $ 2.
00:18:27
Speaker 2: 8 billion.
00:18:27
Speaker 1: It exceeded that, I believe. But it was barely bigger than the old RAA. So, you know, we can trace
it way, way back. Then there's the immigration factor. The population has grown beyond what they expected, and now we're all paying the price. Frank says, morning, GGs. Just remember, Labor have been in power for 22 of the last 26 years, and Malley was the one who introduced reforming health. Back shortly.
00:18:51
Speaker 2: 5AA Mornings with Graham Goodings.
00:18:54
Speaker 1: 27 minutes to 10. Lots of reaction to the Minister for Health and Wellbeing, Blair Boyer's appearance on the show. Lots of texts and calls. Love to hear from you. 8223 0000. We'll get back to those shortly. But firstly, my next guest right now is 5AA' s Canberra correspondent, Michael Packie.
00:19:12
Speaker 2: Michael, good morning to you.
00:19:13
Speaker 6: Good morning, Graham.
00:19:15
Speaker 1: Lots to talk about. Firstly, let's start with Chris Bowen. COP31 is underway.
00:19:20
Speaker 6: Yeah, look, this climate conference is underway in Turkey. This is the conference that was meant to be happening in Adelaide. You might remember there was that big stoush between Australia and Turkey as to who should host it. And then Turkey ended up becoming the winner and they ended up getting the rights to host this COP climate summit. But Australia is taking part and has been made head of negotiations for the summit and Chris Bowen holds that role. He is the head of negotiations for the climate summit. That's essentially the compromise that was reached when Australia lost the rights to Turkey. And Albanese, the prime minister, he's on his way to Antalya in Turkey for these talks as well. And obviously, Graeme, it's always the same question that's asked about these things. Did they actually achieve anything? What we've seen today is that the government says that it wants to continue pushing ahead with renewable energy projects, but it also has to concede that power prices haven't fallen fast enough as a result of all of this renewable energy that's in the market. and that there's, quote, more work to do to offer and deliver bill relief for households that are already struggling with the high cost of living.
00:20:46
Speaker 1: I don't know about you, Michael, but my power bill hasn't come down.
00:20:49
Speaker 6: No, mine hasn't either. You know, when you look at those power bills every quarter, they don't seem as though they're coming down. Well, look, they might be coming down marginally, but nothing that what had been expected. And that's because the suggestion is that prices are expected to continue going higher. There's a story this morning in The Australian suggesting that prices could double by 2029, so what, two years away? And that's because the cost of delivering energy is just skyrocketing. That's because there's delays in building these wind farms. There's also got the closure, especially in Australia, States like New South Wales and Victoria, the closure of coal-fired power plants, and some of that's happening in Queensland as well. So there are these issues that are serious issues for the government to have to deal with, and also for state governments to have to deal with as well. And now you've essentially got the federal government in Chris Bowen, the climate and energy minister, admitting that wholesale prices... are high and they're unlikely to deliver bill relief for households. But despite that, the government is still going to be really pushing ahead fairly aggressively with its renewable energy plan.
00:22:06
Speaker 1: Well, Chris Bowen is also in the gun with Australian taxpayers over the amount of money that we're having to pay for his position as president of negotiations for COP.
00:22:16
Speaker 6: Yeah, look, so the amount of money we're paying is It's been estimated at about $ 150 million. That's Australia's commitment to this COP summit. The suggestion is that if it was held in Australia, if it was held in Adelaide, the cost would have been about $ 2 billion. So that's how the government is trying to justify the saving. It's saying, well, if we held it in Australia, as the government did want, the cost would have been about $ 2 billion. By the conference being held in Turkey, Australia still has to contribute to the cost. It's about $ 150 million. I suppose you could argue, though, that if it was held in Australia, it may have cost $ 2 billion, but maybe the benefit or the broader benefit to the Australian and South Australian economy may have been greater than that.
00:23:05
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's the way it was sold by our Premier, Peter Maranowskis, that it would have been a huge economic.
00:23:09
Speaker 2: Benefit to the state.
00:23:10
Speaker 6: Yeah, that's right. And so, in the end, we lost out. And, I mean, like, you do wonder, you do wonder if one of the reasons that Australia did lose out is because for a lot of the European countries... that would have to travel to Australia. It's a fairly long trip. And given the emissions that would be emitted, travelling from Europe to Australia, that may not be a good look compared to travelling between somewhere in Europe and to Turkey. So you do wonder what all of these reasons are and the machinations behind some of the decisions that were made. But the broader question here is, Graeme, regardless of where these conferences are held, Are they actually going to achieve anything? And really, what everyone wants to know, if you're going to talk so much about renewables and that renewables are meant to deliver cheaper power and bill relief for households and for businesses, for that matter, people aren't seeing that yet.
00:24:07
Speaker 1: Yeah, and there's an embarrassing side issue for a state where the government is pushing towards renewables and lowering emissions, and yet we're more than happy to ship off coal overseas to pollute the atmosphere in the Northern Hemisphere.
00:24:20
Speaker 6: In terms of exports, yes.
00:24:21
Speaker 5: Yeah.
00:24:22
Speaker 1: So, you know, that's a hard sell. Speaking of hard sells or soft
sells, evidently Chris Bowen's free coffee is being well received in Turkey.
00:24:31
Speaker 6: Yeah, I heard that they're spending about $ 32, 000 on Turkish coffee, which I think is being provided to delegates and people at the Australia stand and obviously to other dignitaries that are there. So there you go. It's weird the way some of these sorts of things work out. But yes, Australia is providing free Turkish coffee and allegedly it's been well received.
00:24:56
Speaker 2: I'm sure it is.
00:24:57
Speaker 1: I hear they're queuing up.
00:24:59
Speaker 6: Well, there you go.
00:25:00
Speaker 5: There you go.
00:25:01
Speaker 1: Do you know if the Prime Minister has got to COP yet? I mean, he's headed off overseas in the.
00:25:05
Speaker 5: Last 24 hours.
00:25:06
Speaker 6: Yeah, he's on his way now. So basically what happened, he stopped in Singapore early this morning. That's where he went to a chapel to honour those that have died in war. He's made a Remembrance Day commemoration in Changi at Singapore, and now he's continuing to fly to Turkey for the conference. I'm assuming he'll arrive soon. later tonight, our time, or early tomorrow morning, Australian time, where he'll have to, you know, deliver a couple of speeches and meet with the delegates. And that's the first of 11 days of travel. The Prime Minister is away for the next 11 days after the COP summit in Turkey. He then travels on to the Philippines and then on to China before coming back to Australia for various regional conferences. And look, Graeme, I know that people do criticise the PM or any leader from either side of politics when they travel a lot. The timing isn't great. I acknowledge that. The timing isn't great for a lot of these trips, but it's when they happen. And I would argue that world leaders and a country like Australia does need to be part of the conversation, whether or not he needed to go to COP. You know, there's questions over that. Maybe that could have just been handled by Chris Bowen. But he definitely needs to go to the ASEAN summit in the Philippines. He does need to go to APEC in China. There's also side summits that are happening there. Like, for example, in the Philippines, you've got the Australia summit. In China, you've got one-on-one talks between China and Australia. So I do think that Anthony Albanese does need to be at those sorts of conferences. We are a major player in this region. There is a lot of trade to be done and to be discussed. So I'm not overly critical of the Prime Minister travelling overseas to meet with world leaders. I know it's always controversial. I know that these summits happen in a cluster, so they're all happening one after the other. But I believe that as a world leader, he does need to be there. And Australia, especially in the region, does have an important role to play. and that we do need to be seen to be on that world stage.
00:27:20
Speaker 1: Yeah, I must say I agree with you, Michael. I think, you know, you
can criticise Anthony Albanese for a lot of things, but as a leader of a country of some significance, he does need to meet and greet and meet face-to-face with leaders from around the world. And I think regardless of the party and, you know, prime ministers of other persuasions are being criticised for the same thing, but I think they do need to travel.
00:27:43
Speaker 7: That's right.
00:27:44
Speaker 6: They're both to it. Whether it's Liberal or Labour, who've been in power, they both have to travel. And you've obviously got to... You're travelling to a global deadline. The bottom line is these summits, you know, happen at a very much... at a much... a global level. They're not going to just say, oh, well, the politics don't suit the Australian government at the moment, so let's delay the conference.
00:28:04
Speaker 1: I mean, that's just.
00:28:05
Speaker 6: unrealistic. It's just not going to happen. If this is called summit season, that's the name for it, because there's one summit after the other. And I do think it's right that the Prime Minister is just away for those summits. There's no point in him going to a summit, coming back to Australia, flying back out again for the next one. I just think that he just travels over the next 11 days, knowing where these summits are going to be, does what he needs to do, has the talks that he needs to have. and deals with whatever he needs to deal with while he's overseas. I think that he would probably be criticised even more heavily if he was flying up and down to attend these summits.
00:28:47
Speaker 2: Yeah, most certainly.
00:28:48
Speaker 1: Well, before the Prime Minister did leave, he announced AI guardrails.
00:28:53
Speaker 5: Yeah.
00:28:53
Speaker 6: Look, this was done yesterday, and this was part of a rapid review. You may remember a few weeks ago we heard that an AI bot, an open AI bot, managed to infiltrate a Medicare database. And since then, we've heard a fair few stories of these AI bots infiltrating various government websites. So essentially, this rapid review has made 18 recommendations. Probably the key one is that there's going to be greater oversight of when these breaches happen, that these tech companies such as OpenAI, Anthropic, all these sorts of companies, if they know of a breach, especially to any website, but I suppose a government one, is that they've got to report that breach. And what the government is now going to start looking at is how they can criminalise and put penalties in place if these companies do breach and fail to report that there's been a breach. So I think there's a long way to go on this, but that's what the Rapid Review has found. It's made 18 recommendations. The main one is that there's great oversight and someone is appointed to oversee these AI companies to make sure that they are reporting in a timely fashion if there's been some sort of a breach in whatever system.
00:30:13
Speaker 1: Michael, always great to chat. Thanks for your time today. 5AA' s Canberra correspondent, Michael Packie. 8223 0000 is the number. Love to hear from you. 5AA Mornings with Graham Goodings. 12 to 10, 5AA from the text line. GG, shock, horror. Electricity prices to continue to increase, even doubling in two years. Labor's useless energy policies killing Australians and Australian businesses. When will the Australian voters wake up? We don't earn the ridiculous salaries and enjoy the many perks that politicians do. Even more reason to have a debate about nuclear energy, especially South Australia. Thanks for that, Steve. Let's take a look at the stock market. The All Ords is down by 0.3%. ASX 200 also down by 0.3%. Dow Jones down by 0.3% also. NASDAQ down by 0.7%. Oil, Brent Crude, currently $ 92 a barrel. West Texas, $ 86 a barrel.
00:31:00
Speaker 2: Gold, $ 4, 032 an ounce.
00:31:01
Speaker 1: The Aussie dollar is slipping, now buying 68 US cents. Jim, good morning. How are you doing?
00:31:19
Speaker 5: Good morning, Graeme. How are you going?
00:31:21
Speaker 1: Good, thanks.
00:31:21
Speaker 5: Of course the Aussie dollar would be slipping when the oil prices are going down.
00:31:25
Speaker 8: Of course that would happen, Graeme.
00:31:27
Speaker 1: Yes, well, we'd want petrol prices and diesel prices to come down.
00:31:30
Speaker 2: That would be nice.
00:31:31
Speaker 5: Yeah, but we want our dollar to be high and we can buy a bit more oil for our money. Graeme, before I talk about Remembrance Day and what it sort of means, congratulations on that interview with the Minister at that moment ago. Young journalists or young broadcasters or older broadcasters need to listen how to control a politician without being aggressive or mean or nasty and to give them little bits of bait and to let them out of the situation where they still don't accept it. That was a really, really good lesson to anyone who's interested in your profession, Graeme. They should study at university classes.
00:32:06
Speaker 2: Thanks for that. Yeah, well, it was pretty revealing, I think. Well, you're on.
00:32:09
Speaker 5: The point and hard at him, but respectful, Graeme.
00:32:12
Speaker 1: Well, yes, he deserves that. And I mean, he's a good Blair Belloy, he's a good man, and I believe he's a good minister. The policies of the government have to be called into question.
00:32:22
Speaker 5: I tell you what, he's good at trying to dictate the narrative, but you're at him like a pit bull to the throat of a bad guy, Graeme.
00:32:30
Speaker 6: We'll be respectfully, though.
00:32:31
Speaker 3: Good on you, Jim.
00:32:32
Speaker 5: The whole Harvey Radio School could play that to the future broadcasters and they'll learn a lot.
00:32:37
Speaker 2: Now, you want to talk about Remembrance Day?
00:32:39
Speaker 5: I do, Graeme. I played a year of football in the SGL for a team called Proprietary, which is props, they called them. They've now become the Lions. I don't know how a pamper and a tiger turns into a lion, but
that's what happened to that club. And the old secretary there was an old fellow called Mr. Arnold, John Arnold, and he was taken prisoner or up Java way, Timor way, by the Japanese, and he was spared because he was a draftman and could read blueprints when all his mates were executed in the ocean. I had an Uncle Norm who was my dad's sister's husband, and he flew Kitty Hawks at the same place during the war. And when he got back from the war, sadly, the war didn't end for him, and he took his own life 20 years after. He was a smart man, an educated man who taught himself to fly before the war and rode speedways, industrial chemists. and it sort of didn't end for him. But when my lad joined the Defence Forces, I've told you about before, his first deployment was peacekeeping up in Timor, and an old fellow who was related to the guide he had, he was taken prisoner by the Japanese and built a hospital in the side of the mountain in Timor, and he took my lad through it. My lad reckons the hospital looked.
00:33:48
Speaker 8: Like the Japanese had moved out the day before.
00:33:50
Speaker 2: Is that right?
00:33:52
Speaker 5: So that's three people in my life that had all gone to the same place, and the lad went to Afghanistan. I told you about that. Yeah.
00:33:58
Speaker 6: But my Uncle Norm, if he.
00:34:00
Speaker 5: Hadn't have passed away, guess who his son-in-law would have ended up being, Graeme?
00:34:04
Speaker 2: Tell me.
00:34:05
Speaker 5: Bon Scott, because my cousin Irene married Bon Scott in 1972. Wow, there's a story. And that was Aunty May's daughter, and that's Uncle Norm's daughter. And his son-in-law would have ended up as Bon Scott.
00:34:16
Speaker 9: So how's that for a small world?
00:34:18
Speaker 2: Beautiful, Jim.
00:34:19
Speaker 1: You always tell a good story. Thanks for your time today. Well, impeachment charges have been filed against US Defence Secretary Pete Hexeth. The House of Representatives has just met to discuss the matter. to talk us through it, is Seven News correspondent Rob Scott. Rob, what can you tell us?
00:34:35
Speaker 2: Look, good morning.
00:34:36
Speaker 10: Look, I can bring you breaking news out of the US House of Representatives. They've just voted to refer these impeachment articles to a committee which effectively kills the move to oust Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. So it's a Republican-led house. They voted 211 to 204 to send it to a committee, which means that Hegseth is safe for now. But the Democrats have vowed to, quote, run him out of town when they take over Congress next year after their thumping wins in the midterms last week.
00:35:09
Speaker 2: So that's breaking news.
00:35:10
Speaker 10: Hegseth safe for now.
00:35:13
Speaker 1: From afar, Rob, what intrigues Australians, the move to impeach Hegseth was taken by Republican Representative Thomas Massey.
00:35:23
Speaker 2: Yes, that's right.
00:35:25
Speaker 10: He's an outgoing Republican from Kentucky. He has been a thorn in
the side of Donald Trump throughout this latest administration, so much so that Trump actually decided to back someone else in the primary. So that meant that Massey was no longer up for re-election this time. And but, you know, even before he did that, he has been a staunch critic of Donald Trump all the way along and very, very much against this war from the start. He is the one who led this push to oust him, introducing the eight articles of impeachment, mostly to do. with Hegseth's conduct during the Iran war, but also accusing him of abusing his power and going against the Constitution with regards to the kidnapping, is how he put it, of Nicolas Maduro in Venezuela last year, and also those killings that we've seen on the strikes on several drug boats in the Pacific and the Caribbean.
00:36:18
Speaker 11: So, yeah, he is a Republican.
00:36:19
Speaker 10: He did leave this charge, but he.
00:36:21
Speaker 9: Is on the way out.
00:36:23
Speaker 1: So what was Pete Hegseth's reaction to being impeached or impeachment charges laid against him?
00:36:30
Speaker 10: Well, look, we always expected a defiant response from Hegseth, and that is exactly what we got this morning. He stood up really early this morning at the Pentagon to basically defend his record, labelling these allegations against him as sabotage, a political circus and all of a farce. And he defended his record, saying that everything he did was lawful and came as a result of lawful orders from the commander-in-chief, so from Donald Trump. And Trump watched that press conference. It went for about half an hour or so and afterwards put out this truth social, giving him, and I quote, an A + + + + for his performance. So he is standing by Hegseth for now. But as we know with Donald Trump, he stands by his people until he doesn't. And if the heat continues when Congress is run by the Democrats next year, we'll see if that support continues.
00:37:27
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, the Democrats take control in January. Do you think Hegseth believes those charges will be pursued at that time?
00:37:36
Speaker 10: I think he'd be silly not to. The Democrats have been trying to push for an end to.
00:37:41
Speaker 3: This war basically since it.
00:37:42
Speaker 10: Started, and they have had Hegseth in their sights for a long time. Actually, a lot of Republicans, while they didn't support this move to impeach him, They have said publicly that the reason, or one of the main reasons, that they got thumped in last week's midterm elections was because of the war.
00:38:02
Speaker 3: Deeply unpopular.
00:38:03
Speaker 10: A recent poll found 71% of people were against it. But not just unpopular, they're also deeply against it because of the impact it's had on the economy in the United States, pushing up gas prices, and as a result, pushing up the cost of everything.
00:38:18
Speaker 1: Rob Scott, thanks so much for your time. And that breaking news regarding Pete Hexeth. 8223 0000 is the number. On the text line, Bill says, should aged care minister Sam Ray be sacked? If the feds aren't going to build aged care facilities for the needs of 10,000 people per year, then someone should go. Is it Sam Ray? Is it Mark Butler? Or will it be Prime Minister Albanese at the next election? As you may know, if you're a regular listener to 5AA, Mark Butler often appears on this program. He was scheduled. to appear in the next week or so, but he has other commitments. So unfortunately, we will pursue Mark Butler and get him on the show as soon as we can and ask the questions that need to be asked. David says, the reason power prices will stay high is government gave power companies guaranteed profits. And so to fix ramping, we just need a big new old age complex with 700 plus beds. Thanks for that. And regarding power prices, Karen says, So many are struggling with the price of gas and electricity but apparently we give our gas away for free. Why is this? It makes no sense whatsoever. Shouldn't we be looking after our own country?
00:39:28
Speaker 2: Exactly, Karen.
00:39:29
Speaker 1: We've put this to not only the government, but to the opposition, and they all fall into line that we can't tax our gas exporters, our gas producers, because, well, I don't know why, but other countries do it and do it successfully, but for some reason, we can't in this country. 5AA Mornings with Graham Goodings. Eight minutes past ten on 5AA. It's Remembrance Day, a national day of commemoration to honour all Australian service personnel who have died or suffered while serving in wars, conflicts and peacekeeping operations. If you have any recollections, memories of family members and friends who've served their country you'd like to share with us, give us a call. 8223 0000 is the number to ring. Well, two South Australian friends created a lasting memorial to Australia's Vietnam veterans with the Vietnam War Memorial Walk on York Peninsula in South Australia. One of those was Roger Hodgman, who joins us now. Roger, good to talk to you again.
00:40:27
Speaker 9: Great, Graeme, good to speak again, yes.
00:40:29
Speaker 1: Yeah, now, when we last talked, had the walk just started? I think it was open, wasn't it, the official opening?
00:40:37
Speaker 9: Yes, it was open, and we had a great turnout for that, which was really good. And since then, we've had a lot of veterans come over to walk the walk as well as others.
00:40:51
Speaker 1: Yeah, well, take us back to how did you come up with the concept?
00:40:54
Speaker 2: What was the thinking?
00:40:59
Speaker 9: Basically, it was two old mates dribbling over a cup of coffee, Graeme, but there didn't appear to be any memorial to those who served in Vietnam. People tend to think that... It's men with rifles wandering around the country shooting. But there's a lot more to it than that. We wanted to recognize all those people that served this country in Vietnam. And that included civilians, people like the entertainers and
civilian nurses and doctors, as well as all of the military people, the cooks, the doctors, all of the groups that went there.
00:41:43
Speaker 1: So it's all well and good to have this idea, but how did you go about making it work?
00:41:49
Speaker 9: Spending too many hours on a computer chasing information. It took two years to get it up, but we were very fortunate. We approached the Australian War Memorial and people like the Vietnam Veterans Association of Australia and all those groups that we thought may be interested in it to support and provide information for us. And that worked out really well. As well as that Department of Veteran Affairs, we applied for a major grant from them and achieved that grant, which enabled us to actually fund the storyboards and all the signage that went along that walk.
00:42:37
Speaker 1: So what, at about a three or four kilometre walk?
00:42:41
Speaker 9: It's 3.7 kilometres, the actual walk itself, and it's part of the Walk of York path on the peninsula, and it's a very comfortable walk. It's not steep, and most of it is bitumenised, so it's comfortable to walk, and even with people with walking aids.
00:43:02
Speaker 3: Excellent.
00:43:03
Speaker 1: And as you walk along, there are information posts along the way?
00:43:07
Speaker 9: There are 27 boards along the walk describing the individual, not the individuals, the groups that were there. So there are boards that reflect the ships that the Army had. The Army actually had four landing craft there. One or two of them actually took Centurion tanks from Sydney to Vietnam. So they weren't little tinnies. They were big boats. but the helicopter pilots that flew with the Australian Navy attached to the American Air Force, all sorts of stories along those 27 boards.
00:43:49
Speaker 1: Excellent. So, Roger, tell us about your story, your service as a veteran.
00:43:54
Speaker 9: I was called up as a National Serviceman, along with about 60 other individuals. I was one of the ones that went to Vietnam. I was in the infantry and 4th Battalion Royal Australian Regiment. When I joined them, the designation of that battalion was 4RAR, Royal Australian Regiment, slash NZ, which was the New Zealand contingent. So we had... Most of the battalions that went there had three companies, three rifle companies. Ours had five rifle companies. We had Victor and Whiskey Company, which were the two.
00:44:34
Speaker 9: New Zealand companies, so we were truly an ANZAC battalion. And there were three ANZAC battalions there, so I'm a proud ANZAC.
00:44:42
Speaker 1: So you served your country. How long were you in Vietnam?
00:44:46
Speaker 9: I wasn't there for very long, about four months.
00:44:48
Speaker 3: Four months.
00:44:50
Speaker 9: When I joined the battalion, there were two intakes of National Servicemen going to be released when the battalion arrived back in Australia. So the 6th and 7th intakes were going to be released and the battalion was going to reform with
only 130 men where they should have been reforming with about 600 so anybody that joined them in the latter stages came home and I was one of those that joined them late but stayed with the battalion and we came back into Australia to Enoggera and then shifted to Townsville to the task force up there.
00:45:29
Speaker 1: What sort of reception did you get when you came home?
00:45:33
Speaker 9: We were fortunate. It was the first tour of the 4th Battalion, and when we came back, there had been some controversy over marches, but we arrived back in Brisbane and marched through the city of Brisbane, and I believe we were the last ticker tape welcome. We were wary that there may be some confrontation, but there was none. It was a very good march. And then the difficulty came with the fact that we marched through Australia. We came from Vietnam, marched through Australia, through Brisbane, and then flew home. And there was no debrief back in those days. So we weren't sort of released with any knowledge of what we should do or shouldn't do.
00:46:27
Speaker 1: How hard was it to re-assimilate?
00:46:32
Speaker 9: I found it okay. I had a very good employer in Port Lincoln, and he was more than keen to get me back into work, and that served me very well. I had a problem.
00:46:49
Speaker 10: With the RSL.
00:46:51
Speaker 9: The first Anzac Day I went to, I was actually in uniform, and I was told that I hadn't fought in a real war and I had no right to be in their uniform.
00:47:00
Speaker 1: And this was from the RSL?
00:47:03
Speaker 9: That was from a drunken RSL member at the bar who hadn't bothered to go to the dawn service where I'd been. But I took it personally. I shouldn't have, but I did. I was a bit fragile, I guess, at that stage.
00:47:22
Speaker 1: Understandably so. I mean, that is horrific. In hindsight, it just seems how... the men who served their country, who were like yourself. You're a national serviceman. Your marble came out of the barrel. It wasn't your choice. You served your country to the best of your ability, and then to have the RSL or members of the RSL turn their back on you, that must have just been devastating.
00:47:45
Speaker 9: Yeah, it didn't seem right. We were given one year's membership of the RSL when we arrived back in Kethwick Barracks on discharge. But I threw my badge away. But having said that, the RSL is a very good organisation. It was a politically strong organisation in that era. And it changed over time. And now the presidents of the various sub-branches tend to be Vietnam or Afghanistan veterans, whatever. So it's had to change and keep up with the times. Some of the clubs haven't, but the majority have, and I think that's really important.
00:48:32
Speaker 1: So, Roger, as a veteran, what does Remembrance Day mean to you?
00:48:37
Speaker 11: It's interesting, Graeme.
00:48:39
Speaker 9: I'm visiting a school this morning, Maitland Central School, and I've been asked to... They're putting on a Remembrance Day service, and I've been asked to lay a wreath with one of their students. Since we've done the walk.
00:48:58
Speaker 9: John and I and my partner Jan have spent a lot of time talking to school groups about war, what it means. And it's amazing the number of really young primary school kids who are really interested. And a lot of the schools spend a lot of effort on war. looking at Australia's history, including our involvement with wars and peacekeeping operations. And so it's been really... I think that it's important that veterans talk about our involvement. and let the younger people know what that involvement was and as much as we can, why, and why it shouldn't happen.
00:49:49
Speaker 1: Roger, well said. I agree with you 100%. Thank you so much for your time today. Thank you so much for your service. And thank you so much for the Vietnam War Memorial Walk on York Peninsula.
00:49:59
Speaker 2: Great to chat.
00:50:00
Speaker 9: And thanks for letting us talk to you about these things, Graeme.
00:50:03
Speaker 1: It's great.
00:50:04
Speaker 2: Good on you, Roger. Great to chat. 5AA Mornings with Graeme Goodings.
00:50:09
Speaker 1: To calls in a moment but first from the text line hi graham why a federal government will not tax gas exports as a valued commodity japan south korea and malaysia rely heavily on australian gas and reportedly warned the federal government that sudden tax hikes could threaten their energy security the business council of australia and industry lobby groups actively campaign against changes arguing a flat tax would dry up long-term energy investments and ultimately drive up domestic power prices. So lobbyists rule in place of looking after the mere plebs. Thank you for that, Bill. Very insightful. But I mean, other countries do it.
00:50:43
Speaker 2: Look at Norway.
00:50:44
Speaker 1: Norway tax oil and gas profits at a rate of 78%. Is that dissuaded investment?
00:50:50
Speaker 2: Not so.
00:50:51
Speaker 1: Qatar, I don't know what their rate of tax is, but they do tax their exports. Australia is very coy. We don't want to upset anybody.
00:50:58
Speaker 2: Greg, good morning.
00:51:00
Speaker 13: Yeah, g'day, Graeme there. Good mate of mine. He was 3rd Battalion Rifles, he just passed away recently and your previous caller, I concur with what he was saying about the vets coming back and copping some, you know, really, what can you say, unfortunate insults and stuff that really wasn't needed or called for and it used to get to my mate, you know.
00:51:29
Speaker 1: I can imagine, yeah.
00:51:31
Speaker 13: And I'd chat to him and he you know a tear would come to his eye and that and he was really really hurt about stuff like that but suffice to say you know you move on and he put one foot in front of the other and he um you know he kind of had a love hate thing with the RSL and that he wasn't condemning anyone and you know he wasn't holding grudges because you know stuff like that's no good for
you he said and stuff but he he moved on and But he was telling me, yeah, he had a couple of those really sort of horrible incidents. But then again, on the flip side, his time in the Army, he was in 72. So one of the up there in 71, 72, 3rd Battalion Rifles. I won't mention his name because not right now. But, yeah, he was telling me about things. And I'd say to the young ones out there, if they're not sure about, just go up to a vet. And say hello.
00:52:33
Speaker 5: Yeah.
00:52:34
Speaker 13: On Anzac Day or something. And just strike up a conversation and stuff like that. And you won't say anything out of the ordinary. And you'll know what to say. And that's how I kind of learned growing up. I come from a military family anyway.
00:52:49
Speaker 1: Greg, I like your thinking. I really like your thinking. That's a nice way of looking at it. And, you know, there are so many veterans, the Vietnam veterans that copped it. I can remember the era well where it was– You know, you came back from Vietnam and you were treated like poison. And you hear the RSL turn their back on Vietnam veterans. And many of these were conscripts. They didn't go to fight for their country willingly. They were conscripted. And yet they came back having served their country and were turned on, which was an absolute disgrace and an embarrassment to the country. Thankfully, that has largely changed now. But the scars run deep.
00:53:26
Speaker 2: Mark, good morning.
00:53:28
Speaker 14: Morning.
00:53:28
Speaker 8: How are we today?
00:53:29
Speaker 2: Good, thanks.
00:53:30
Speaker 8: Wouldn't it be a real shame if you actually found out that if you put 10 litres into a jerry can at a service station and you didn't get it?
00:53:39
Speaker 2: So, yeah.
00:53:40
Speaker 8: Meaning, as in, I just went to a service station, put 10 litres of fuel into a 10-litre jerry can, and it didn't get there. I pulled the manager out. Well, you know, we've been in complaints about that for a while.
00:53:50
Speaker 6: Oh, right.
00:53:51
Speaker 8: So how many pumps in Adelaide are actually ripping off all of us by a litre out of every 10?
00:53:58
Speaker 1: Was it that much?
00:54:00
Speaker 15: Yeah.
00:54:01
Speaker 1: So you've got a 10-litre jerry can. You're obviously trying to fill it up, and all of a sudden it said 10 litres, there's your 10 litres, and you reckon you've only got nine.
00:54:11
Speaker 16: Yeah, correct.
00:54:12
Speaker 8: I've got the receipt for it still too.
00:54:14
Speaker 17: Yeah.
00:54:14
Speaker 1: Look, I'd pursue that. I don't know if it's the ACCC, but I know there are regular inspections of pumps. They're regularly tested.
00:54:23
Speaker 3: It's not the.
00:54:25
Speaker 8: First time I've had an issue with that. Obviously, companies can change names. So a service station owned under a name called, I don't know, Leroy's, owned by a different company. I got fuel from there a while ago when they first reopened, and my fuel pump and all that had to
be replaced. Did that, went back, showed them the receipt and the damage and all that kind of, no, we're not going to repay your fuels. Cost me over $ 350. Yeah, is that right?
00:54:56
Speaker 2: Yeah.
00:54:57
Speaker 1: Look, thanks for bringing that to our attention, Mark. When you've got a jerry can and it's 10 litres or 5 litres or whatever it happens to be, and you go to fill it up and you look up at the readout on the bowser and it says 10 litres and your jerry can is only three quarters full or around that, you can judge that there's been a mistake and you can pursue it. But when you're filling up your car, you don't really know how many litres it will take to fill it. You wouldn't have a clue. So you just stick the nozzle in, pull the trigger, and you think, oh, well, there it is. I've 45 litres. Are you getting that 45 litres? Is it saying 45 litres and you've only got 40 litres? I know they do checks on a regular basis and I think there's a pretty hefty fine if you're running or giving or dispensing the incorrect amount of fuel. But yeah, we will pursue that matter further. Thanks for that. John, good morning.
00:55:49
Speaker 5: Good morning, Graeme.
00:55:50
Speaker 18: Firstly, respects to the service people.
00:55:54
Speaker 19: That gave, many of which gave their lives for our country. On a less respectful note, the Usman.
00:56:02
Speaker 10: Khawaja book thing, I refuse to call.
00:56:05
Speaker 19: It sandpaper gate because I'm sick of the gate reference. It was water gate, not water and gate. So that annoys me for no other reason than I get annoyed easily. But the thing that really shocked me was 7.30 dedicated half of their program to interviewing Khawaja last night. And I'm thinking.
00:56:27
Speaker 20: You've got to be kidding.
00:56:28
Speaker 19: There's got to be more important things than other than giving him more promotion for his book.
00:56:33
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's a good free hit for the book.
00:56:35
Speaker 11: Oh, you're not wrong.
00:56:36
Speaker 19: I mean, that's clearly, he must be rubbing his hands together, I would have thought. I don't know whether the rest of us is boring or anything or what. Obviously, I have no intention of buying it, but I would have thought our national broadcaster with the multitude of stories around, I can understand maybe giving it a five-minute, hit but i kept turning it over to something else until and i was shocked to see it didn't come uh the normal program didn't resume until quarter to eight so yeah well.
00:57:01
Speaker 1: I didn't see the show but i would agree with you i think it's a story of significance no doubt about it but giving half an hour up a national broadcaster uh half the program to um to about a cricket and yeah no yeah i've.
00:57:18
Speaker 19: Yeah, no, I mean, I've gone off the ABC bit by bit.
00:57:21
Speaker 11: I was a big fan. I do watch bits and pieces.
00:57:24
Speaker 19: But I really do think that there's some things that could easily go elsewhere to subscription services.
00:57:30
Speaker 21: I think.
00:57:31
Speaker 2: Yeah, good point.
00:57:32
Speaker 19: But regardless of whatever happens, I think to say that you're going to bring that up and you had no intention of causing any problems is obviously a load of rubbish, and everyone usually has to have some sensationalist bit in their book to sell us, and obviously that's it.
00:57:48
Speaker 1: Well, let's see if it works for him.
00:57:49
Speaker 2: Good on you, John.
00:57:50
Speaker 1: Thanks for your call. Kevin, just before news headlines. How are you going?
00:57:53
Speaker 11: Good morning.
00:57:54
Speaker 18: How are you there, Grant?
00:57:54
Speaker 2: Good, thanks.
00:57:57
Speaker 22: They're going on about this aged care, the shortage of aged care homes and shortage of housing.
00:58:03
Speaker 16: Both sides of.
00:58:04
Speaker 22: Governments, but mainly later because they've been in the longest.
00:58:07
Speaker 8: They've known about this for decades because we have a sense.
00:58:10
Speaker 22: Of 75 years of And that data is used to plan for the future, and they have done nothing.
00:58:18
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah.
00:58:20
Speaker 1: I mean, yeah, censuses are there, so we know what is going to happen. We predict what is happening and so forth. And all of a sudden, this crept up on us. This is a shock.
00:58:28
Speaker 2: And that's what I find.
00:58:30
Speaker 1: Totally unforgivable, that the government, well, hang on, we've got an aged care problem. Well, you know, everyone's getting old all of a sudden. No, not all of a sudden. It's been happening for bloody decades.
00:58:41
Speaker 22: And wasted all this money on net zero, and there's that many scientists, including Nobel Peace Laureates, who have said, there's no climate crisis.
00:58:51
Speaker 2: It's nonsense.
00:58:53
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's a big money business. Good on you, Kevin.
00:58:55
Speaker 2: Back shortly. 5AA Mornings with Graeme Goodings.
00:59:02
Speaker 1: 25 minutes to 11, 5AA, on this Wednesday morning, the 11th day of November. My next guest is Aaron Minney, Head of Retirement Income and Research at Challenger.
00:59:13
Speaker 2: Aaron, good morning to you.
00:59:14
Speaker 11: Good morning, Craig. Great to be here.
00:59:17
Speaker 1: The 100-Year Life, Rewriting Australia's Retirement Rulebook. I guess we've looked at retirement as something, for most people, off there into the future at some stage, and we'll have a certain number of years in retirement. But It looks like we're needing to change the rules.
00:59:36
Speaker 16: That's right.
00:59:37
Speaker 11: I think part of this, we've been looking at sort of how Australians manage retirement, how they finance retirement, how they live their best life. And we've connected with the Stanford Center on Longevity. So it's a US-based research. And they're talking about this new map of life. And what their research is based on is that people these days are living, and they're
talking about the 100-year life. People are living longer. But the old rule book was that you sort of, you learned some stuff when you were young, you worked, then you stopped and had a sort of a short retirement. And what we're finding is that people don't want to do that. And, you know, you're probably a case in point here, Graeme. Not everyone wants to just sort of stop when I hit 65 and not do anything anymore. We can be much more productive. We can be involved. And so the rule book needs to change so that it's not just, you know, once and done, but mix it up, find ways of getting it together, find different ways for people to live a more productive life where they can, but also a happier one. So maybe less time busting your gut sort of in those mortgage-built years, but more time sort of for freedom in older age.
01:00:52
Speaker 1: So are we looking at the fact that traditional retirement age of 65 is pretty well redundant and irrelevant in this day and age?
01:01:00
Speaker 11: It almost is irrelevant because 65% the German Chancellor von Bismarck did that in the 19th century hasn't really moved a lot. We still tend to see people retiring at that age, but it's not everybody. Some are retiring earlier by choice. Some are retiring earlier because.
01:01:20
Speaker 16: They had to.
01:01:20
Speaker 11: Maybe they were injured or had to look after somebody. And then some of those that do retire sort of sit there and after a couple of years and go back, you know what, I'm I still want to connect with my old colleagues. They un-retire. They get back into work and sort of they find meaning. And the other side of this, we've done work looking at how much volunteering people do, giving back to the economy, giving back to the local community. And it's the importance of this, which is sort of keeping our mental health going, which is just as important in retirement as it is in the earlier lives.
01:01:57
Speaker 1: And we're living longer, so that means in years gone by, retirement at 65, you might have another 10 years sort of thing. Now, it could be 25 or 30 years even.
01:02:09
Speaker 11: Yeah, 25, 30 years. If you've got a couple that are about 65, it's almost a 50-50 chance one of them is going to live 30 years. This is what's happening with health and where being better healthily, you know, maybe diet, sort of taking the leg back, but these days that's improving.
01:02:30
Speaker 2: Again as well.
01:02:30
Speaker 11: A lot of the other medical advancements around sort of heart health and sort of other stuff means we are living longer. You know, but we're also not certain exactly how we're going to live that life unfunded. And so this is where this new mapping, in a sense, will change in the world when it comes around to, well, how do you support that? How do you break it up? How do you have, you know, a stable, secure income that gives you that confidence to spend and have the fund while you can, you know, because you may not have that flexibility later on.
01:03:03
Speaker 2: Yeah.
01:03:03
Speaker 1: I mean, when you think about it, I mean, if you plan for the future and say, I'll need X number of dollars per year, and it's open-ended, you know, you might have plenty of money to survive for 10 or 15 years, but nowhere near enough for 20 or 25.
01:03:18
Speaker 7: That's right.
01:03:19
Speaker 11: And, you know, when you talk to people at that stage, It's actually hard to know what that number is. One of the things when we do the research and ask people what they think it is, the most common answer is.
01:03:31
Speaker 20: Almost, I don't know.
01:03:33
Speaker 11: And that leads to one of the things we talk about is underspending. And this is a bit of choice sort of overload. People are so worried about, I don't know, maybe it's 15 years, maybe it's 25 years old. Am I going to need health costs? Am I going to need aged care costs? And then they stop spending now. And, of course, the trouble for these people is someone who's doing that at 65 and 70 might get to 80 and realize, oh, no, I've got more than enough now. But maybe they won't have the opportunity. They'll travel a little bit harder and everything there. So it's about being able to get the most out of the time in retirement throughout life while you can.
01:04:15
Speaker 1: So how do you estimate how much superannuation you'll need to fund 25, 30 years of retirement?
01:04:23
Speaker 11: Yeah, so there's a couple of things. One, for a lot of people, you've got the age pension as well. So you want to add age pension on top of super. And the second thing, and I think this is where it's really important, is to start thinking about not the dollar balance, but the income and your lifestyle. Because if you're spending $ 70, 000 a year as your lifestyle and you know, someone down the road spending $ 50, 000 a year, you're going to need a different amount of income in retirement. You'll still have that same lifestyle. And so the balance you're going to need at the end is different. So I would sort of, if someone, yeah, and I'm doing a bit to you, Graeme, and someone asks me how much do I need, I don't give them a dollar number because the dollar number is not only sort of misleading, it's not only wrong, but it's misleading. You know, you don't want to be thinking about the dollars. You want to think about Have I got my income? Do you want to save with super and build up a balance? But think about, is the income that you've got going to support the lifestyle you want and what you're spending now?
01:05:33
Speaker 1: Are you seeing retirees that are too frightened to spend their super because they're just worried they're going to run out of money?
01:05:40
Speaker 11: Yeah, yeah, we do. We did some work recently with a researcher called Susan Bell, and we actually found there's four different types of retirees. There's those that know what they're doing and they're happy and they're spending it up. But there's some that are
worried about running out of money and they're just cutting back. And they fall into two camps. There's those that are worried and cutting back and they think they'll be okay, but only because they've cut back. And there's those that have cut back but still don't think they'll be okay and they don't know what the solution is. And that's really.
01:06:15
Speaker 11: Sort of the worst hit around happiness and sort of coping with retirement because they don't really know enough about what they need.
01:06:22
Speaker 1: So what are the biggest mistakes Australians make when planning for their retirement?
01:06:28
Speaker 11: Biggest mistake, number one, is not planning. I think a lot of people kick that tyre down the road and sort of, oh, it's a bit hard. So, yeah, first thing to do is sit down, have a plan, talk to an advisor. Even if you sit down with your husband, with your wife, Think about, okay, what are we going to do? What's our life going to look like? How much income are we going to need? And then if you start with the goals, you can figure out the money will follow. The money's there to sort of thing. And that's probably the second one is focusing on the dollars first without thinking about what life means once you stop working or cut back working.
01:07:07
Speaker 1: Aaron, thank you so much for your time and timely advice. That's Aaron Minney. Head of Retirement Income and Research at Challenger. Your thoughts, folks? On retirement, are you approaching retirement? Have you already retired? Are you fearful for the years ahead that you just don't know? You have a certain amount of money and, well, you're going to live like a king or queen for 20 years. But what if you live for another 15 years beyond that? Will the money extend beyond that? It's a fair question to ask. 8223 0000 calls in a moment. Good morning. In regard to our rising power prices, a not-so-wise federal government provided a safety net of revenue to the owners, so they are, as such, guaranteed not to lose financially. It would be nice if we could all run a business with a guaranteed income safety net, Also, is there any way of finding out if all wind and solar farms popping up in our country areas are actually connected to the power grid? Louise at Walkerville. Well, the ultimate aim, obviously, Louise, is to connect them to the power grid. But if there is no connection at the moment, they're going to have to build lines there, aren't they? Because as they build solar farms, wind farms further away from populated areas, there are no power lines.
01:08:22
Speaker 2: So what do they do?
01:08:22
Speaker 1: They have to build them.
01:08:24
Speaker 2: David, good morning.
01:08:26
Speaker 8: Oh, yeah.
01:08:26
Speaker 21: G'day, Graeme.
01:08:28
Speaker 23: I was watching the fast bowler talking last night on the TV, and to me, he looked guilty as all hell when he's saying he had no recollection of the ball tampering, Barger, and he doesn't recall anything. I'm convinced Kawaj is telling 100% the truth. The whole team would have known about that, but they're trying to cover up. I mean, the captain and the vice-captain were both found guilty. It's very, very obvious that the whole team.
01:08:55
Speaker 2: Knew about it.
01:08:56
Speaker 1: I take on good what you're saying, David. I don't know if we can draw those conclusions, but look, I am very sceptical. A cricket team is fairly close-knit and every player on the team handles the ball, you know, in fielding, whether it be the wicket-keeper, the bowlers and so forth. And I find it incredibly difficult. It stretches the bounds of possibility that a ball could be massaged with a piece of sandpaper.
01:09:23
Speaker 23: No worries.
01:09:24
Speaker 9: Thank you.
01:09:26
Speaker 1: You still there, David?
01:09:27
Speaker 6: Oh, yeah, I'm still here.
01:09:28
Speaker 5: Sorry.
01:09:28
Speaker 23: I thought you might have cut me off by now.
01:09:30
Speaker 2: No, I haven't cut you off.
01:09:31
Speaker 1: I was going to say, it stretches the bounds of credibility that the ball could be thrown back to the bowler after being massaged with some sandpaper and he didn't notice anything different.
01:09:41
Speaker 23: And I think they're actually experimenting with it previously to test it out. So the whole team would have known about it, you know.
01:09:50
Speaker 1: Well, we want answers and the Cricket Australia, you know, closed ground. I can't believe that the current captain of Australia who was involved in that test match, Pat Cummins, has not spoken out. I mean, the significant role of the Australian cricket captain, I mean, it's been said that it's the second most important job after the Prime Minister. Well, if that's so... Pat Cummins, come on down. Tell us your story.
01:10:14
Speaker 2: Did you know?
01:10:14
Speaker 1: Were you aware or not? You just can't be quiet and hide behind, you know, oh, that was eight years ago and we said no then and there's no now because we've got senior members of the team saying that the ball was tampered with and everyone knew.
01:10:27
Speaker 2: G'day, Harry.
01:10:29
Speaker 16: G'day, Graeme. Oh, the fast bowler must have changed his position, Graeme. Don't you think?
01:10:35
Speaker 2: He'd been listening to the Prime Minister, I reckon.
01:10:38
Speaker 16: Exactly, yes. And Kawaja, yes, you're just as guilty as the rest of them, mate. You're just the first rat to desert the ship. And as far as the interview with the Labour Minister, Graeme, good stuff. I like your style. Can I say, er, er, er, talking point, uh-uh. Ah, ah, ah, talking point. Ah, ah, ah, talking point. He was scrambling, Graeme. I reckon the notes must have went up in flames. They were being flickered through that fast.
01:11:09
Speaker 1: Yeah, well, it concerns me that they try. I mean, the federal government is ultimately responsible for aged care. There's no question about that. They fund aged care. But the state has played a role in that. They
promised, you know, ramping would be gone. We will fix ramping. knowing full well that the aged care problem was getting worse and worse.
01:11:27
Speaker 2: And they've got to own up to that and wear it.
01:11:31
Speaker 16: Exactly, Graeme. And when will people realise that the Labor Party is the left cheek, the Liberal Party is the right cheek, the Greens is the crack in the middle, and until we get away from our back end, which has led us down the garden path for over 50 years, until we get back to that part in our brain that is sense, common sense... and give this mob, all these three parties, what they deserve. And if I just may finish too, Graeme, I've got a good solution as to where to hold the COP conference, the climate change conference. Yes, I think a very good place to host that would be in low Earth orbit.
01:12:21
Speaker 12: Yes.
01:12:21
Speaker 16: So that when the conference is over, they can just burn up on the way back into the atmosphere. Because let's be honest, Graeme, they're burning the populations of the world now, aren't they?
01:12:32
Speaker 2: Good on you, Harry. Always good to chat.
01:12:34
Speaker 1: Back shortly.
01:12:35
Speaker 2: 5AA Mornings with Graeme Goodings.
01:12:38
Speaker 1: 8 to 11, 5AA on this 11th day of November. I see Qantas is cutting 850 positions, going to move some roles overseas under an outsourcing deal with tech firm Accenture. The airline says hundreds of the roles would go over coming years, with the first changes expected to be in place by mid-next year. Some of the roles will be outsourced to workers in India. I'm wondering how many will go to AI. And then it makes me wonder, if we know in the private sector many, many jobs are going to AI, how many jobs in the public sector are going to AI? Will that be the safest job to have in the future? Because we know governments, of whatever persuasion, are loathe to tamper with the public service because you reduce the number of public servants and they're not going to vote for you. So they have a big public service and it's a big pool of voters. So how many jobs in the public service will go to AI? What are your thoughts? Love to hear them. 8223 0000.
01:13:35
Speaker 2: Morning, Graeme.
01:13:36
Speaker 1: In regards to the guy ringing in about the 10 litre fuel jerry can, unless you can actually measure what you're putting in, you can squeeze in about 11 to 11 and a half litres into them. So maybe... they can throw things out or that can throw things out. Not saying that pumps are out of calibration, probably are. Thank you for that, Derek. Greg says, petrol pumps should be calibrated on a regular basis and a sticker indicating when the last calibration was undertaken and the next is due. Common practice in the aviation and mining sectors, for example. Yeah, why not? Why couldn't they have a sticker saying this pump was last calibrated on the 24th of October or something like that? So you've got to, A rough idea when it was calibrated. It might be six months ago. It could be way out. Craig says, I put some petrol in my car and it was at $ 1 already and it haven't even gurgled into the fuel pipe yet. They should have dates on pumps when last calibrated. Yeah, that is a very good point. And we might pursue this issue.
01:14:34
Speaker 2: Hi, Graham.
01:14:35
Speaker 1: On Tuesday, I filled a five litre jerry can. It took a fraction over six litres. I questioned the staff and was advised to contact the manager. And Con says, Dad was proud of this country, granting him an Allied Serviceman's DVA pension five years before Age Pension Age. I remember him this 11th day of November. Con, thank you very much for those thoughts. After 11.30 this morning, Australia's got its newest and best big thing.
01:15:00
Speaker 2: What is it? We'll find out.
01:15:06
Speaker 24: On this Remembrance Day, we pause to remember the more than 102,000 men and women who died on the surface of our nation in all wars, conflicts and peacekeeping missions.
01:15:22
Speaker 12: I guess the thing I always remember most is flying alongside a young pilot And he'd been badly hit. His plane was on fire. And I could see this young man with very little chance of survival. And I always think of that at commemorative services.
01:15:41
Speaker 25: And some of them had just come down from New Guinea with scrub typhus and that sort of thing.
01:15:46
Speaker 26: And you'd think that he was coming along nicely, you know.
01:15:49
Speaker 25: And he'd turn you back for five minutes and come back and he would have died.
01:15:53
Speaker 15: Mates of mine were killed in front of me on the side of Hill 317.
01:15:56
Speaker 2: One was dying and yelling at me, what can you do for me?
01:16:00
Speaker 3: Poor bugger.
01:16:01
Speaker 14: I said, you'll be right, mate, we're going to get you out of here as soon as we can.
01:16:05
Speaker 2: Then they bloody will die in your arms.
01:16:09
Speaker 25: You have to realise that there was a full-blown massacre and all the nurses, the doctors had been wiped out. So part of our skill set was to actually train the locals how to nurse.
01:16:24
Speaker 27: Remembrance Day is only natural.
01:16:28
Speaker 3: As a mum.
01:16:29
Speaker 17: We think of our son who we lost in Afghanistan and the.
01:16:33
Speaker 3: Other 40 soldiers who were very proud of all of them.
01:16:38
Speaker 28: One chap next to me, we said to him, don't look over the top.
01:16:42
Speaker 15: I said, yeah, they're gone, I feel his eggs. He thought, oh, he'd have a bit of a pop-up.
01:16:47
Speaker 4: He did.
01:16:47
Speaker 15: He did.
01:16:51
Speaker 29: All of the gravestones had a personal message that had been inscribed by the family of the dead soldier and it was intensely powerful because the men who died at Gallipoli were young boys.
01:17:07
Speaker 30: As we welcomed Richard home in the ramp ceremony, the regimental sergeant major uttered the Anzac Day ode, they shall not grow old as we who are left
grow old. And I think probably for me, for the first time that I've been hearing that for many, many years.
01:17:20
Speaker 1: It struck home to what that meant.
01:17:22
Speaker 30: That meant that there was a young man, a wonderful young man, a great citizen, a great kid, a great sportsman, a great family member, but also a great soldier, isn't coming home and will never grow old.
01:17:34
Speaker 14: The memory of what that battlefield looked like the next day after Long Tan, the sheer emptiness, desolation, the rain had sort of washed everything pretty clean and there was an awful lot of dead bodies on the ground and that will stay with me forever.
01:17:49
Speaker 31: Somebody had left an anti-tank mine in the road and it had 75 pound of TNT in it and my machine gunner walked on it just as he was alongside me and.
01:18:00
Speaker 2: He went to heaven and blew me to hell.
01:18:03
Speaker 17: You become mother, sister and girlfriend to the boys that are dying and so you just have to learn to hold their hand, pretend to be who they want to be and give them the best death they can have.
01:18:14
Speaker 15: 11 Platoon was particularly badly mauled and in the tent next door to him there was one survivor.
01:18:22
Speaker 13: I walked past his tent and here's this fellow sitting in the mud and simply silent tears running down his face and I've never forgotten that.
01:18:33
Speaker 3: And all of a sudden there was a knock on the door.
01:18:34
Speaker 17: And as soon as I'd seen the army man there and the padre, I knew straight away what had happened.
01:18:42
Speaker 3: I couldn't believe it.
01:18:43
Speaker 9: Though.
01:18:44
Speaker 1: Very hard to believe.
01:18:45
Speaker 32: At the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month, we will remember them, lest we forget.
01:18:57
Speaker 33: © transcript Emily Beynon Thank you.
01:19:44
Speaker 3: Thank you.
01:20:22
Speaker 13: Thank you.
01:22:09
Speaker 2: The latest local, national and international news for South Australia.
01:22:14
Speaker 33: This is 5AA News.
01:22:16
Speaker 34: Always Adelaide.
01:22:23
Speaker 35: Partly Guardian 22 with the 11 o'clock news.
01:22:27
Speaker 27: Good morning, I'm Kendall Bretig.
01:22:29
Speaker 35: A national service has been held in Canberra honouring those who served and sacrificed in war and peacekeeping operations.
01:22:38
Speaker 27: Nelson Scott is at the war memorial.
01:22:40
Speaker 36: The national service is taking place here at the memorial 180 years after the guns fell silent, marking the end of the First World War. Governor-General Sam Mostyn has laid the memorial's oldest wreath, first placed in 1934 by the Duke of Gloucester during the site's construction. A fragile cloth poppy worn by First World War veteran Stanley Mason at the memorial's official opening 85 years ago is also on display. Deputy Prime Minister Richard Miles is representing the government. Attendees are remembering everyone who served and those who never came home,
from Gallipoli to Afghanistan.
01:23:18
Speaker 35: While thousands have gathered at Adelaide Shrine of Remembrance to observe a minute's silence. US Defence Secretary Pete Hegsworth has survived an impeachment vote over his handling of the war in Iran. Republicans in the House of Representatives voted 211 to 204 in favour of blocking the move. Seven's Rob Scott says Republican Congressman Thomas Massey had accused Hegsworth of waging war in Iran.
01:23:47
Speaker 27: despite no imminent threat to the US.
01:23:49
Speaker 10: He's an outgoing Republican from Kentucky. He has been a thorn in the side of Donald Trump throughout this latest administration, so much so that Trump actually decided to back someone else in the primaries. So that meant that Massey was no longer up for re-election this time. But even before he did that, he has been a staunch critic of.
01:24:09
Speaker 35: Donald Trump Adelaide's AI camera car fleet will stay on the roads for at least another fortnight. There were calls for them to be taken off the roads immediately as the state government prepares to introduce regulations banning ticketless parking fines. There'll be a vote at next council meeting in two weeks' time, while a motion which passed two weeks ago banning advertising and sponsorship from fossil fuel companies on council land has been overturned. Council staff will now prepare a report into the impact on events like the Two and One Under and the BP Adelaide Grand Final. British actor David Walliams has lost a court bid to stop the press publishing accusations against him.
01:24:53
Speaker 27: Josh Bavis reports.
01:24:54
Speaker 37: Little Britain star David Walliams has been accused in the British press of grooming young women and teenage girls as young as 15. The Guardian and ITV News has been working on an investigation for the past three years, but when they came to publish the stories, he brought an injunction before the court, his lawyer arguing he would self-harm if the allegations were published. The High Court in London has dismissed that bid. Now a documentary has been published claiming he used his fame to target young women. London's Metropolitan Police says it has not received a complaint of that nature and the actor has denied the allegations.
01:25:33
Speaker 35: Queensland researchers have uncovered a decades-long rise in rates of a common skin cancer across Australia and Europe. The team at QIMR Berghofer analyse more than 30 years of data finding SCC rates have climbed steadily over generations. Professor David Whiteman says the sharp increase among women is especially alarming.
01:25:55
Speaker 7: What we actually saw was that rates were rising much more quickly in women than in men. And this was a real red flag for us. Typically, we think that skin cancer is more common in men, and it often is. But in women, it is rising rapidly, and this is quite a concerning finding.
01:26:14
Speaker 35: Turning to 5AA Sport, newsman Gawadja has cancelled all media interviews about his new book. Publisher Penguin has advised several media outlets the former opener will be doing no further radio or TV interviews. Gawadja had been hoping the book would not be remembered for its sandpaper chapter.
01:26:33
Speaker 27: Meantime, in the Sheffield Shield match in Sydney, New South.
01:26:36
Speaker 35: Wales is three for 88 on day one against South Australia. And Chris Fagan has done an Alistair Clarkson, the Brisbane Premiership coach, donating six signed items of Lions Club merchandise to Vinnies in Queensland. It's to raise money for families and individuals experiencing homelessness.
01:26:56
Speaker 27: Now I'm checking 5AA traffic.
01:26:58
Speaker 38: At Everard Park, there are urgent works on South Road right near the Gallipoli ramp. Speeds reduced to 40 k's outbound. Also, urgent repairs at Gulfview Heights. Two southbound lanes now closed on Bridge Road or Bryan's Road just near McIntyre Road. Reports for breakdown on the shoulder of Southern Expressway inbound at Darlington. And watch for debris on Main North Road at Paraka, just near Montague Road. The Mercedes-Benz Sprinter 311 from 69900 Drive Away. It's built for work. Visit Mercedes-Benz Unley Vans today. T's and C's apply. Adelaide's most accurate traffic on 5AA.
01:27:33
Speaker 35: To the weather, a partly cloudy day, 22, cloudy tomorrow, 26, showers easing on Friday, 27, and cloudy for pageant day on Saturday, 22. At the moment, 16 on 5AA, always Adelaide.
01:27:51
Speaker 2: 5AA Mornings with Graeme Goodings.
01:27:54
Speaker 1: Nine minutes past 11, 5AA on this Wednesday, the 11th of November, Remembrance Day. Harry says, G'day, Graham. I still have goosebumps as I do on every 11th day, 11th hour, 11th month. Well done, 5AA. I can never forget. Jeff says, Thank you for such a wonderful Remembrance Day tribute. Thank you for that, Jeff. Joining me in the studio is 5AA' s own Vietnam veteran, Graeme Corns.
01:28:17
Speaker 15: Cornsy.
01:28:18
Speaker 2: G'day, Graeme.
01:28:19
Speaker 1: Thanks for dropping by.
01:28:20
Speaker 15: Thank you for having me. It's a pleasure to be here. It's a sombre occasion.
01:28:23
Speaker 6: Isn't it?
01:28:23
Speaker 1: Yeah, I was going to say, what does Remembrance Day mean to you?
01:28:26
Speaker 15: You know, nothing personally. Sorry about my service, but I just my grandfather was at Gallipoli it was an artillery unit at Gallipoli and he lived that Eric Bogle song when like a big Turkish shell knocked me excuse the language ass over hell yeah and he was evacuated to a first hospital ship and then to England where he recuperated for about seven or eight months and then was evacuated back to Australia and and suffered for the rest of his life. So he was an Anzac, and of course Anzac is such an important part of our country's history. So you think about that, and then you think about on the Western Front, the terrible losses on the Western Front. I mean, that just can't help, I just can't get
over when you see the numbers. 60,000 Australians lost their lives in World War I, and that's more than any other conflict we've been in. I can't help but think of that. I drive down Anzac Highway and there's two memorials on Anzac Highway to return service people. And very rarely do I drive past without some thought about that. So when it comes together on a day of remembrance like this and you have the minute's silence, it is quite moving and personal perhaps.
01:29:52
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think we all have our own thoughts. My marble didn't come out. I'm the same vintage as you. My marble didn't come out. I'm thankful it didn't, and I've got friends who did end up going to Vietnam and how it changed their life, some for the better, but some with lasting scars.
01:30:07
Speaker 15: I can't see how it changed them for the better. Maybe the experience that they gathered, but I can't possibly see, particularly if you're in a combat unit like an infantry unit or artillery or, you know, an engineer who had to go down the tunnels. I couldn't imagine that. So I can't possibly say how it changed them for the better, other than the experience that they lived.
01:30:31
Speaker 7: Yeah.
01:30:31
Speaker 1: Has it had a lasting negative impact on you?
01:30:33
Speaker 15: Oh, I guess it does. I mean, there's no doubt about, you know, that it resurfaces from time to time in different forms and manifests itself in different ways. not the least of which is having wild, violent dreams when you fall out of bed.
01:30:50
Speaker 2: Oh, hang on. We all have those. Don't worry.
01:30:52
Speaker 1: So how– I spoke to a Vietnam vet earlier who came back early and was able to march through Brisbane to a ticker tape reception before it all turned nasty. How were you received?
01:31:06
Speaker 15: Look, I've got to say, I mean, I'd heard the stories about the guy, the soldiers, the moratorium marches, when obviously we really resented the– the protests and the moratorium marches and the unionists who wouldn't load our supply ships and wouldn't bring our mail over. So there was a lot of resentment building up. But when I came back, there was an old fellow called Pompey Power, who was one of our room stewards at Glenelg Footy Club. He was a big garrulous guy, a sergeant type. And he said, Graham, I want to take you down to the Glenelg RSL.
01:31:38
Speaker 17: And so.
01:31:39
Speaker 15: Hey, I was welcomed back.
01:31:41
Speaker 7: Yeah.
01:31:41
Speaker 15: I know some guys found some resentment at the RSL from World War II veterans because, you know, they'd say, you weren't in a real war.
01:31:49
Speaker 1: Yeah.
01:31:50
Speaker 15: Now, I understand World War I and World War II were long conflicts and some of the soldiers saw terrible things, but, I mean, ours was, at times, was just as brutal. So I could understand that sentiment. But personally, I found nothing but support. And respect, perhaps, if I can say that. I certainly didn't face any resentment. I wasn't accused of being a terrorist or a baby killer.
01:32:22
Speaker 1: How important do you think is it for younger generations to appreciate what Remembrance Day is all about?
01:32:27
Speaker 15: I think it's really important. It's so easy to forget in this day and age of instant gratification. They're stuck to their screens and they live through TikTok and Instagram and Facebook. and you don't see, I mean, you've got to be aware of the sacrifices, you know, your forebears made for you. Now, Australia hasn't really been threatened, and we had, you know, Darwin was bombed and Sydney Harbour was penetrated, but we haven't really been threatened, so that most people live in ignorance of what a soldier goes through. A soldier over there is living that 24 hours a day. Back here, you just see clips on the newsreel, so... It's really important to understand what service people have gone through, men and women.
01:33:13
Speaker 2: There has been a real change.
01:33:15
Speaker 1: I mean, Anzac Day is a barometer, and the way the people lining the route of the Anzac Day march have grown. I mean, they diminished, probably after Vietnam, when there was that turmoil and conflict and Vietnam veterans weren't sort of welcome, and the numbers lining the route diminished, and they've grown over years, and particularly a lot of young people, and that's a good sign.
01:33:36
Speaker 15: I just thought the last couple of years that the numbers haven't been quite as big. Maybe since COVID perhaps. COVID seemed to be a watermark in a lot of areas. But the enthusiasm and the, you know, the, not enjoyment, you know, the, The pleasure that you see on the people, the smiles that you get on the people calling out and saying good on you, that's always great. I mean, it's getting harder to march as you get older, there's no doubt about.
01:34:03
Speaker 2: It, because it's not.
01:34:06
Speaker 15: Marching downhill is okay, but then you've got to walk away back.
01:34:09
Speaker 1: Well, my first memories of watching Anzac Day parades when my father marched, the World War II veterans were the young guys. And when you see now the old guys are the Vietnam veterans, you realise how the years have.
01:34:22
Speaker 15: passed. We're lucky because 7th Battalion, or it was based here in Adelaide, obviously my unit was the 7th Battalion, so a lot of older guys, our numbers are many. In fact, we lost one last week, Gil Green, an Aboriginal soldier who we served with in 7th Battalion. People would recognise him from our marches. He passed away, but 7th Battalion was based here in Adelaide, so they marched as a unit, and so they've got younger veterans from 7th Battalion who are joining us and sort of making our numbers bigger. They look big and strong compared to us.
01:34:57
Speaker 1: So what do you see for the future for the RSL and for, I mean, as the numbers dwindle, as they inevitably will, and hopefully we'll not have veterans who have fought in theatres of war, what do you
see as the future of Remembrance Day and Anzac Day?
01:35:12
Speaker 15: Well, Remembrance Day has always got to be a fixture in our calendar. What does it mean for the RSL? Those numbers diminish. I mean, we're you've got conflict in the Middle East, of course, but the numbers are nowhere near as big, even as we have in Vietnam. I think it'll have a place to play for veterans' health. I mean, veterans will always have issues, and regardless if they're older veterans or younger veterans, I can see that. But, you know, the RSL halls are being sold off, are being used for something else, because we just don't have the numbers.
01:35:48
Speaker 5: So.
01:35:50
Speaker 15: It's hard to predict, other than I can see it, like Legacy is a tremendous organisation, so I can see it aligning with that. When you get a question I can't really answer off the top of my head.
01:36:00
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, the only way that it can be replenished is with a war, and we don't want that, because we certainly don't want that. So, I mean, it's always got to be fondly remembered and recognised and respected.
01:36:11
Speaker 2: I guess so.
01:36:13
Speaker 15: We're always going to have an armed service, armed forces. But I read an interesting clip the other day that, about how China's never been at war, and they've got all this amazing infrastructure. America's been at war for 100 years. It was an interesting concept to contemplate. We're all scared of China, but they haven't been at war.
01:36:36
Speaker 36: Yeah.
01:36:37
Speaker 2: A few internal wars.
01:36:38
Speaker 15: A few internal wars. They were all with Japan there at one stage, weren't they?
01:36:42
Speaker 5: Yeah.
01:36:43
Speaker 1: Do you think we, as a nation, respect our veterans enough now Anyone that's been to America will realize how veterans are held on a pedestal. You know, you go to board a plane and the veterans get, you know, treated like first class business class or whatever. You go to a theater show and often they will recognize, would all the veterans please stand up and they get acknowledged. In so many ways, veterans in the U.S. are really acknowledged and appreciated. Do you think they're underappreciated in Australia?
01:37:11
Speaker 15: Oh, possibly. It's never been an issue. I mean, I've never thought much about it. There's always this thank you for the service sentiment that's offered in America, maybe because they've got a lot more veterans and they're still at war in various theatres of the world. The thing about respect, when you see memorials desecrated, as we saw in the last week... I mean, there should be an enormous penalty if they can find out who does.
01:37:45
Speaker 1: I think they're saying they will jail people who desecrate memorials and the like.
01:37:50
Speaker 15: Absolutely. A bit more respect in that regard. But, yeah, business class air travel would be good.
01:37:59
Speaker 1: I'm not saying they got business class. They're treated like that. They get first access to their seat.
01:38:03
Speaker 2: Okay, right.
01:38:04
Speaker 15: That's fair enough. But we are a different– we're much more egalitarian here in Australia than I think.
01:38:12
Speaker 2: And long may it rain. Yeah, definitely.
01:38:14
Speaker 1: Cornsy, thanks for dropping by.
01:38:16
Speaker 2: Thank you, Graeme.
01:38:17
Speaker 15: Thank you for respecting the day.
01:38:19
Speaker 1: And thank you for your service. It is truly appreciated by me and the 5AA audience. No, it truly is. No doubt about that.
01:38:26
Speaker 15: Thank you. You never feel as though it's enough compared to what other people have done. But thank you. Thank you for having me.
01:38:33
Speaker 1: And you'll be back at 1 o'clock with Conversations.
01:38:35
Speaker 15: I am, yes, but luckily that's recorded.
01:38:37
Speaker 2: At 12 o'clock.
01:38:37
Speaker 3: Oh, it's recorded.
01:38:38
Speaker 2: You've given it away.
01:38:39
Speaker 1: It's recorded, is it?
01:38:40
Speaker 2: No, it's recorded.
01:38:41
Speaker 1: Well, you'll be here in spirit, if not in voice. Thanks, Graeme. See you.
01:38:46
Speaker 2: 5AA Mornings with Graeme Goodings.
01:38:48
Speaker 1: 24 past 11, 5AA, this Remembrance Day to your calls in just a moment. Andrew says, My dad was in Townsville and only 10 days old when the Japanese bombed it. His mum put him in a box and slid him under a bed to protect him. I'm so lucky to be here. The lights were turned out in Townsville and the Japanese bombed the ocean and missed the town. We are lucky to have not been invaded because of those who fought for us. John says, My pop got docked a day's pay for swearing in front of an officer. on his second day at Gallipoli during the First World War. I'm sure I would have come back a poor man if I was there. Thanks for that, John. Hi, G, you talking about super? What about the 20% who don't have any super? I know of quite a few people in my own area don't have super and expect the taxpayer to pay for their retirement now. Thank you for that, Neil.
01:39:40
Speaker 2: Brenton, good morning.
01:39:42
Speaker 28: G'day, Graeme, how are things?
01:39:43
Speaker 2: Good, thanks.
01:39:44
Speaker 20: Graeme, I just wanted to thank 5AA for remembering and acknowledging Remembrance Day.
01:39:49
Speaker 11: We should.
01:39:50
Speaker 7: all.
01:39:50
Speaker 18: Continue to remember those who have served and those who continue to serve this country for our freedom and democracy.
01:39:57
Speaker 1: Yes, we're so lucky to have the freedoms we do have.
01:40:00
Speaker 20: I've got four grandparents, step-grandparents, natural grandparents or step-grandparents who have served.
01:40:08
Speaker 18: There was one in World War I, the Light Horse Brigade as a gunner, one who was a corporal in World War II. another one was a senior nurse in World War II, and one who was a prisoner of war, Japanese prisoner of war in World War II, who never recovered from it. So we must never forget those who have
served this country.
01:40:31
Speaker 1: No, I think Remembrance Day, whether we're fighting battles or not, is going to have to be there for all time. Brendan, thank you very much for your sentiments and thoughts.
01:40:40
Speaker 2: Edwin, good morning.
01:40:42
Speaker 21: Good morning, Graeme. Look, I regard the Labour government as being very dishonest. And I think that whenever they say something, I think it's always the opposite. The opposite is true. Like I say, power bills will come down. The opposite is true. And everything else that they say, the opposite is true. Because everything they say is down so nice and true, but it's all the opposite. They're full of lies and everything that they say is false. Anything that's true that they say is the opposite of what they say.
01:41:16
Speaker 7: That's what I reckon.
01:41:17
Speaker 1: Surely not 100%. Surely they've got to be speaking the truth sometimes.
01:41:22
Speaker 21: Oh, sometimes they do, but very rarely. I think very rarely.
01:41:26
Speaker 1: How can you tell when the politician's telling a lie?
01:41:29
Speaker 21: Well, you've got to make up your own mind about that. I mean, it depends what they're talking about. Like, for example, when you talk about getting.
01:41:38
Speaker 21: You know, they're going to increase, they're going to, they say they're going to reduce the power prices and they say it's wholesale and you would say, no, it's not wholesale, it's got to be retail. Well, there you go. That's one example, for example, okay?
01:41:52
Speaker 25: Yeah.
01:41:53
Speaker 2: No, I agree entirely with that. Yeah.
01:41:56
Speaker 37: Yeah.
01:41:56
Speaker 2: Good on you, Edwin.
01:41:57
Speaker 24: Yeah, thank you.
01:41:58
Speaker 1: Yeah, thanks for sharing that with us. Yeah, it's just a gross mistruth that Chris Bowen keeps coming out talking about how power prices are down. We played the grab of him. He went on social media. with a big grin on his face saying, you know, we're setting the world on fire. We're setting the trend, cheaper wholesale prices. Kept talking about cheaper wholesale power, which is a totally meaningless number. Until the retail price comes down, wholesale means absolutely nothing. He can say that, you know, well, we've got a little bit of work to do. Yeah, well, you've got a lot of work to do, pal. Come back from your COP conference, stop being a part-time energy minister and do your job.
01:42:36
Speaker 2: Ben, good morning.
01:42:38
Speaker 40: Yeah, good morning, Graeme.
01:42:39
Speaker 11: Thanks for calling me.
01:42:43
Speaker 2: Are you there?
01:42:43
Speaker 5: Yeah, go ahead.
01:42:45
Speaker 34: Yeah, hello, Graeme. I wanted to call you about the housing crisis here in just South Australia alone, mate.
01:42:52
Speaker 40: Me and my daughter, we've been waiting about five to six years. Now I'm on cap one, mate. There's just absolutely nothing.
01:42:59
Speaker 34: Like, I've just been starting to push now, even with the housing minister of Nick Champion.
01:43:06
Speaker 40: And, mate, like, I just wanted to get some answers. You know, when you Google, you know.
01:43:09
Speaker 34: Is there any public housing going in such areas as what we've put it as.
01:43:13
Speaker 40: You know, when you Google, you know, Google always comes up, yeah, we're building up.
01:43:18
Speaker 34: So many public housing because of the housing crisis and everything else. But, you know, I've contacted Nick Champion's office. I've got no response. I've contacted Housing SA.
01:43:28
Speaker 40: They don't know anything. There's no response.
01:43:30
Speaker 34: I've contacted Housing SA, Renew SA. They're the developers of, like, anything on projects and everything ongoing.
01:43:39
Speaker 40: Mate, no one knows nothing about public housing. And as far as I've.
01:43:43
Speaker 34: Got from someone high up in the Department of Renewal SA, they say there's no plan at all in future for any public housing.
01:43:54
Speaker 1: Are you in public housing at the moment, Ben?
01:43:56
Speaker 40: Mate, no, I'm sleeping in my car, mate.
01:43:58
Speaker 2: Is that.
01:43:59
Speaker 1: You're sleeping in your car?
01:44:01
Speaker 40: I've been sleeping in my car for quite some time and I'm doing it hard.
01:44:04
Speaker 2: Oh, dear.
01:44:05
Speaker 24: So.
01:44:06
Speaker 1: You've said you've tried to approach Nick Champion. Have you spoken to anyone.
01:44:10
Speaker 2: In his office?
01:44:11
Speaker 40: Oh, I've made multiple attempts. You can't contact directly Nick Champion.
01:44:15
Speaker 34: I've written multiple emails to his office, and they go through the staff member.
01:44:19
Speaker 40: There's just no response. I mean, he's the Minister for Housing. He's got to know something. I want to know something like, yeah.
01:44:25
Speaker 34: We're going to be building something in 2027, which everyone's been talking about, like Housing SA. Apparently, Housing SA are saying there's meant to be some project in 2027. But when I contact.
01:44:37
Speaker 40: With USA, mate, they don't know anything about this new.
01:44:40
Speaker 34: Project for public housing. That's incorrect information they're telling me. There is no ongoing project or anything in the future for public housing.
01:44:49
Speaker 40: Like, if you're on the line, it's just, it's really frustrating.
01:44:55
Speaker 2: And in the meantime, you're living in your car.
01:44:58
Speaker 34: Yeah, doing it hard, mate. Can't work.
01:45:00
Speaker 2: Yeah.
01:45:01
Speaker 1: Look, Ben, I'll put you back to my producer, Sam. We will get in touch with the Housing Minister at Nick Champion's office. You deserve some sort of reply. Obviously, the Minister is not able to reply personally to every request, but he has a lot of people in his office, and I'm sure, and you do, deserve a response. Living in your car.
01:45:20
Speaker 2: Wow, what a thought. 5AA Mornings with Graeme Goodings.
01:45:25
Speaker 1: 27 minutes to 12 on 5AA.
Jack says a big, big thank you to all who served and died for this great country so that we could live in peace and freedom, lest we forget. And yet, fast forward to 2026 and we see our flag burned on our streets while waving foreign flags. Why is this government so benign and silent when this happens? Thank you very much for that, Jack. Well, South Australia's next big thing, have you heard about it? It's arrived in the tiny outback town of Kingunya. The Big Fly Swat, it's called. If you've seen it, it's sensational. Founded by the Outback Communities Authority, it's found a home in the far north town that I think there are barely a dozen people live in Kingunya. Joining us now is Dr Amy Clark, historian and heritage researcher. Thanks for your time, Doctor. A Big Fly Swat, what do you reckon?
01:46:19
Speaker 26: It's pretty spectacular, isn't it?
01:46:21
Speaker 39: And it's got a fly squished in it too, which I really, I love the attention to detail. And I think it was a really good idea for them to add that because I don't know whether other people would confuse the big fly swat for anything else, but it's now abundantly clear that it's a fly swat and that it's done its job.
01:46:40
Speaker 1: I mean, it's so Australian, isn't it? You don't get more Australian than flies and the need for a fly swatter.
01:46:46
Speaker 39: Especially in outback South Australia, right? Like it's pretty well known for having, you know, the constant flies buzzing around your head. So, yeah, they've really hit the money with this one.
01:46:59
Speaker 1: I mean, Kingunya is a pretty small place. Only about a dozen people live there. How did the idea come up in the first place?
01:47:05
Speaker 2: Do you know?
01:47:06
Speaker 26: I'm actually not sure.
01:47:07
Speaker 39: Other than that, you know, the local council was quite heavily involved. So I believe it's been sort of bubbling away as an idea.
01:47:15
Speaker 26: For a little while now.
01:47:17
Speaker 39: And I think it's pretty indicative of the sort of thing that we see across Australia with these very small communities, small towns, often in fairly remote areas, really looking for a way to put themselves on the map quite literally. And we see them using big things as the way to do that. So they're really wanting to capture people's attention and they've achieved it with the big fly swat.
01:47:40
Speaker 1: Are big things unique to Australia? I mean, every state in Australia has a big something or several big somethings.
01:47:47
Speaker 26: Yeah, many big somethings.
01:47:48
Speaker 2: Many big somethings.
01:47:49
Speaker 1: And I think here in South Australia, we lay claim to some of the biggest and best of them all. But do big things happen in other countries?
01:47:57
Speaker 39: Yeah, I'm very sorry to say that we didn't invent them. They actually come from the United States in roughly the 1880s is where we start to see them appearing.
01:48:08
Speaker 26: The US has quite a lot of them. They've got more than Australia does.
01:48:11
Speaker 39: Canada has a number of them too, just a little bit more than Australia. But we probably come in about third place globally. We've got over 1,000 or we've had over the years over 1,000.
01:48:23
Speaker 26: But they're actually– my.
01:48:24
Speaker 39: Research has shown there's big things in just about every country globally. The only continent I'm aware of that doesn't have a big thing is Antarctica.
01:48:33
Speaker 1: And they've got big snow, big ice.
01:48:36
Speaker 26: They're already big, yeah, exactly.
01:48:37
Speaker 1: So– Are there any plans that you know of? I mean, you alluded to the fact that a new big thing was coming and it was the big fly swat. Are you aware of any other big things on the horizon?
01:48:50
Speaker 39: I do know that there are a few more that are being discussed. None that are as far along as the big fly swat, obviously. The big Sultana that was unveiled in Mildura recently, that did take me by surprise.
01:49:05
Speaker 26: I did not know that one was coming.
01:49:07
Speaker 39: So that was a very fun week for me, having that sort of hit the news headlines. The other couple that I'm aware of are sort of top secret at the minute, and I don't know that any of them have progressed beyond idea stage, but I'm really hopeful that they do because I just see the way that they add value joy to people's lives. Obviously, you know, we're talking about another big thing, you know, in the space of a couple of weeks, we've had four of them, three or four of them.
01:49:36
Speaker 26: Unveiled across Australia.
01:49:38
Speaker 39: And I just think it's a beautiful thing that we've got lovely public art and, you know, a little bit of something to laugh about in the news when otherwise the news is pretty dire.
01:49:51
Speaker 26: So, I do hope we see some more very soon.
01:49:53
Speaker 1: Most certainly. Do you get any feedback on the fact that it actually impacts local tourism and interest, generates something for the local economy, having a big thing?
01:50:02
Speaker 39: Yeah, so it's an interesting one because it's quite hard for us to measure whether or not it actually does have a genuine impact. So we can track things like media impact, social media, the number of times people have taken a photo of it and put it on Instagram, things like that. But then converting that into economics into hard cash, it's quite difficult because we essentially have to stand, you know, on either side of the town and stop literally every car and say, why are you here? You know, and how much money have you spent because of this big thing? So we can sort of say, generally speaking, the ones that really hit the headlines certainly would have an impact. They are quite difficult in terms of long-term prospects because they fall out of the headlines pretty quickly and then people tend.
01:50:51
Speaker 26: To forget that they're there.
01:50:52
Speaker 39: And then we sort of see a
sort of slower burn of just the kind of ad hoc people are driving along and then they go, oh, that's right, this town's the one that's got whatever their big thing is. And so we do see a little bit of that kind of extra, you know, maybe it's stopping at the petrol station or stopping at the local bakery or whatever. But generally speaking, that sort of big boost comes with that wave of media coverage with the first couple of weeks.
01:51:20
Speaker 1: We know the successful ones, you know, the big pineapple, the big banana, the big rocking horse, the big lobster, they all work. Do you know of any big things.
01:51:28
Speaker 2: That are duds?
01:51:32
Speaker 39: I have to be so careful answering that question.
01:51:36
Speaker 2: The big dud. I want to know the big dud.
01:51:38
Speaker 26: The big dud.
01:51:39
Speaker 39: I mean, probably the easiest way to answer that question is to say that we've lost several big things. You know, they've been demolished. So there used to be a big earthworm, a big Gippsland earthworm.
01:51:52
Speaker 3: Oh, really?
01:51:52
Speaker 2: Yeah.
01:51:53
Speaker 39: Yeah, in Victoria down near Phillip Island. And, yeah, I mean, from the– from the outside, it just looks like this big, long kind of winding tube. It wasn't until you sort of got inside that you realised what it was intended to be. And it was demolished, I think, in 2020 in the sort of midst of COVID lockdown. So, yeah, there have been some that haven't quite worked as their builders and owners intended. But I think by and large, even the quote-unquote duds, you know, even the ones that are a bit on the nose, you know, that look a little bit you know, rough around the edges might be a polite way to say it. They themselves have their own appeal. Like I actually quite like the ones that are really weird looking.
01:52:38
Speaker 2: Yeah.
01:52:39
Speaker 39: Where the design hasn't quite come off the way that they were hoping. So I think that, you know, duds can be embraced too, let's put it that way. The runts of the litter can still have some value.
01:52:52
Speaker 1: Now you're an expert in this field. You've seen the big things all around Australia, around the world for that matter.
01:52:59
Speaker 2: Mm-hmm.
01:53:00
Speaker 1: If you were advising a small town somewhere, what would you say? This is the next big, big thing?
01:53:05
Speaker 13: Oh, yes.
01:53:06
Speaker 26: Yeah, so I think the advice I do give.
01:53:10
Speaker 39: Is you need to have, you need to be aware that in order for it to be successful, it's got to have some kind of joke or some kind of funny thing or quirk about it that's going to set it apart.
01:53:23
Speaker 26: From all the others that are competing for news headlines.
01:53:25
Speaker 39: So, you know, adding that fly, squish to the fly spot, Perfect example. I think the other thing that I'm constantly telling people is these are one-trick ponies unless you keep adding things to them over time. So the Big Banana is a really good example. It's one of the earliest ones built in Australia, beaten only by Adelaide's own big Scotsman.
01:53:49
Speaker 26: Go Adelaide.
01:53:51
Speaker 39: The Big Banana has over the years added a number of different rides and attractions and things around it. So it's constantly giving people a reason to come back beyond that first time where they've taken the photo with it. So I think it is, if you're wanting it to work as a boost for the local economy, you really have to be thinking long-term planning rather than just we've got it and it's going to keep doing the job.
01:54:15
Speaker 1: Doctor, always great to chat. Dr Amy Clark, historian and heritage researcher. What's the next big thing? Any thoughts? What would you like to see and where would you like to see it? What do you think would be a big hit? Big fly swat. We have the big lobster, Larry the Lobster. Big rocking horse. Big banana.
01:54:33
Speaker 2: Big pineapple. Big orange.
01:54:35
Speaker 1: Lots of big things all over the place. What is missing? What would you like to see?
01:54:38
Speaker 2: What big thing?
01:54:40
Speaker 1: On the text line, Varda says, Good morning, Graham. I was born in 1960. I was too young to fight for my country in Vietnam. I was too old to fight in any of the other wars that Australia became involved in since, but I'm extremely grateful for the sacrifice that so many have made, some the ultimate sacrifice, just so that I can live in a free country that has provided so much in so many of my generation and those that follow with such an amazing existence. We owe so much to those that we remember today.
01:55:06
Speaker 2: 5AA Mornings with Graham Goodings. 14 to 12 5AA.
01:55:13
Speaker 1: Regarding big things, Harry says, The Big Dad, Graham, is all state and federal government since 1972. The joke's on us.
01:55:21
Speaker 2: Hi, Graham.
01:55:22
Speaker 1: How about a Big Cooper's beer can? Thank you for that, Rob. The Big Rocking Horse is my favourite. It's the most local in Adelaide. It still has the toy factory and continues to sell a range of wooden toys, handmade in South Australia. You can also climb in it, which you can't on Larry the Big Lobster. The Big Rocking Horse is also much more of a destination. While the Big Lobster is... is more of a roadside stop. Mike, we've got you back.
01:55:45
Speaker 2: G'day, Mike. Yeah, g'day.
01:55:47
Speaker 9: I'm down in Metro Brighton, where I live, and a clock came. They've got poppies on the bar, and they turned the music down, but the pokies played on right through.
01:55:56
Speaker 2: Did they really?
01:55:57
Speaker 1: You think they could just flick a switch and turn them all off just for a minute?
01:56:01
Speaker 21: Yeah.
01:56:04
Speaker 4: Yeah.
01:56:05
Speaker 1: Yeah, thank you, Mike. Thanks for bringing that to us. Yeah, look, that is not a bad thought. And for all hoteliers listening, Next Remembrance Day, I'm sure some do it, but come 11 o'clock, it's a minute out
of your life. Just turn the pokies off. If people are addicted to gambling, if you turn the machines off, they'll have to stop, at least for 60 seconds. Might save them a buck or two. Brad, good morning.
01:56:29
Speaker 28: Good morning there, Graham. A couple of things. Big things. As you cross the border from Victoria to South Australia, you have a huge, stirred desert pea. A national emblem, yeah. I reckon that'd look all right.
01:56:45
Speaker 1: A huge, sturt desert pea. That would look very attractive, because I like the look of the sturt desert pea.
01:56:51
Speaker 28: Yeah, yeah. Now, could I talk about before today, Remembrance Day?
01:56:57
Speaker 2: Please do.
01:56:58
Speaker 28: Yeah, right-o. My Uncle Dan, great-uncle, come back from World War I. Before he went, he was a good Methodist. Never smoked, never drank. Come back, full-blown alcoholic, smoked his head off and drank himself to death. You know, it's a fine shame it was.
01:57:17
Speaker 2: Yeah, the ravages of war.
01:57:19
Speaker 28: Yeah, and the other thing you're talking about in America, flew from Memphis to Texas and an announcement come over, veterans can board first or second or something.
01:57:31
Speaker 16: Yep.
01:57:31
Speaker 28: I said, I'll give this a go. So I went up and showed him my veterans card. I said, this is an Australian veterans card.
01:57:37
Speaker 5: Oh, nice.
01:57:40
Speaker 28: Thank you for your service, sir.
01:57:41
Speaker 11: You can board.
01:57:43
Speaker 2: Is that right? Yeah.
01:57:44
Speaker 1: It's a nice touch, isn't it?
01:57:45
Speaker 2: And it doesn't cost anything.
01:57:47
Speaker 1: It doesn't cost anything.
01:57:48
Speaker 28: No, no, no.
01:57:50
Speaker 5: Yeah.
01:57:51
Speaker 2: Yeah. Nice one, Brad. Thanks for sharing. Yeah, the Yanks do it well.
01:57:55
Speaker 5: Yeah.
01:57:55
Speaker 1: I'm critical of a lot of things the Americans do, but when it comes to recognising veterans, and that's a nice touch. And what does it cost? An airline to sort of say, you know, those in first class, business class, and veterans can board first. No expense, but it's just a slight recognition for what veterans have done for their country.
01:58:13
Speaker 2: G'day, Charlie.
01:58:14
Speaker 9: G'day, Graeme.
01:58:16
Speaker 13: Big things.
01:58:17
Speaker 9: I reckon a big microphone on top of the 5AA building.
01:58:21
Speaker 1: Ah, there's a thought. We'll put that to management. A big mic, a giant microphone.
01:58:26
Speaker 13: Yeah.
01:58:27
Speaker 1: Yeah, I like that. I like that. I don't know if it'll pass the air safety requirements.
01:58:34
Speaker 28: Well, we've got tall buildings going around the place.
01:58:36
Speaker 1: That's true. And I like your thinking there. My producer, Sam, says he's going to email Lachlan Murdoch now, and I'm sure by this time next year, we'll have a giant microphone atop the Nova building.
01:58:49
Speaker 2: G'day, George.
01:58:49
Speaker 20: How are you, Graeme?
01:58:51
Speaker 2: Good, thanks.
01:58:52
Speaker 11: Great show, mate.
01:58:53
Speaker 31: And I'd like to endorse the big microphone on top of the 5AA building. They have a great station, mate, and people like me love to listen and ring up. On another light note, you had a caller on a while back and you asked him, how do.
01:59:08
Speaker 28: You know when a politician's lying? And he didn't answer.
01:59:12
Speaker 31: But the answer is every time they accuse another politician of telling a lie.
01:59:18
Speaker 11: How do you know when.
01:59:19
Speaker 28: They're telling the truth?
01:59:20
Speaker 11: I'm sorry, the other way around.
01:59:21
Speaker 31: You know they're telling the truth when they accuse another politician of lying.
01:59:25
Speaker 1: Yeah, I take your point. It's very hard to know anymore when you can trust a politician. Thank you for that, George.
01:59:32
Speaker 2: Yeah, it is.
01:59:33
Speaker 1: And the thing is, people are far more savvy to it. Many years ago, politicians were taught, and I know I used to, I've done media training and so forth, and you teach politicians how to answer the questions only that they want to answer, how to evade questions. I mean, it's a technique to it, but I think we're all a lot smarter now. We've all seen these evasive techniques. When was the last time you heard a politician say yes or no? They don't, because once they say yes or no, that commits them. There's nowhere to go with that. So they won't say yes or no. They'll give you a definite maybe. And yeah, so the old line was, no matter what, there was a prime minister of Australia, Malcolm Fraser, and he would be asked a question, and he's almost always would answer with Before I say that, let me say this. And then he'd go off and make a statement about something that he wanted to talk about and never get back to the this. Wonderful, wonderful days. I see the Premier's got the Adelaide City Council in his sights again. He's launched another attack on the City Council over restrictions on major events at Adelaide Oval. He's accused councillors of standing in the way of the city's growth and economic opportunities.
02:00:44
Speaker 2: It's about.
02:00:46
Speaker 1: Oval No. 2. The Village Green, where the council's endorsed changes to event rules designed to give organisers greater flexibility. Well, apparently it's not quite doing that. The proposed changes would allow up to six events a year to run across three consecutive days. The Premier wants to know what about the other 300 days or so in the year when the area could be put to good use. So it does seem that the Premier has made a target of the Adelaide City Council and they're not going to escape his gaze. The number is 8223 0000. Russell says, a big carton of the Farmers Union iced coffee. We here in South Australia are the only place in the world that art sells Coca-Cola.
02:01:25
Speaker 2: Good on you.
02:01:25
Speaker 1: Thanks for that, Russell. Yeah, Farmers Union iced coffee, distinctly South Australian.
02:01:30
Speaker 29: Leith.
02:01:31
Speaker 2: Welcome back. Thank you very much. Are you well? I'm well. I'm well-ish.
02:01:36
Speaker 6: Well-ish.
02:01:36
Speaker 2: I'm well enough to be here.
02:01:37
Speaker 5: Yeah.
02:01:38
Speaker 41: I always think it's a bit like footballers who make the decision. Are you fit to play? You're putting your hand up.
02:01:42
Speaker 2: No excuses.
02:01:43
Speaker 1: Once you're on the field. I'm good to go. Once you're in front of the microphone, Leith, there's no way back.
02:01:47
Speaker 2: I wasn't.
02:01:48
Speaker 41: I've got to be honest and shout out to anyone who's sick at the moment because there's a lot of RSV around. I was talking to doctors and pharmacists across the four days that I was unwell and there's a lot going on.
02:02:00
Speaker 2: Yeah, there are bugs.
02:02:01
Speaker 1: And you can do the test for COVID and RSV and flu and all that and fall between the cracks. You've got something else. I never had RSV.
02:02:10
Speaker 41: So I went from Friday night dinner feeling fine, normal, perfect, to Saturday 3 a.m. feeling like death and then just four days in bed. I had to give up my Robbie Williams tickets.
02:02:21
Speaker 2: I was so sick.
02:02:22
Speaker 5: You what?
02:02:22
Speaker 2: I had to. You were really sick. I was unwell enough to even be in the car.
02:02:27
Speaker 5: Oh, wow.
02:02:29
Speaker 1: Well, welcome back.
02:02:29
Speaker 9: Thanks.
02:02:30
Speaker 41: No, I'm happy to be here. I'm happy to be here. So catching up on everything over the last couple of days. But, yes, one of those quick shout-out to anyone. Because I had that thought. You know when you're laying in bed for four days, no radio, no television, and you're just going with thoughts? That can be dangerous. It can be dangerous. My two thoughts were the people who listen to us all the time who are constantly in pain or constantly unwell.
02:02:53
Speaker 2: Because it's so frustrating.
02:02:54
Speaker 41: You just think, how on earth– am I going to get over this? And I only had it for four days. Imagine people that are going through constant pain. That must be just so debilitating. Then the other thought was, when did we allow handshakes post-COVID to return? I think I'm done with handshakes. I already broke the rule where I walked out into the office, saw someone for the first time and shook their hand and went.
02:03:16
Speaker 2: Dammit, stop it.
02:03:18
Speaker 1: Yeah, I still shake hands. I know what you're saying, that we sort of stopped doing it. It's a funny little Habit, isn't it?
02:03:24
Speaker 41: So I went to the supermarket today for the first time in the best part of a week, and there was masks everywhere.
02:03:29
Speaker 2: Is that right?
02:03:30
Speaker 5: Yeah.
02:03:30
Speaker 41: I spoke to someone at the RAR over the weekend, one of the doctors being sick, and they said, we're just seeing so many cases of it. Mount Barker's got
outbreaks of RSV. There's RSV everywhere. And now I'm looking at these people in the mask going, they're not wanting to get sick.
02:03:45
Speaker 2: They are sick. They are sick. They don't want to share it. I don't want to share it.
02:03:48
Speaker 29: Yeah.
02:03:48
Speaker 2: But you're not wearing a mask, Lee. But I'm not sick anymore. I'm sickish.
02:03:53
Speaker 36: No.
02:03:53
Speaker 41: You've crossed your fingers there. But do you know how 5AA is a healing place? I could feel it. As soon as I walked through the elevator, I thought, oh, I feel better.
02:04:00
Speaker 1: It does that to you, doesn't it? As soon as you get in the lift, yeah.
02:04:03
Speaker 41: So we're going to continue, and I love the tribute that you had today for Remembrance Day.
02:04:07
Speaker 2: We'll continue that today.
02:04:08
Speaker 41: We're going to speak to the Virtual War Memorial, so a chance for people to get online and pay tribute to their family and friends who serve, which is great. Not everyone can get to the actual war memorial.
02:04:19
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's a great idea.
02:04:20
Speaker 41: Great to hear Kendall in the news too say that thousands were on North Terrace today. I drove past the one on Henley Beach Road at, Miller Park there, and that was full this morning of people, which was terrific.
02:04:29
Speaker 2: So we'll talk about that on the show today.
02:04:32
Speaker 41: And also Lex Hurst is going to join us, who is the daughter of Rob Hurst, the legendary.
02:04:36
Speaker 2: Drummer who passed from Midnight Oil.
02:04:39
Speaker 3: Oh, okay.
02:04:39
Speaker 41: So when Rob was sick with pancreatic cancer, he decided, right, I'm going to write a final book. I'm going to talk about every song that I ever wrote or sang on or drummed on and give you my thoughts and my memories, and then I'm going to ask other people to add theirs. So it's a really, and now the family's put it out, So it's a really kind of sad yet triumphant book, if that makes sense.
02:05:01
Speaker 32: Yeah, sure.
02:05:01
Speaker 2: So Lex, the daughter, is promoting that. So we'll speak to her as well.
02:05:05
Speaker 1: Good on you, Lee.
02:05:06
Speaker 41: And I'll be fit and firing, Graeme. You know those players who, yeah, yeah, I'm right to go. Grand final and then halfway through the first, they're out. All of a sudden, sub-vest comes off.
02:05:16
Speaker 2: Done a hammy. So anyway, we'll see you after one. As he wheels out of the studio. That's right. As I limp and just slither out. You brought a nurse in too.
02:05:25
Speaker 1: That's interesting.
02:05:25
Speaker 2: You've got a nurse. Yeah, that's just, that's my new thing. So I'll see you at one.
02:05:30
Speaker 1: Lee Forrest coming up after one this afternoon. Just about time to go. No one has mentioned the big galah at Kimber.
02:05:36
Speaker 2: Is that right, Pete?
02:05:36
Speaker 1: Is there a big galah at Kimber? I find galahs fascinating birds, but I didn't know there was a big galah at Kimber. Yeah, we might pursue the matter of big things.
02:05:46
Speaker 2: Hi, Graham.
02:05:47
Speaker 1: I'm thinking instead of being welcome to my own country at certain events, we need to stand up and say thanks to those current and past service people for their sacrifice and and service to our country. Yeah, I think that's a good note to end on. And I certainly do thank all those that have given service to their country. We appreciate your efforts. That's it for today. Thank you so much for your company. We'll be back tomorrow and we'll do it all again.