E&OE

18 February 2008

Interview with ABC Radio Australia Pacific Beat program

Subject: Pacific relations

PRESENTER: The new chief of Australian policy for the South Pacific says the Rudd Government will repair damaged relationships with Pacific states, and avoid a bullying or self righteous stance.

Duncan Kerr is the Parliamentary Secretary for Pacific Island Affairs, and he says Australia can do a better job in the region and use more respectful language, even when there are differences.

Mr Kerr has just returned from his first visit to the Pacific in his new job, and in his Canberra office, he spoke with Radio Australia’s Graeme Dobell.

GRAEME DOBELL: Duncan Kerr, the previous Australian Foreign Minister, Alexander Downer, pursued a sort of a tough love approach to the South Pacific and there was a fair bit of toughness in that love. Are you offering the Pacific a different tone, a different way of thinking?

DUNCAN KERR: Yes. Very much a different tonality. We’re committed to a partnership arrangement. It doesn’t mean that Australia won’t have its own independent, and sometimes quite different, interests that it needs to pursue for its own national interests. And we respect that. We respect the right of Island states to have their own independent areas of difference.

But, what we hope to do is to build partnerships to recognise those areas in which we have common interests. To build on those common interests and where we have disagreements, to deal with those disagreements with respect. I think there is no doubt that our relationship with the Pacific was damaged to some degree, by a perception that Australia was bullying and sometimes was self righteous in its relationships.

On the other hand, I think it’s important to recognise that the former government left a legacy of strength in many places too. So it’s a tonality issue. It’s building on a body of work that was undertaken, not just with the former government, but through governments previously.

We’re not starting off from a clean page in a sense that, everything will be undone and started and done differently. But I have no doubt that we can do better in the Pacific and the idea of having a particular position for a Parliamentary Secretary for Pacific Island affairs reflects the determination of the Rudd Labor Government, to have a much strengthened approach to the Pacific, a greater focus.

GRAEME DOBELL: Is it now possible, do you think, for the Prime Minister of Papua New Guinea and the Prime Minister of Australia to talk on the telephone? Which didn’t seem to happen very much for a while there.

DUNCAN KERR: Oh, I’m absolutely convinced of that. And of course, we are leading up to a series of meetings in Papua New Guinea. There will be a ministerial forum later this year. The Prime Ministers are discussing matters together. Look, it’s a much better basis to build an effective relationship between Australia and Papua New Guinea.

Papua New Guinea may have a number of problems, but we see it as a country with great success and strengths as well as having a series of issues, which, it itself would acknowledge are issues which require attention.

So, I think we need to get away from the idea that we’re dealing, in popular language, with failed states and all the sort of rhetoric that sometimes comes out about this neighbourhood. We are talking about countries with development challenges. There are issues that no one should turn their backs on. There are issues of health, there are issues of significant under-employment in many of the countries. Education systems in some countries are frail.

But, we are increasing our overseas development assistance budget. Bob McMullan, who’s got responsibility for development assistance is working very closely with me and we just did a trip to three of the Pacific Island countries together: Samoa, Tonga and Kiribati.

We are intending to do more travel together because, of course, in the Pacific, because of these issues of development, it’s silly to talk about our diplomatic relationships without regard to the development assistance program.

So, Bob and I are working closely together. Stephen Smith, the Minister for Foreign Affairs is involved very directly. We are increasing our focus on the region rather than diminishing it in any way, and I think the region is getting the message. It’s coming back to us very strongly that the message is welcome.

GRAEME DOBELL: You know the Pacific, you’ve been there many times, you lived in Papua New Guinea in the early 80s. Do you see the Pacific now being in a worse shape than when you first knew it more than twenty years ago?

DUNCAN KERR: Well, some bits are stronger. I don’t think we can see this as an easy snapshot to say then and now. Some aspects of Pacific Island economic and social opportunities are improved. But some institutions have become less robust.

Papua New Guinea is a really interesting case, because it currently has very strong revenues from its resource-based industries and potential for even greater strength if it can bring on stream a number of large projects that are potentially available to it.

Some of the key institutions in Papua New Guinea have been strengthened. Some with Australian direct assistance, some with mentoring through programs that Australia has been involved in. Others simply because they’re inherently strong and have been robust ever since independence.

For example, I think the judicial system in Papua New Guinea is really robust, although every judicial system has its critics, and I know in Australia it’s a favourite past time of many.

GRAEME DOBELL: That PNG Constitution you wrote so much about seems to be holding up pretty well.

DUNCAN KERR: The PNG Constitution has had a remarkably vigorous life, but the judicial system is one system that, you would say, has to be respected for its independence and for its integrity. So, you look at Pacific Island countries, you can see some have had difficulties. Now, Nauru, for example, has gone through very, very difficult times.

GRAEME DOBELL: Let’s look at Nauru, which is entering a new phase in its relationship with Australia. The boat people camp being closed down, Nauru is a bankrupt state, even Nauruans would talk about it in those terms. Is Australia going to continue to bank roll Nauru now that the camp is no longer there?

DUNCAN KERR: Well, I think per capita, probably Nauru is the greatest recipient of Australian development assistance, so we have got a big interest in a strong stable Nauru. It’s got a small population base, it’s isolated, it has challenges.

Some of those challenges, regrettably, were brought about because of the way in which the trust funds that were made available after independence, and after the settlement of outstanding issues, how they were used by the Nauruan Government. That’s a tragedy, but there’s nothing I, or they now, can do about it. The people who are responsible have passed out of the political system.

It’s true that the ‘Pacific solution’ has ended. The Labor Party made it very plain that we were not going to use Pacific Island neighbours as a dumping ground for refugees. That’s just inappropriate. We decided, it was announced in our election campaign, and it’s an irrevocable decision and it’s been implemented.

But, equally irrevocable is our commitment to try everything we can to provide an ongoing economic basis for good development opportunities throughout the Pacific. Nauru is going to be a challenge, but we want to do what we can to make sure that Nauru has a future. There’s no mechanism to declare a country bankrupt and put it out of existence. There’s national sovereignty issues, the Nauruan people are entitled to choose their future and we as a good neighbour are there to assist them in making the best of that future.

GRAEME DOBELL: Can you though, justify giving Nauru much more money per head of population than you give to Papua New Guinea or to any other Pacific Island state?

DUNCAN KERR: Well, I think, you have to see the challenges across the board. Certainly we want to make sure that we don’t get distracted away from a robust support, for say, Papua New Guinea as our closest and most populist neighbour.

Over the last decade the real value of our assistance to Papua New Guinea has declined and though that’s directly the responsibility of my parliamentary colleague, Parliamentary Secretary for International Development Assistance, Bob McMullan, I would like to see us get involved in more robust support for Papua New Guinea and right across a number of institutions.

GRAEME DOBELL: So, less dollars for Nauru?

DUNCAN KERR: But you see, we don’t have to play a zero sum game here. Because one of the things that Kevin Rudd as Prime Minister has done is to commit us to a substantially increased development assistance program. That’s a remarkably good opportunity, because what it means is that we can, in this instance, almost have the cake and eat it too.

We can maintain a very solid support program for smaller Island states like Nauru which have very immediate direct problems with the viability of their infrastructure just to run good governance. While at the same time, building on programs in countries like Papua New Guinea which enable us to partner with those countries to rebuild the bits of the infrastructure and that perhaps have frayed as our assistance to them in real GDP terms has declined in the past.

So, I think we are in a position of being able to do both. Our real national interest across this region is for strong economic stability and good governance. Because Solomon Islands is a really good example of proving to us what happens if there is a vacuum in that area. I mean, before that a lot of people might have had in their heads the idea that, well, you can have a policy of benign neglect and in the end, so what. You know, this isn’t really an issue that goes to the core of our national interest.

Solomon Islands is a great wake up. It demonstrates the real costs that are involved if you allow catastrophic disintegration of one of your neighbours. Nature abhors a vacuum. There is a broad acceptance that it is Australia’s responsibility as the most powerful of the Pacific Island neighbouring states, to be the guarantor of that regional security. But if we aren’t, someone else will step in and they may not always have the most benign motivations. They may not even be states. They may be criminal groups. They have vulnerabilities that exist. So, you can’t just turn away from the Pacific and sort of say, well, if they fall into crisis it’s not really something that will affect Australia. Solomon Islands is a wake up call to that.

GRAEME DOBELL: On Solomon Islands, through most of last year, the previous Solomon Islands Government was talking about the need to get an exit strategy for RAMSI, to get the Australian-led intervention moving towards the exit door. Do you think there’s still a need to talk about firm exit timetables?

DUNCAN KERR: Well, it’s a puzzling question, because, in fact, there was work being done on a medium-term strategy that I’m advised was not taken further because of the failure of the Solomon Islands Government to get engaged in those discussions. So, I’m not sure that the premise of that question is absolutely right. It may be rhetorically accurate, but, I understand that work was initiated but not proceeded with because of Solomon Islands was not engaged in how do we transition RAMSI from an intervention crisis mode into the middle stage where it’s more involved in strengthening institutions and then fazing into an exit strategy.

GRAEME DOBELL: Does that say something more about the lack of communication between Honiara and Canberra for much of last year?

DUNCAN KERR: Well, look I’m not sure what it says. But, plainly there were tensions in the relationship between Honiara and Canberra and some of those were related, I assume, to the tensions over former Attorney-General Julian Moti. But, whatever the cause of those tensions, they were reflected in the fact that those discussions weren’t progressed.

GRAEME DOBELL: Does Australia see that there should still be some sort of RAMSI in 2010, 2015. What’s the medium term for you?

DUNCAN KERR: Well, the medium term is the shift from the immediate crisis intervention to one which is designed for institution strengthening and then ultimately, a shift to essentially the kind of relationship that Australia has with any other Pacific Island country where aid is essentially a normal part of the discussion between sovereign nations. So, we want the Solomon Islands Government to get involved in working with us to identify priorities where we want those things and there would be a gradual shift from a RAMSI-based process to an AusAID-based process.

GRAEME DOBELL: So, another two years of RAMSI? Another five years of RAMSI?

DUNCAN KERR: Well, that has to be ultimately agreed and maybe the timelines are essentially outcomes-based. When we get certain benchmarks of performance working, we phase out certain initiatives and move to the next stage.

GRAEME DOBELL: Does the idea of new tone, a new page, extend to the military leadership, the military regime in Fiji?

DUNCAN KERR: Fiji is really tough because I don’t think anyone in the Pacific wants to see the continuation of a military-led regime. And Australia wants a return to Democracy. We welcome the commitment that interim Prime Minister Commodore Bainimarama made to proceed with elections by March next year, and we want to do all we can to move in that direction.

There is no doubt that we will not abate from our commitment to see the military take a backward step and allow electoral processes to resume. I don’t think there’s any dispute across the region. So, it’s a difficult and complex issue. How do you deal with a military regime in this situation?

The military regime has initiated a process called the ‘People’s Charter’, that you may have heard of, that was designed to try and engage some kind of dialogue within the country towards possible constitutional evolution in Fiji. But, it hasn’t engaged all of the parties to date. We have perhaps – softened is perhaps the wrong word – but we’ve recognised that there are people of goodwill that want to participate in that charter process. So, we’ve not imposed the travel bans that relate to those who take roles in the dialogue of the charter.

GRAEME DOBELL: So, would you say not necessarily softened? Are you taking a more opened-minded approach to Bainimarama?

DUNCAN KERR: Well, we don’t own the past. What we want is outcomes and if we can move to a situation where we return to an electoral democracy and someone can point to a better method of getting there, certainly my mind would not be closed to that. But equally, I don’t want it to be seen as a retreat from our very strong opposition to the military regime.

PRESENTER: You’re on Radio Australia, listening to ‘On the Mat’, and we are talking to Australia’s Parliamentary Secretary for Pacific Island Affairs, Duncan Kerr.

GRAEME DOBELL: In opposition, Labor put forward a very detailed program, a five year program to allow in unskilled Pacific workers to do guest work, particularly in agriculture. In government, has Labor stepped back from that idea?

DUNCAN KERR: What we are doing is looking at the New Zealand trial. There’s been some press mis-reporting that followed the meeting that the Prime Minister had with the Prime Minister Sikua from the Solomon Islands. That reporting said that we had ruled out a Pacific Island labor mobility scheme. The true response was that we were examining the success of the New Zealand trial, which is using about 5,000 places, and we are going to make a decision on the basis of that assessment.

But, I can tell you there is no doubt that across the Pacific, one of the strongest messages that keeps coming through, is that Pacific Island countries see this as very important. So, we know it to be important for the Pacific. Many commentators urge us, with a view, that it’s maybe the most significant contribution we can make to development in the region. That said, the ultimate decision has not been made about whether a scheme will proceed. It will depend on evaluations that are going to be made in relation to that New Zealand experience.

GRAEME DOBELL: Do you think it is a good idea?

DUNCAN KERR: Well, I certainly know that the Pacific Island countries are doing their utmost to make certain that nothing goes wrong with the New Zealand scheme.

GRAEME DOBELL: If it works in New Zealand, if it is shown to work, can the Pacific assume then that Australia will then adopt it?

DUNCAN KERR: Well, I can’t give an undertaking of that kind, because ultimately it will be a matter for our Cabinet to decide. What I can say is that, given that we have made our examination of the idea for the Pacific Island mobility scheme conditional on the success or otherwise of the New Zealand scheme, it would be a big tick for the process if that scheme is assessed to have been successful.

GRAEME DOBELL: Do you think that that’s the decision that Australia will confront in this current three-year term of government?

DUNCAN KERR: Well, I imagine that, I mean, we will be confronted with it, because the Pacific Island countries will continue to press it. Prime Minister Sikua has asked Prime Minister Rudd to consider a scheme along the lines of the New Zealand scheme. So, it’s on the table, and it will continue to be pressed. And everywhere Bob McMullan and I went through the Pacific it was up there on the checklist of the things that were put to us. What are you going to do about this? We made it plain. We had to firstly disabuse people of the idea that the Australian Government had ruled out such a scheme. We then had to explain the process we were going through for evaluation of the New Zealand experience. But the requests from the region are there and are not going to go away. So, it will be an issue we have to confront, but when a decision will be made is a matter for others. But certainly the assessment process is currently in train, we are looking at the New Zealand experience.

GRAEME DOBELL: A lot of the discussion about the Pacific in Australia in recent years is centred around this idea of the ‘arc of instability’ and this focus on instability and problems. What would you like the all-encompassing phrase be for the Pacific? How should Australia be thinking about the Pacific?

DUNCAN KERR: Well, I think it should be thinking about the Pacific as our healthy neighbourhood. I really don’t like the language that sometimes is used about our region. There is no doubt that many countries have problems, different problems. Papua New Guinea is a huge country with huge language diversities, 700 plus languages, internal communication very problematic.

But, you know, it’s still got a functioning democracy. Elections are conducted. Sometimes some electorates have trouble, but, in the main, elections are conducted in a free transparent and fair way. Their judicial system is still strong. Their economy at the moment is doing much better than it has for a long time because of the mining boom. Contrast that with Samoa, where you have a single language, largely culturally-homogeneous, small state, and a very different set of issues.

Each of the countries have great challenges, but I would like us, ten years from now, to say that the new approach of the Rudd Labor government leads to a period of Pacific harmony.

GRAEME DOBELL: Duncan Kerr, Thank you for speaking to Radio Australia

DUNCAN KERR: Thank you.

Media inquiries: Mr Kerr's office - 02 6277 4991

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