E&OE TRANSCRIPT 
TELEVISION INTERVIEW  
NEWS 24  
THURSDAY, 12 NOVEMBER 2026 

TOPICS: COP31; ECONOMY; HOME LOANS; Russel BRAND; US MIDTERM ELECTIONS.

LAURA JAYES: Welcome back. You are watching AM Agenda. Joining us now in the studio is Social Services Minister Tanya Plibersek. Good to see you, we've got lots to talk about. I first want to talk to you about COP 31. I went to the Paris class climate change conference; I don't know how long ago that was. It feels like more than a decade ago, definitely. And the mood has certainly changed. What's being pointed out today is, you know, this thousands of dollars spent on subsidised coffee. I think the world should know what Australian flat white talks about. I don't have a problem with that. But, you know, you have a whole airport full of private jets, you have lots of plastic cutlery. It does seem like there is this lanyard class that get together to tell us how we all should live, but they're not actually doing it in practice. Do you see a bit of hypocrisy there?

MINISTER PLIBERSEK: I think when you talk about any big conference, people calculate the air miles and things like that. But it is absolutely true that addressing climate change is something that no country can do on its own. It is really important that world leaders, Ministers like Chris Bowen, who've got responsibility for energy and climate actually get together, actually look at each other in the face and say this is what we are prepared to do together to make a difference in the future. I don't know that there's any way of doing that other than an international conference.

JAYES: Sure. But I mean the plastic forks and things can quibble over that. Like it just seems to be weird. Also, the US and China aren’t there.

MINISTER PLIBERSEK: Can I say, Laura, you, you know, we had our nature positive conference in Australia a few years ago, all of that carbon neutral and we were really careful about things like the, you know, the plastic, the lanyards, the paper, the consumables at that conference. For that very reason, I think you do have to demonstrate leadership in the day to day as well.

JAYES: Sure. But demonstrating that leadership and the optics of Anthony Albanese being over there when you're looking at, you know, a sliding housing market, people losing their jobs, whether it's, whether it's Qantas, Canva, the rest of it, I just don't think is the, you know, it's fallen down the ladder in importance. Would you agree with that?

MINISTER PLIBERSEK: I would say that everybody is absolutely focused on cost of living at the moment. That means all of our Ministers and our Prime Minister as well. But as the Prime Minister, he also has a responsibility to put Australia's view firmly in international forums. And he's going to ASEAN next. The relationships with the G7, with ASEAN on things like trade are really critical to our economic future. We know that Australian jobs depend on having strong trading relationships with the world. The relationship with our Pacific neighbours is not just fun times and friendliness. This is our doorstep. We actually have to have good security relationships with our neighbours and personal relationships. The Prime Minister being prepared to front up, answer tough questions, look people in the eye, put Australia's view firmly, that is in Australia's national interest.

JAYES: What about the cost of things? Because there's been a real shift in government spending. At least what people want to see your government spend and not spend. Is it still the right time to be subsidising things like electric vehicles? They're not made here. If you want a price signal in the market, we're getting that from the Iran War.

MINISTER PLIBERSEK: We've made $180 billion of savings since coming to government in the last budget, $60 billion worth of savings. That compares to $0 of savings in the Coalition's last budget. We are serious about savings, but we're also serious about helping people like EVs. Big difference to the cost of running a vehicle if you get an ev. The batteries is the other area that people are talking about. So, far, 600,000 homes have got a battery on the roof connecting to close to 4 million solar panels. That brings electricity bills down to zero for many of those households.

JAYES: It does take awhile for those costs to catch up. The cost of putting a battery, I think it's like 10 to 15 years, in some cases. Neutral.

MINISTER PLIBERSEK: It is a really important investment and not just for those individuals, but also for our electricity grid. The more decentralised power generation we have, the more batteries we have, the less pressure on the grid, the less government investment we need to make in those big systems. So, it's got a general benefit as well. And again, we're talking about savings. I’m not going to take lectures from the Liberal Party, who are holding up $10 billion worth of savings in the Senate right now. $10 billion worth of savings right now.

JAYES: I mean, they're, they're expensive anyway. They're.

MINISTER PLIBERSEK: Well, one of the savings that they're holding up changes to EVs that we wanted to more tightly target. We've got a month between now and the and the mid year economic update and all of these issues will be canvassed and examined over that next month.

JAYES: So, they are being looked at by the Cabinet?

MINISTER PLIBERSEK: I think everything's being looked at by the Cabinet, absolutely. Every dollar of spending has to be justified. I feel that as a Minister that I'm being able, being asked to justify every dollar.

JAYES: Is it harder to justify now these subsidies for electric vehicles, do you think?

MINISTER PLIBERSEK: I think electric vehicles have made a huge difference in the cost of living for many, many Australians. And the changes that we made have actually brought down the cost of electric vehicles not just through subsidies but because we've allowed those cheaper vehicles into Australia. There's just more choice, more variety for people to choose from. I don't know, I can't tell you what the system will be like in 10 years time but we're examining every dollar of government spending and again like we've got $10 billion worth of savings being held up by the Liberals right now. If they were serious about savings, they could pass those through the Senate.

JAYES: Ok. It was described by someone anonymously think that they thought Anthony Albanese's support of Jim Chalmers when he was asked as he flew out to Antalya, that it was like a living eulogy. What would you say of Jim's performance right now?

MINISTER PLIBERSEK: I'd say it's excellent. We're in difficult economic circumstances globally, he's steadied the ship. And I'd also say every single time we have a Treasurer that is bold, that does difficult things that the nation needs, there's a pile on. The idea that Paul Keating got all this support from people to deregulate the banking sector and you know, make the Reserve Bank independent and open our country by reducing tariff barriers. That was vociferously opposed and constantly criticised by his opponents, the same opponents who are now saying oh, the golden days of reform under Hawke Keating. It's tough when you are in the main job, when you're the one who's responsible for finding the savings, when you're the one delivering the big changes to set the country up better for the future, you cop it. And that's unfortunately that's just part of the job of being a reforming Treasurer.

JAYES: Paul Keating also recognised when he needed to reverse course and he did that on negative gearing.

MINISTER PLIBERSEK: Well, that assumes that there are things that Jim's doing that we should be reversing course on and I don't, I don't agree with that. I think we're making big changes that will benefit the nation and they will be. They will be opposed by the people who are beneficiaries of those policies.

JAYES: Now we're about to hear from the big four banks. It starts today and goes into tomorrow. The evidence isn't great, though. When you look at first home buyer loans, they are down as a comparison to historically. Also, investor loans have so have. Have also reduced. I mean, what’s the good news her?

MINISTER PLIBERSEK: The good news is that home buyers, particularly first home buyers, are a larger share of the loans being written. And we did want to rebalance the housing market so that people can buy a home of their own.

JAYES: Sure, but loans are down low historically. But you're saying first home buyers are?

MINISTER PLIBERSEK: A bigger share.

JAYES: But they’re still much lower than they were last year, though

MINISTER PLIBERSEK: They're a bigger share of a smaller number, which shows that the market's rebalancing back towards home ownership. And honestly, we've got so much demand in our economy for housing. I am confident that what we will see over time is people being able to afford a house to live in, which is what the housing market should prioritise. People need a roof over their heads. And in recent history, it's been much easier for an investor to buy their fifth home than it has been for a first home buyer to buy their first. That's not sustainable for the long term. And I represent an electorate where lots of people have benefited from negative gearing over the years. There'd be plenty of people in my electorate who had an investment property. You know what they say to me? I'm glad you've changed. I want my kids and grandkids to be able to afford a home of their own. Before the last budget, when we made these changes, the most frequent thing that wasraised with me at street stalls, was, what are you going to do for the kids? What are you going to do for my grandkids? What kind of country are we leaving them if they can't afford a home of their own?

JAYES: Ok, I just quickly want to ask you about Russell Brand and the reaction that we have seen from some quarters saying this is a witch hunt. He's been pursued for historical matters that, you know, the evidence has been provided. It was circumstantial that, you know, he shouldn't have been prosecuted and he shouldn't have got 10 years down. They compare it to other things that are happening around the uk. What do you think about those conversations?

MINISTER PLIBERSEK: So, I haven't followed the court case closely enough to give you an opinion on whether the outcome was, you know, fair or proportionate. But there's a few things I would say. The first is we know that sexual assault is phenomenally under reported. Most sexual assaults never make it to the police. If they do make it to the police, they never make it to court. If they do make it to court, it's very rare to get a conviction because, you know, in most cases there aren't witnesses. So, the fact that someone attracts a guilty verdict in a sexual assault case, it's incredibly rare for the volume of sexual assaults that occur. The fact that something happened in the past doesn't mean the victims haven't been suffering for years or decades in many cases. Many people keep assaults to themselves for years or even decades because they think no one will believe them or nothing will change if they make a complaint. And when they see other complainants come forward, they think, well, I'm going to give evidence in support of this other complainant, because if there's two of us telling the truth or three of us or four of us telling the truth, it makes it harder to deny that this is a pattern of behaviour.

JAYES: Yeah, right. One final thing. I've just returned from the midterms, as you know. Are there lessons from that for your government? This was very much, I think, an election that was not only a repudiation of Donald Trump, but it was about the cost of living.

MINISTER PLIBERSEK: I 100% agree. I think it was a cost of living election.

JAYES: Are you in trouble?

MINISTER PLIBERSEK: Well, no, because we are firmly focused on the cost of living. The Americans had a president -

JAYES: Donald Trump said he was as well, but people just didn't feel it.

MINISTER PLIBERSEK: They didn't feel it because he was also saying things like, our fuel companies have made billions of dollars of profit and people are just paying a few cents extra. And his response to that is, I don't know why people are complaining about paying a few cents extra at the Bowser. I think the fact that he was focused on the reflecting pool and a whole lot of building projects when people can't put food on the table or petrol in the tank. 

JAYES: The Ballroom.

MINISTER PLIBERSEK: What did I say?

JAYES: Oh, you said infrastructure project.

MINISTER PLIBERSEK: Well, the ballroom. I think that sent a signal to Americans that the most important thing for them was not the top priority of the government. We need to be absolutely 100% focused on reassuring people. We get it. We know people are feeling the pressure. We're doing everything we can to take the pressure down.

JAYES: Ok. Tanya Plibersek. Good to talk to you

ENDS