Rita Panahi:
Joining me now is deputy executive director of the Institute of Public Affairs, Daniel Wild. Dan, it was a pointless exercise as far as I could work out. We’ve had what, just motherhood statements, nothing concrete, nothing consequential, but what really annoyed me was the tone. The way he was patronising the nation, talking to us like he’s a prep teacher, and we’re the little kid that’s sitting on the ground listening. I just don’t understand the tone, or what he hoped to achieve out of that whole exercise.
Daniel Wild:
Well, he’s completely and totally out of touch. This was a PR exercise, where he basically took all the media companies for a ride, they believed, oh, if he’s calling the nation to have five or 10 minutes of his time, you better have something important to say. Instead, he basically just said, “How good am I for cutting the fuel excise?” Nothing of substance in terms of actually getting more oil out of the ground, how are we going to have our own supplies? How are we going to have our own refineries so we’re not in this position? Again, I thought it was a truly bizarre but revealing moment that he really isn’t a leader, he’s someone who just exists in a ceremonial role, and sort of pats himself on the back every now and again.
Rita Panahi:
That’s an interesting description. Perhaps the dream that the Republicans had of that ceremonial leader that we all elect, maybe that was Alba, he’s before his time. There was nothing there concrete about, okay, this is a wake-up call for this country, perhaps we’ve been on the wrong track with energy policy, not just my government, but coalition governments, and we need to be energy independent. We need to stand on our own two feet. If he even just broached that topic and gave us some confidence that he gets the magnitude of this, he gets the long term implications, and he’s going to do something about it, I think that would have changed everything. I think he would have had people from all sides of the political aisle going, “Well, thank God there’s going to be something positive come out of this crisis.”
Daniel Wild:
Well, that’s what Australians wanted to hear, but we’re not going to get that. And as a matter of fact, Albanese and a lot of people in this government like high fuel prices because it encourages people to ditch internal combustion engines and take up electric vehicles. So, as far as they’re concerned so much, the better. And you’re absolutely right, this is an off ramp for the net-zero climate change madness, but this government won’t take it.
Rita Panahi:
They won’t take it, and as Donald Trump has pointed out, the US is energy independent, the European countries that are upset about this conflict and Australia, which really isn’t helping out much, we’re the ones who have depended on this, and we’re acting like it’s the other way around, that we expect the US to fix this issue as opposed to taking some action ourselves. And unlike most European countries, we are blessed with all the natural resources you need to be energy independent.
Daniel Wild:
Yeah. This is a self-inflicted economic wound. You’re always going to have external circumstances, be it war, be it supply chain disruption, and you’re spot on, in a country like ours, the only reason we’re in this situation is because of shortsighted damaging policy that’s both sides of politics, it was the coalition that signed us up to net-zero thanks to Scott Morrison, but this is a self-inflicted wound that’s been accelerated by the international event.
Rita Panahi:
Absolutely. Now, Richard Marles, Defence Minister Richard Marles, has confirmed that Australia will participate in a virtual meeting of 35 nations to discuss military measures to secure the safe passage of vessels in the Strait of Hormuz. And we could contribute assets to the plan, this is what he told ABC Radio today.
Richard Marles:
Yeah, we will be participating in that, it’ll be a virtual meeting, as I understand, the next 24 hours, and the foreign minister will be representing Australia at that meeting. And it follows on from Australia signing up to the UK led statement of more than a week ago in respect of the Straits of Hormuz. That statement gives a sense of where we’re at. Obviously all of those countries and very much Australia have an interest in seeing the Strait of Hormuz opened as soon as possible. We will look to what Australia can do.
Rita Panahi:
Again, does not fill one with confidence. Just so weak, wishy-washy, we signed a statement at the UK [inaudible 00:04:38], really?
Daniel Wild:
Yeah. Look, in principle, this is a good thing if they’re able to get the job done, and if we can make a contribution, then so much the better. But yeah, it doesn’t fill me with confidence, it sounds like he’s sort of going through the motions, I can sort of picture him sitting in his office with the notes in front of him, reading them out, to get the lines out there. And it just goes to this point that we have been, as a nation, so far behind where we should be on our abilities to defend ourselves and make meaningful contributions to international challenges that we currently face. And this is a reason why the US and others are not looking at Australia as the reliable ally that we once were.
Rita Panahi:
Now, we spoke yesterday about the looming threat of stagflation due to this fuel crisis. That’s when you have the worst of both worlds, high unemployment, high inflation. Well, more economists are warning that we are headed in that direction, economists at [inaudible 00:05:30] say there is a 25% chance that the country will enter a recession. They said, “With growing, slowing inflation and unemployment rising, this is the greatest stagflation risk faced by the Australian economy in the 21st century.” Dan, is Treasurer Jim Chalmers up to the task here? Can he prevent the country from falling into recession, perhaps even stagflation?
Daniel Wild:
Well, he can, but he won’t, because what needs to be done is beyond the capacity of the government. Now, stagflation is a problem because usually if you have high inflation, that’s a sign that unemployment is low because you’ve got people in jobs spending money, and usually if inflation is low, that’s because people are out of jobs and not spending money. When you’ve got both that are high, that’s a real structural problem. The reason we are going to that place in this country is because we’re not generating any wealth or growth. Our supply side, our capacity to produce wealth has collapsed at the same time as we have demand increasing because of mass migration and massive government spending. So, that is what is causing these twin problems.
You put on top of that all of the regulation and red tape that businesses face, that’s why we’ve got the problem that we have. So, yes, the government can do things to fix it, cut immigration, reduce red tape, make sure that we can have a resources sector that can generate wealth rather than undermining them. Are they going to do those things? Absolutely not.
Rita Panahi:
Well, no, it’s not in their DNA to do any of that, is it? It just goes against their ideological position. And we’re hearing all sorts of mixed reports, they’re talking about slashing the capital gains tax discount, they’re talking about increasing spending in certain areas, when everyone’s recommending they slash spending. So, it’s going to be a surprise what we get out of this budget.
Daniel Wild:
Well, I think it’ll be more of the same, it’ll be higher taxes and more spending. I just don’t-
Rita Panahi:
Worst surprise possible.
Daniel Wild:
Look, I don’t… What else are they going to do? As I say, the big ticket items, cut immigration, get rid of net-zero, reduce regulation on small business, I don’t get any indication that they’re going to do any of that. So, things are just going to keep going on as they are.
Rita Panahi:
Now, after the huge success of One Nation in the South Australian election, leader Pauline Hanson has doubled down on her quest to reshape Australian politics. This is what she had to say on Sky News yesterday.
Pauline Hanson:
People want change, they’re sick and tired of these political parties. They don’t have vision for the future, they don’t have answers. We’re in the dire mess that we are in this country because their policies, under both of them. And people want clear policies, direction, someone like One Nation, who has this country and its people at heart.
Rita Panahi:
Now, Pauline Hanson also confirmed One Nation would go after Victoria in the November state election, and declared that the party would win the hotly contested federal seat of Farrer in the upcoming bi-election. That was Susan Lee’s old seat. I’m going to be speaking to Cory Bernardi shortly, Dan, but the tide is slowly… Well, maybe not so slowly anymore. We’ve got One Nation now, who are saying we are the official opposition in South Australia.
Daniel Wild:
Yeah. Well, I think it has all sort of changed, and it’s almost as if it’s passed the Liberal Party by. The results in South Australia can’t be understated. One Nation wiped out the Liberal Party in the outer suburbs, but they also overtook the Liberal Party in the urban fringe as well, which is-
Rita Panahi:
Yeah, the number of seats where they came in second ahead of the Liberals is something that should be alarming the coalition across the country.
Daniel Wild:
That’s right. That’s right. You might be able to understand the outer suburbs, but certainly when you’re eating into the middle suburbs, and the regions, there’s not much left. But One Nation has also succeeded in taking the Labour Party’s vote, you look at the outer suburbs, some seats went from 70/30 Labour/Liberal to 55/45 Labour/One Nation. So, One Nation is also eating into Labor’s working class vote as well. Now, can they maintain that? The challenge One Nation has is they don’t get many preferences, so it’s hard for them to win a lot of seats. So, if they don’t get a primary of 30+, it’s hard for them to get seats. So, the next phase is, are they going to convince people to put One Nation second for those who don’t want to put it first? And if they can do that, then they’re off to the races.
Rita Panahi:
Well, the Liberals Coalition need to decide what they want to do as well because they can’t continue to treat One Nation like they’re the minnow in this relationship. They can be disregarded because if they don’t have some sort of a preference still, some sort of preference discipline on the right, you’re going to have Labour remain in power. You’re going to have Labour with a primary vote of somewhere around the 30% mark winning comfortably.
Daniel Wild:
Well, that’s probably the most likely scenario is Labor’s primary goes backwards, but they win more seats. Liberals lose seats, One Nation wins a few seats. Look, preferences can only be recommended, people will vote the way they want to vote anyways. So preference deals are important, but I don’t think they’re as big of a deal today as they used to be because people basically make up their own minds now.
Rita Panahi:
They’re not looking at the little slip of paper that the party-
Daniel Wild:
No.
Rita Panahi:
No.
Daniel Wild:
Not as much.
Rita Panahi:
Daniel Wild, thank you so much for your time.
Daniel Wild:
Thank you.
This transcript of Daniel Wild on The Rita Panahi Show Sky News Australia from 2 April 2026 has been edited for clarity.
