BEN SMALL MP
FEDERAL MEMBER FOR FORREST
SHADOW ASSISTANT MINISTER FOR INFRASTRUCTURE
SHADOW ASSISTANT MINISTER FOR ELECTORAL MATTERS
OPPOSITION WHIP
ABC Afternoon Briefing
Television Transcript – ICAC & Tomago Bailout
13 August 2026
Host: PATRICIA KARVELAS:
Guest Panellist: JULIAN HILL MP
Guest Panellist: BEN SMALL MP
STARTS
Patricia Karvelas
I want to bring in my political panel for today. Julian Hill is the Assistant Multicultural Affairs Minister. Ben Small is the Shadow Assistant Infrastructure Minister. Welcome to both of you.
Ben Small MP
Happy Thursday.
Julian Hill MP
Good to be with you.
Patricia Karvelas
What did you think of that?
Ben Small MP
Look, I think the only person that's running as the alternative Prime Minister in Australia is Angus Taylor and I guarantee that the ratings on Angus's plan for the Coalition to Fix the economy and Protect our way of life, those are the ratings that we need to watch because they're on the up. And every Australian that I talk to, to talk about our plans, lower interest rates, lower power prices and put Australia first is being received really, really warmly in the community.
Patricia Karvelas
Okay, so you're saying that he did the wrong thing? Shouldn't be talking about TEN’S ratings? You should be looking at Angus Taylor's ratings?
Ben Small MP
Well, at the end of the day, we're putting ourselves forward as the alternative government of Australia and we've got a plan to fix everything that's going wrong on Mr Albanese's watch. I mean, the Prime Minister himself is the one ducking and weaving journalists.
Patricia Karvelas
You're ducking and weaving my question. You are, Was it wrong to talk to a journalist like that? He's asking questions about ICAC.
Ben Small MP
And I think that Dave Sharma put it beautifully there, where he did say that that was out of line. But like I say, I think Australians are focused on the conduct of the two men that currently lead the government of Australia and the alternative government. Prime Minister Albanese refuses to answer questions about his conduct in relation to the podcast we've all seen. It harks back to when he wouldn't admit to falling off a stage and all sorts of things. So I'm very comfortable that Angus conducted himself in that interview, as one would expect an alternative Prime Minister of Australia will.
Patricia Karvelas
Uh the conduct obviously has sparked a lot of discussion. I suppose ca- gets on camera what some of us experience off camera sometimes, rebukes from all sorts of politics, sides of politics, but uh it's unbecoming?
Julian Hill MP
Oh it was inappropriate conduct towards a journalist and look, people get heated, they should say sorry. But let me pick up on the last three words of what Ben said, not the kind of weird key message bit at the start, but well done for saying whatever you were talking to say on TV.
Ben Small MP:
Thank you.
Julian Hill MP:
You said alternative Prime Minister of Australia. The conduct actually, the apologies made for that workplace exchange, the conduct actually that should be concerning to Australians, if you want to be the alternative Prime Minister of Australia, you have to answer the questions. You're held to a higher standard. This is not one of those silly stunts like we've seen this week where you know the Opposition want to refer people to the Federal Police or the Corruption Commission for a media headline. This is an active inquiry by the New South Wales Corruption Commission that's received text messages, specific evidence, specific suggestions.
Patricia Karvelas
Who's not a party to the proceedings?
Julian Hill MP
They require a specific answer and that's all the journalist was trying to do was get an answer to a specific question a generalised denial when there's specific evidence alleging corruption in Angus Taylor's own branch of the Liberal Party - New South Wales deserves a specific answer, if as Ben said you want to be seen credibly as the alternative Prime Minister. I'll finish on this point I'll give Angus an acknowledgement he's had a bad day it was his six-month anniversary from knocking off Susan Ley and he had one of his own frontbenchers out refusing to back his leadership at the National Press Club where he went to share his true authentic feelings.
Ben Small MP
PK on this though there's a real double standard from Labor, Luke Gosling is a party to current court proceedings having been charged by the NT police.
Patricia Karvelas
He’s an NT MP for those who don't know.
Ben Small MP
Exactly right charged with the alleged assault of the NT administrator. The Prime Minister has used that as a basis not to answer questions. So if that's the highest standard that we want Andrew Taylor held to, I think he more than acquitted himself to that standard and exceeded that earlier today.
Julian Hill MP
Nice try, but you understand PK and I suspect Ben does. There's a fundamental difference between a proceeding before a court and a corruption inquiry where people have every right on royal commissions and corruption inquiries to be asked questions and answer them. The prohibition for the criminal justice system on any of us shooting our mouth off is much stronger and for a good reason. People deserve a fair trial.
Patricia Karvelas
Let me share with you something that we believe here at the ABC and that I believe individually, which is thankful because it's in combination with my employer, which is that everyone should answer questions. So, it strikes me that the Prime Minister hasn't really answered a range of questions about the ‘melons’ or apologised. It's taken all week. Why not just apologise for the gesture that many people, including many women, as you know, found offensive?
Julian Hill MP
We've dealt with this. Sure, let's go back to this.
Patricia Karvelas
No, it's one of the issues and I'll go back to ICAC too. I think both issues-
Julian Hill MP
I think a collective form of insanity has overtaken the Opposition. For whatever reason, some journalists have chosen to pursue this. The Prime Minister apologised weeks ago.
Patricia Karvelas
Was it for that as well?
Julian Hill MP
But you can't apologise for something that didn't happen.
Patricia Karvelas
But people have seen it and think it happened.
Julian Hill MP
We're going around in circles. The Japanese Embassy ambassador put out a statement today. this is nonsense, it's confected and you've now got the opposition pulling political stunts, making ridiculous references, wasting the police's time to perpetuate a fantasy media story of something that didn't happen. I mean we've spent all week, but if the Opposition want to turn up to Parliament, frankly what I think you're doing with this bizarre frolic that you're on is driving up One Nation's vote because when people out in real world turn on the TV and go, what's the Federal Parliament up to? They're talking about this, that has nothing to do with the daily lives and it's completely fanciful and made up.
Patricia Karvelas
Alright, people can watch it and decide if it's made up.
Julian Hill MP
Absolutely, and they can watch all of us.
Patricia Karvelas
And many have watched it and don't think it's made up. That's the problem.
Julian Hill MP
All sorts of hand gestures out of habit repeatedly. Like this is what people do who talk with their hands as I do. Like honestly the allegation, the suggestion is fanciful, it's ridiculous, it's been addressed and if they want to waste the time of the Federal Police and waste the time of the National Parliament instead of doing their job then people should judge them accordingly.
Patricia Karvelas
I'll give you a right of reply.
Ben Small MP
Yeah I think look Albanese set the standard here when he was the Opposition leader and in 2022 he criticised the then Prime Minister for leaking private correspondence between leaders of, leaders of countries right and he said that that should be kept private. We've seen his own government leak a diplomatic cable from the Japanese government-
Julian Hill MP
This is just made up.
Ben Small MP
to Australia. So, again we are simply requiring that Labor meet the own standard that they set.
Patricia Karvelas
So let me go to another standard because as I say I'm an equal opportunity questioner, the Opposition leader has only said he did not write a check for this particular group that was trying to clearly stack and join people up to stack branches and do all sorts of things. He didn't answer the question about deliberations, what he knew, who he'd talk to. Doesn't he need to answer all those questions?
Ben Small MP
Well, look, I think if there was any evidence that existed to suggest impropriety on Angus's part, he would be sitting in ICAC right now. So at the end of the day, we can draw all sorts of allegations from all sorts of sources across the community, but we have laws in this country and they require that a prosecution, whether it be in a criminal court, as we're seeing play out in the NT at the moment, or indeed the corruption agencies that exist across Australia, they compile evidence, where that meets a civil threshold or a criminal threshold, prosecutions abort.
That's not the case here. Angus has said that he has nothing to hide, he's done nothing wrong and so I think that the real debate that Australians are worried about is about fixing our economy and restoring our way of life.
Patricia Karvelas
I think fixing the economy or dealing with the economy is definitely something people are very concerned about.
Julian Hill MP
Well, they’ve spent a week not talking about it. They've been talking about fantasy and making fake police referrals. And they've now got a plan, presumably written with ChatGPT, because there's no actual policies or costings, but they hold it up on TV. So for all the viewers at home, when you see them hold the plan up on TV, there's nothing in it. But anyway, that will become apparent.
Ben Small MP
I'm very happy to step through it, P.K.
Patricia Karvelas
Please don't read the plan.
Ben Small MP
I was going to say, no, no, no,But.
Patricia Karvelas
I accept there are things in that plan and that it's not quite right to say that there's nothing in the plan. Finally, Tomago and the bailout. Do you support the bailout?
Ben Small MP
Look this is really a concern to me because in February this year in my own electorate hundreds of people were laid off when the Albemarle-Kemerton lithium refinery was shut down. There was no bailout, there was no support and it was due to high energy prices that have occurred under this government. The Tasmanian workforce just let go in the last month at Bell Bay, no bailout for them. This is the consequence of Albanese's so-called ‘Future Made in Australia’ and Net Zero Fantasy. Higher energy prices are driving industrial activity and the jobs that that creates out of this country and it seems to be a lottery some sort of sick postcode lottery as to whether or not you get a taxpayer funded bailout as Tomago has or like my own constituents you left high and dry on the unemployment line.
Patricia Karvelas
Is that the inconsistency about who gets bailed out that's a genuine issue isn’t it?
Julian Hill MP
No each proposal every industrial case needs to be put on its merits I'll just make two points; it's obviously a very important day for the thousand workers and their families who now have security. Their jobs are there for the next 10 years. There's a $2.5 billion investment between the Commonwealth and the New South Wales Government, complemented by $1.1 billion by the private owner. But this is not an issue just for the town or the region. This is a really important point. This is a nationally significant industrial facility of aluminium, which is critical to our industrial base. And the world's changed. We saw this in COVID. But even since COVID, with a deteriorating geopolitical situation, security environment, Australia can no longer rely on the just-in-time economy. We have to make more stuff here and we have to make sure that aluminium, which is critical to so much of the economy, is made here. It's absolutely critical for our defence, strategic and economic needs. and I applaud the New South Wales.
Ben Small MP
A Nationally significant asset that's no longer viable. Renewable energy was going to be cheaper PK and here we are with a refinery of that national-
Julian Hill MP
renewable energy is cheaper.
Patricia Karvelas
Ben Small, Julian Hill I say goodbye to you both
Julian Hill MP
Thanks PK.
Ben Small MP
Happy Thursday.
Patricia Karvelas
That's it for afternoon briefing.