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- [00:01]
A
I'm Jacqueline Maley and you're listening to Inside Politics from the newsrooms of the City Morning Herald and the Age. As usual, I am joined by our chief political correspondent, Paul Sakal, who joins me from Canberra. Paul, here at Inside Politics, we're generally pretty lo fi, but how much do you use artificial intelligence in the course of your work?
- [00:23]
B
Well, I've had a few conversations with people about this this week, actually, and I. I'm actually surprisingly and almost embarrassingly bad with technology. My default when I have a tech issue is to call the IT guys without even trying to have a crack. I don't have a AI app on my phone and I feel like I'm at the point where if I don't start to learn the skills to just do some basic stuff, not write stories, but do research and other admin things, I will be left behind, like Australia might be in the AI arms race. So I need. I need to get onto it. I think I'm a bit embarrassed by my lack of use.
- [00:55]
A
You'll be the basket weaver, the basket weaver of the press gallery. Look, I'm. I'm also. I would not say that no one could accuse me of being a tech genius, but I definitely use AI in sort of my personal life, if that, like for, you know, various bits and pieces, like home maintenance, et cetera. And in terms of my work, I use it increasingly a lot like I use it for transcripts. I use Google Pinpoint, which is a really good tool if you want to put a lot of documents together. I use it to search documents, et cetera. I would never in a million years use it to write anything. But I'm sure there are probably journalists who already do. And of course we're talking about AI, because the Prime Minister gave a landmark speech this week about the government's approach to AI. It's an issue that's been bubbling away for them politically on a few fronts, most notably with data centres and sort of local and community opposition to data centres and bigger questions about how much resources these things are going to suck up. And then also there's been lobbying to the government by artists, music authors, about the protection of copyright laws, because the big AI companies basically have been asking or lobbying the government for a blanket exemption to copyright law so they can take all of this artistic content and use it to train their AI models, as they call it. So Albanese gave a speech this week on Wednesday at his alma mater, which is Sydney University. What did he say in the speech?
- [02:17]
B
Yeah, it was a highly anticipated speech. This was on Wednesday at lunchtime. It was his first big set piece. Moment to speak at length about AI.
- [02:27]
C
Australians have always been enthusiastic adopters of new technology, and AI is, of course, already part of our daily lives.
- [02:37]
B
The opportunities it presents, the risks it presents, how it might affect the workforce, what it might mean for governments and more broadly, how the government saw AI, almost in a moral sense. And he did actually quote the papal encyclical on AI from the new Pope last year, which made waves on.
- [02:57]
C
Also because the real issues that AI presents are not technical ones, they are economic ones, legal ones, social ones. And as Pope Leo has made clear in his superb first papal encyclical, Magnifica Humanatis, there is also a moral and a spiritual one. They are tests of our national values.
- [03:24]
B
And really, in a political sense, the key intent from the Prime Minister was to let all the groups who are becoming increasingly interested in this topic know that the Government was aware that there was bubbling concern about job losses. It understood that there were local communities who felt uncomfortable about water usage and potential electricity price spikes caused by data centres and particularly to the union movement. And it knew that there was the potential for huge economic upheaval. And that unlike a year ago when the government rejected the idea of making specific laws for AI, which were put forward by the then Industry Minister, Ed Husick, who was dumped from Cabinet, has become quite a critic of Albanese, the government was now of the view that there was a requirement to put something in legislation not quite as expansive and as interventionist as the EU's request regulatory approach from a couple of years ago, which was. Has been unwound and has left the EU a bit behind in the AI race. But some significant new, you know, guardrails is the buzzword to put around this new emerging technology, which we'll see in legislation next year.
- [04:29]
A
Yeah, so they're talking about legislation early next year which will basically set out AI regulatory standards. There's going to be an office of AI which will sit in his own department, the Prime Minister and department of Prime Minister and Cabinet. He said it was a bigger challenge than social media. And he also said with the data centers that they're going have to generate at least as much electricity as they soak up. And I think the same with water. And the other question with the data centres is whether or not they're going to take resources and even land away from construction, home construction, which we so desperately need. So he sort of had some words to say on that and said that, you know, they'll be required to build on land that is not going to be used to build houses on. How much of this is sort of about jobs? Because the Australian Council of Trade Union President Sally McManus has been out, she's been pretty punchy in her statements and said, you know, if businesses think that this is just an opportunity to cut lots of workers, then they're going to have a fart on their hands. How much of Albanese's speech was about placating the unions, particularly in the lead up to the AOP national conference?
- [05:33]
B
Yeah, I thought there was some of his firmest language yet outlining his view that the AI revolution should not be used to replace workers, but rather should be used to augment workers, make them more productive. Of course, he was keen to say that it wasn't a Luddite approach. In this speech, he was. He emphasised, and also on 7:30 report on ABC at Nighttime, emphasised that it would be folly to try and keep this technology out of workforces. He encouraged workers to embrace AI where they could. But he sent a pretty clear signal to big corporate firms in Australia that he wouldn't. He would not like to see mass layoffs, which would cause potentially social upheaval, create, put pressure on, you know, workers, insurance schemes and generally create anxiety in the community. This is obviously in line with the union movement, on the other hand, and this is what's so tricky and murky about this policy area because there are so many competing imperatives here. He, on the other hand, said to big AI firms like Anthropic and Google and Microsoft, who are keen to plough not just billions, but tens and potentially hundreds of billions of dollars into Australia to build these data centres, which they've already been doing. In 2024, we were the second biggest data centre investment destination in the world. I've seen some dispute on those figures, but the government repeatedly says it and I think there's good evidence for it. So this is already occurring in Australia and he's telling those firms who want to invest even more. Anthropic wants Australia to become its second home, that these guidelines and these new laws, the detail of which we've not seen, and we'll see how rigid they are, will in create more investor certainty and facilitate increased investment also. So on the one hand he's saying we want to protect jobs, on the other hand he's saying we want to maintain sovereignty, build up our own AI tools and then on a, you know, you don't have three hands. So my metaphor's not really working here. But on the other side, he's telling big US tech behemoths who have famously, if they follow the pattern of their social media counterparts, do not really respect sovereign nations laws. They're telling those firms that they want more investment and that we're open for business. So there was a message for all, all the stakeholder groups on Wednesday?
- [07:51]
A
Yeah, it was, it was very upbeat. It was kind of reassuring. He definitely downplayed the risks or he didn't really talk about the risks. And he certainly didn't talk about what some people, including economists and some of the AI architects themselves, think of as basically a threat, an existential threat to humanity. How was the business response to this speech? Because he I was really keen to talk up the investment prospects and that Australia is going to be a really good environment to invest in.
- [08:17]
B
I think most of the stakeholders were keen to give the Prime Minister credit for trying to take grip of such an unwieldy policy area as he tends to do. His approach as a politician is to try and bring disparate groups together, to create commonality and try and move forward with a sense of cooperation. He invoked the Hawke Keating era accord when Australia was facing a moment of globalisation. Thatcher and Reagan took a more laissez faire approach to that period, whereas that very successful labor government sought to create a greater social welfare dividend at that time. So he invoked that labor spirit to say that business and unions and government needed to come together to ensure we were not left behind, but also make sure that there was a of the profits that would be made. A significant proportion of that profit would flow to workers, not just firms. Now that's a Pollyanna ish view. It'd be fantastic if Australia could go down that route. But the unsaid part of Albanese's speech, and you know, some of the business figures pointed this out, is that we have no idea how this technology will play out. There are wildly different forecasts from different economists and there seems to be, if you go by, a statement that 200 very prominent economists put out earlier this week in the US, including 15 Nobel laureates. There is a growing consensus that there might be more speedy and highly disruptive change in the workforce in the space of five or 10 years than the median opinion in the economist world was a year ago. So the business community and the AI firms themselves were happy that Albanese was seeming to seize the moment. But there was also a kind of let's wait and see what we actually provided here by way of legislation.
- [10:06]
A
Yeah, there's so much unknown about the layoffs question. I think the Federal Department of Employment and Workplace Relations has put out a report last week that found no evidence to date. A broad labour market upheaval driven by AI. However, there are increasingly economists and even banks. The UBS bank put out an analysis this week that said on a sort of moderate AI adoption scenario, then ASX listed Australian companies might shed, or could potentially shed 10 to 15% of their workforce. And if it's an extreme adoption or a high adoption scenario, then it could be up to 20% of their workforces. And I mean, Sally McManus says, well, you know, the companies have got another thing coming if they think they can lay off workers. But ultimately the job of a company is to do its work the most efficiently it can so as to maximise shareholder return. So the heavy adoption of AI could well be in a company's interests. I mean, there could be an enormous public policy challenge that we're facing as we could be facing around the world. And, you know, a government, a Labor government that is on the side of workers by ideological bench will, could face an enormous conflict, right?
- [11:17]
B
Absolutely. And that labor tradition is why Albanese has made the noises he's made in this speech. And at that estimate you just cited at 10 to 15% turnover, even if AI does create a new set of jobs sometime down the track and ultimately lead to higher living standards and higher productivity, which is the aim, the great aim, particularly in a low productivity economy like ours that churn in the medium term could generate a huge level of political tension, unease in this society. People have done research on what the growth in Chinese manufacturing and exports did to Western societies in the early 2000s and onwards in terms of the reduction in manufacturing jobs in places like America and even much smaller rates of workforce turnover than 10 to 15%. Even in the single digits though, that that group of workers shifting out of the workforce, needing to find new places to express themselves and find their identity, caused huge political upheaval, in part led to the populist moment that we're in and created a general sense that the country was on the wrong track. So we really are heading into a moment where, you know, far be it for much smarter people than us who try to get their head around what this means for a modern society is quite profound. It's quite confusing because there are so many different trade offs and so many possibilities and we're in the centre of it. So it's a fun time to be talking about politics. Fun and a bit scary.
- [12:48]
A
Yeah, it is particularly when you think that, you know, if it is sort of entry level or graduate level jobs that are going to be going to be defunct because of AI, then it'll be young people coming out of university or coming out of education. The next generation, they might, you know, they might be facing mass unemployment. We don't know. We just don't know.
- [13:04]
B
Telemarketers, bank workers, people in software, low level lawyers and accountants. It's journalists.
- [13:13]
A
I think a lot of journalistic jobs could go. Absolutely. People in the care economy, in service industries are the ones who are going to be protected and you know, tradies, I guess. Send your kids into a trade. All right, Paul, let's switch to sunnier climes. I want you to imagine we're in Sicily. We're in the resort town of Taormina. We're staying in at the Grand Hotel San Pietro at the moment. We're just about to order some cocktails. We're sitting by the pool. This is the scenario that Pauline Hanson and her friend and benefactor, political benefactor Gina Reinheit are currently facing. That's where they are right now. According to photographs that we've just published on our websites, Pauline Hanson has been in having a hot girl summer in Europe and she's been in the UK doing some political business and now she's obviously having a few days off in Sicily. Why is she over in Europe? What's she been doing?
- [14:05]
B
Has Barnaby Joyce been having a hot boy summer, would you say? Because he's been over there too. He's never been turned that way probably.
- [14:12]
A
Maybe he's having a. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I think he is. I hope he stays out of the sun.
- [14:17]
B
So Hanson left Australia after the last sitting of Parliament when Labor passed its budget bills. There's a big five week break from sit ins in Canberra. So there's a little moment where pollies tend to quite often jet off. But this is quite a unique trip. Hanson has been in London for conservative political conferences. The CPAC conference where there's an Australian variant and the ARC conference which is a bit of a more highbrow version of CPAC. CPAC's A, A forum where which has really become the global leader in highlighting the populist agenda. Nigel Farage, many, many figures from the Trump world and increasingly Australian politicians are part of it as well. Figures like Jacinta Price, Tony Abbott, various others have spoken at these forums. They kind of highlight conservative ideas and the agenda of what, you know, many people describe as the new right. So there is an Australian version of cpac, but the London and US versions are places where there's often global attention. So she's been over there for those conferences, but she's also on a little bit of a tour of the European, or more appropriately, UK populist milieu, if you'd like. She's said that she'd meet with Nigel Farage, the leader of Reform uk, who's been in a little bit of a pickle himself, call in a by election in his own seat due to a scandal over donations from a dubious crypto billionaire. That meeting I haven't seen reporting on yet. I'm not sure if it's occurred. She's also met with Rupert Lowe, who is a figure who had defected from the Tories, which is the fair version of the Liberal Party, to Reform, before being pushed out by Nigel Farage due to his extreme views, but also his personal alleged abuse towards other officials in Reform. He's now started a party called restore, which is kind of the right wing upstart that's, you know, pushing reform to the right. And most controversially, Hanson has teased, but not yet released a podcast with Tommy Robinson, who's the anti Islam kind of provocateur, who's been widely condemned by figures including Farage, the Australian conservative Andrew Bolt, for being a thug, who's been charged with various criminal offences and who has been involved in a number of scandals where his credibility's been brought into question. She's been touring the streets of a town called Luton, which Robinson and others have used to highlight what they say is the scourge of, you know, political Islam in Britain. We're yet to see a spotlight episode by Channel 7, which is their version of 60 Minutes, which will air on Sunday, which has some of her UK trip. She's apparently grilled quite heavily by Liam Bartlett, the very experienced Channel 7 reporter, who also has a bust up with Robinson. And all of this, and sorry to drone on, all of this has raised questions even inside One Nation. I'm trying to write something on this which our listeners could read in the next few days on some of the questions inside One Nation about Hanson's approach. And what they're questioning is why she would go on a trip like this and vacate the domestic political terrain, giving the coalition much more oxygen than they've had in a while. And at a moment when she was polling around 30%, which is an extraordinary figure, leading labor and the Coalition, she's dipped in quite a few polls to the mid-20s, still averaging around 26%. But the trend is just. She's clearly having a down moment and she's taken some really big hits on her personal popularity numbers as well. So, you know, it's not worth exaggerating. 26% is still a huge number, but there appears to be a miscalculation.
- [18:01]
A
They're still out polling the coalition, we might add, you know, which is on 23% according to our Resolve Political Monitor, compared to one nation's 26%. So, I mean, she's keen to connect with all these far right figures from overseas who may or may not be familiar to Australian voters. I suspect they're really not particularly kind of low information voters. It's generating some publicity for her in, you know, our newspapers. I just wonder what the political strategy is here because, you know, if there are people at home who are struggling with the costs of living or struggling with whatever they're struggling with, and she's sort of, I don't want to say swanning about Europe, but it does look a little bit like she's swanning about Europe. She's. She's in this really fancy hotel in, in Sicily. Admittedly that's a private holiday. She's allowed to have a private holiday, but even when she. She met up with Holly Valance, who's of course a former neighbours star who's recently divorced from like a. A UK billionaire who was a strong. Her and her hu or ex husband were very strong supporters of, of Nigel Farage and they're sort of at Blenheim Castle, like they're doing some touristic sightseeing. I just wonder like, yeah, how does that land with voters back here that she's trying to win over?
- [19:09]
B
Yeah, well, this is the question that some of her own colleagues are asking. She had a poor time at the press club, which we've been been through in length, so we won't go through that. And, you know, the argument that some of them and many in the coalition are surprised she didn't take this course is to, you know, bed down her position over winter, regain any lost skin that she had at the press club. Instead, she's gone overseas, met with a bunch of figures that most Australians, I agree with you would have, would not know. And if you're searching for a rationale, and I have been thinking about this and asking people about this, I guess there's a. There's a few, a few fronts where you could, you know, create a logical explanation for what she's done. One is that there's a very influential world of wealthy, populist, friendly donors and other figures around these conferences and in a, in a hub, financial hub such as London, where because of Hanson's rise, she's treated as an absolute superstar in these circles. Now there's a lot of energy in the European and North American populist world. She's a darling in that world.
- [20:10]
A
She wants, but we're not allowed to. Australian politicians aren't allowed to take donations from overseas donors.
- [20:15]
B
Yeah, exactly. So. Yeah, precisely. So there's, I imagine there are wealthy Australians in that scene, such as Holly Valance and people around Valance and Anne Reinhardt perhaps. But also, I guess there's people who can actually donate. And then there's powerful and wealthy and intelligent figures in the populist political world in that part of the world where she can learn ideas, gather resources, find, you know, recruitment, helpful pieces in the one nation jigsaw puzzle to boost her brand here and attract, you know, thought leadership and advice and, and, and donors potentially, if there are Australians there. So that, that's, that's some of the thinking and, and, and the other part that was put to me is that, you know, where Farage has. Nigel Farage has been a, you know, very potent figure there for two or three years, speaking about what they say are the ills of mass migration and political Islam. She's trying to latch onto some of that to utilise the example of Britain and to show that to an Australian audience. Now, whether that lands or whether she appears to be off on a frolic, people will make their minds up.
- [21:27]
A
I mean, I suppose it makes her look kind of. Yeah, as she's accepted in these global sort of circles, it makes her look a bit more. It gives her a high profile, maybe people like that. I don't know. We'll see if it pays any political dividends for her. Meanwhile, just quickly, there has been a fair bit of reporting about her Senate colleague, Malcolm Roberts, who is, you know, fellow one nation senator who has been, I would say, on the extremes of Australian political life for his entire tenure in the Senate. And he has often dabbled in conspiracy theories, anti Semitic tropes, and we're seeing a lot of that reporting come out. He's sort of always done it and he's always done these things that would, might maybe cause a bit of outrage on Twitter or whatever, but it hasn't really been reported in mainstream media like ours. But now, you know, he's done stuff like he reposted, he praised this really notorious anti Semitic mural image which people can read about on our websites. You know, a lot of it is really, really deep rabbit hole, extremist sort of right wing conspiracy stuff that if you don't, if you're not across those tropes, then you sort of wouldn't even recognise them. He also praised Russian President Vladimir Putin for invading Ukraine. He's endorsed conspiracy theorist Alex Jones, who's a disgraceful individual from the United States, who of course said that the Sandy Hook school massacre was a false flag operation. And he has insisted that the US was controlled by a globalist sect of bankers, which as we know, is a common anti Semitic tr. So, I mean, that's pretty embarrassing for One Nation, is it? Barnaby Joyce has tried to distance himself from Malcolm Roberts and says those views don't reflect the party, but clearly they do because he's a One Nation senator
- [23:04]
B
and he's a longtime, very close ally of Pauline Hanson in Queensland who's been intrinsic to the One Nation show even though he's not very well known in the public. I think you're right. It is embarrassing and it, you know, there is a tendency in the left to label whatever view that an activist may not like as misinformation or conspiracy. But this is proper deep end lunacy.
- [23:26]
A
It's crazy, crazy stuff. It's like your grandpa's gone mental because he spent too much time on YouTube. Like it's really mad stuff.
- [23:33]
B
Yeah. That a party that wants mainstream attention would accommodate. This is a sign that it's not a serious organisation which has boundaries. And Pauline Hansen admitted just in front of the seat I'm sitting in a month or two ago to us that her branches have been. And this is a quote from her. I've seen lots of people on Twitter criticise me for repeatedly saying this, but she said the words herself. She's been infiltrated by extremists in her branches. She's had to shut down four branches because she can't control the types of characters coming into her branches. Now, the suspicion is that's white supremacist groups, potentially people with neo Nazi links and others potentially with views from similar to Malcolm Roberts. Now, those kinds of characters are absolutely on the fringe of Australian political debate. But if they see a party leader like Pauline Hanson, who's now grabbing mainstream attention, hanging out with someone like Tommy Robinson, then you could only imagine that people who have Malcolm Roberts view of the world might see an incentive to try and get themselves into One Nation because they see people like Roberts and Hanson fraternizing with Tommy Robinson and think, that's my home. So, you know, One Nation's had this amazing surge because of the coalition's ineptitude. And it's just been, you know, in such a parlous position. Labor has obviously activated a lot of people on the right to feel quite animated about politics. This has led to a surge to One Nation. But as time goes on, if stories like the ones that you've referenced, written by our colleague Rob Harris, keep emerging, you'd imagine that that would continue to chip away at One Nation's mainstream credibility.
- [25:07]
A
Yeah, I'm aware that we haven't really talked about the coalition or Angus Taylor this podcast, but we're going to. We will next week, I think, because Angus Taylor is sort of trying to reclaim a bit of political space for himself and he gave a speech to the Sydney Institute this week that laid out a little bit of his vision and gave a sharper attack on One Nation. We don't have time for that this week, but we will talk about it next week, amongst many other fascinating topics, I'm sure. Paul, when is our hot girl Summer? When are we going to do that?
- [25:34]
B
I spent all my money.
- [25:34]
A
When are we taking this?
- [25:35]
B
I spent all my money in the US I'm done for holidays.
- [25:38]
A
Okay. We'll have to wait for 2027 and take. We're going to take this show on the road to Sicily. I look forward to that. And I look forward to next week, too. And we'll just be in Canberra, in Sydney.
- [25:48]
B
Thanks. Thanks for talking. I'll talk to you next week.
- [25:50]
A
Bye.
- [25:51]
B
Bye.
- [25:55]
A
You can read all of our political news on our website, cah.com au or smh. Today's episode was produced by Chee Wong with help from Debbie Harrington. Our executive producer is Tammy Mills. And our podcasts are overseen by Lisa Muxworthy and Tom McKendrick. Before you go, follow Inside Politics and leave a review for us on Apple or Spotify. I'm Jacqueline Maley. Thank you for listening.