Paul Keating slaps down Anthony Albanese over final term as PM

The former PM has some sharp words for the Labor leader over ‘an unexpected term in office’.

Former PM Paul Keating and Opposition Leader Anthony Albanese.

Paul Keating has corrected Anthony Albanese for suggesting he lacked “a plan for that additional term” as prime minister after winning the March 1993 election.

“The published remark attributed to Anthony Albanese may not be accurate but in the event that it is accurate, Anthony not being in the parliament at the time may have only scant recollections of the 1993-96 parliament,” Mr Keating told The Australian.

“Be that as it may, that parliament saw the Labor government probably had a larger agenda and achieved more in those three years than any other Labor governmen­t, certainly in the post-war years.”

In an interview with The Aust­ralian published last Saturday, Mr Albanese compared Scott Morrison to other prime ministers who had won elections against the odds. “When governments get an unexpected term in office, as (Paul) Keating did in 1993 in that election, as (John) Howard did in 2004, as Morris Iemma did in NSW in 2007, then sometimes they don’t have a plan for that ­additional term,” he said.

Mr Keating was asked to respon­d to Mr Albanese’s comments about his prime ministership. He pointed to a plethora of activity and achievements in economic, social and foreign polic­y before Labor’s election defea­t in March 1996.

“Notwithstanding the great reforms that Bob Hawke and I and our colleagues engineered through the 1980s and into the 90s, there was no one three-year period so replete with change as 1993 to 1996,” Mr Keating said.

“Certainly, the distinction Anthon­y makes about the program of late-term governments cannot at all apply to the one I led in this period.”

Paul Keating and wife Annita on election night in 1993.

In Mr Keating’s 1993 election campaign launch speech, he outlin­ed a plan for a fifth term in government. After winning that election with an increased primary vote and more seats in parliament, he initiated an activist policy progra­m across government.

“For what it is worth, as soon as the election was over in 1993, I wasted not a second in beginning the huge Mabo consultative and legislative task, which had member­s of the indigenous communit­y in the cabinet room from April 1993 until the passage of the Native Title Act in December 1993,” he said.

“And then, of course, there are all the other massive reforms. Perhaps highest among them, in April 1993 before the Australian Institute of Company Directors I outlined the plan to abandon centralise­d wage fixing in favour of enterprise bargaining — which of course led to the 70 per cent increas­e in real wages up to the current time.

John Howard and Scott Morrison celebrate this year’s poll win. Picture: Adam Taylor.

“There was the $6.5bn Working Nation set of reforms for the long-term unemployed, which took months of my personal time, in May 1994. After that, the Creativ­e Nation package for the arts and the digital economy in October 1994. And beyond that, the definitive outline of an Australia­n republic in June 1995.

“The APEC meeting in Bogor in November 1994 followed the first historic meeting I had promoted the previous year in Seattle to establish an ambitious free-trade agenda for the region. And right at the end of 1995 was the negotia­ted security treaty with Indonesia, which I personally negotiated with president Suharto.”

In 1994-95, Mr Keating signed off on a new national competition policy with premiers that turbocharged economic growth by $25bn by 2005. In 1993 and 1995, new Accord agreements were struck with unions. And in May 1995, the government announced a plan to increase superannuation to 15 per cent.

“Labor governments change the country,” Mr Keating said. “It is very important that both the country and the Labor Party have clarity about the achievements and the sequence of them.”

Mr Albanese was a Labor candidate for the March 1996 election. Between 1993 and 1996, he was NSW Labor assistant secretary and an adviser to NSW premier Bob Carr.

A spokesman for Mr Albanese said: “As any reasonable person … clearly knew the comment was not a criticism of the Keating government but of Scott Morrison.”