TOM STEINFORT, HOST: A battle over government control and political freedom is brewing this morning, with the Coalition warning against Labor's new plan to police addictive social media algorithms. Joining us to discuss today's headlines, we have Minister for Indigenous Australians, Malarndirri McCarthy and Nationals leader Matt Canavan. Good to see you both. Matt, you've come out swinging on this one since Labor released their draft Digital Duty of Care bill, claiming that it's censorship. From my reading of it, all they're doing is allowing people to follow whatever they want and ditch the algorithm. How does that then equate to censorship?
MATT CANAVAN, NATIONALS LEADER: Well, this bill gives the Minister the power to determine what is harmful conduct. And in the Minister's own words, she thinks that people have stopped trusting her because of social media. I mean, news to the Labor Party, people don't trust you because you lied to us at the election about taxes. And I don't think proven liars should be given the power to decide what's harmful online. That's what the bill says. Now, clearly the Labor Party have given up on trying to lower prices, on trying to cut taxes, on trying to lower migration, and now they're going to try and ban you from complaining about it. These people are not impartial. In their own words, this is to tilt the political field in their favour. They're not impartial. This bill is like putting Anthony Albanese in charge of refereeing a South Sydney Rabbitohs game. He wouldn't be an impartial judge. These people aren't an impartial judge and we should not allow this type of censorship to emerge in a free and open country.
HOST: Malarndirri, censorship, is that what you're doing?
MALARNDIRRI MCCARTHY, MINISTER FOR INDIGENOUS AUSTRALIANS: Well, nice slogan for the next election, Matt, but what we saw yesterday, Tom, was families, was parents who spoke about how important this next step is. The death of loved ones, of children who should never have passed away. Their words have been heard in this. This is about the care of our families right across the country. Saying to big tech companies, stop. We want to be able to have a choice, a choice as to whether we go through whatever we want to on social media. And that's really at the crux of this, giving Australians that choice, as opposed to big tech companies running your lives.
MATT CANAVAN: So, why does the Minister have the power to define what's harmful conduct? How does that fit into what you've just said?
MALARNDIRRI MCCARTHY: Well, I think Matt –
MATT CANAVAN: This is clearly not about protecting people, it's about protecting politicians. It's about protecting your backside.
MALARNDIRRI MCCARTHY: Well, Matt –
MATT CANAVAN: Why does the Minister need. If it's about choice, why does the Minister get to determine what’s harmful? That’s in the Act.
MALARNDIRRI MCCARTHY: It seems to be. This is your opportunity to actually be a leader and speak with the Minister -
MATT CANAVAN: OK. Right. Why don't you just answer the question?
MALARNDIRRI MCCARTHY: Speak with the Minister. And I am answering the question. It's your opportunity to do that. To just whitewash all of this simply because you're going to spit the dummy over a point that you think has merit when it doesn't, is quite irresponsible –
MATT CANAVAN: I didn't get an answer of why that is in the bill.
MALARNDIRRI MCCARTHY: It’s quite irresponsible.
MATT CANAVAN: You're trying to sneak this through.
MALARNDIRRI MCCARTHY: So, you can speak with the Minister on that, Matt.
MATT CANAVAN: Why do I have. You’re in Cabinet.
MALARNDIRRI MCCARTHY: This is going to be a very important -
MATT CANAVAN: Did you ask this?
MALARNDIRRI MCCARTHY: Well, I don't see a problem with it.
MATT CANAVAN: OK.
MALARNDIRRI MCCARTHY: I don’t see a problem with it.
MATT CANAVAN: I don't know why you can't answer the question.
MALARNDIRRI MCCARTHY: I see the problem with you, Matt.
HOST: Matt, we'll focus on this because there's clearly sentiment in the community to have something done about fixing social media –
MATT CANAVAN: Absolutely.
HOST: And the huge damage that is being done to a generation of adolescents in Australia.
MALARNDIRRI MCCARTHY: That’s correct.
HOST: What's your solution then? What are you coming up with that's better?
MATT CANAVAN: I do think we should give more choice to parents. I do think we should have greater transparency for the Australian people about the algorithm and some social media companies are doing that. But I don't see why that objective would involve giving the Minister for Communications, who herself has said that the social media algorithm is hurting her politically, a power to define what is harmful conduct. I mean, the devil is in the detail here. We can't just have these talking points about it's all about parents, when actually when you read the bill, which I don't know if Malarndirri has, because she couldn't answer the question before.
MALARNDIRRI MCCARTHY: Oh, nice one Matt.
MATT CANAVAN: When you read the bill, it gives this Minister extraordinary power to define what is harmful conduct.
MALARNDIRRI MCCARTHY: Always go personal. Always go personal when you can’t push your argument.
MATT CANAVAN: That is not. That is not acceptable in any democratic country to give the executive government that kind of power to decide what is and isn't harmful in political discussion.
HOST: Ding, ding. The referee is calling time on that battle. We'll head now to the City of Rockhampton. Matt, of course this will be something very close to your heart, set to host the 2032 Olympic rowing there, apart from the fact that every other country in the world doesn't want to go there, we're being told. And now we're seeing today fresh reports that they're struggling to accommodate just 800 students ahead of next weekend's school state championships regatta. Matt, what's going on? We're hearing about crocs in the water there. Can Rocky actually host this?
MATT CANAVAN: Well, if crocs were a problem, why would we have the school championships there? And we've hosted this many times. Rowing Queensland has been open in not wanting it in Rockhampton because they want it at their headquarters down in Brisbane. So, I'll take anything Rowing Queensland says with a grain of salt on this. We've hosted the school championships in Rockhampton for many years. I've never heard a complaint about accommodation.
HOST: School championships is very different to the biggest event in the world.
MATT CANAVAN: But this is, the complaint you raised was about this event and that's not been an issue. We'll be fine. We host Beef Week in Rockhampton where 100,000 visitors come. Now, no doubt the Olympics will put strain on hotels and accommodation. It will in Brisbane too. And we've been seeing a lot of reports about that. And that's why it makes sense to spread these events around the state. We will build more accommodation in Rockhampton and in Brisbane for the Olympic Games. And that will provide a legacy then for areas like Rockhampton and Brisbane, which have housing shortages. So, it makes very good sense to spread these events right around. And Rockhampton, the Fitzroy River is a beautiful, beautiful part of our country. And it will be a wonderful presentation of the Great Barrier Reef catchment and regional Queensland to the world.
HOST: All right, Matt, Malarndirri, we’re out of time. Appreciate you joining us this morning.