THE HON ANDREW HASTIE MP

SHADOW MINISTER FOR INDUSTRY AND SOVEREIGN CAPABILITY
FEDERAL MEMBER FOR CANNING

TRANSCRIPT

INTERVIEW WITH MARK LEVY, 2GB

Thursday 5 November 2026

Topics: Cost of living; RBA interest rate hike; Jim Chalmers; immigration; US midterms.

E&OE……………………………………

MARK LEVY: Andrew, good morning to you.

ANDREW HASTIE: Good morning to you, Mark. Great to be with you.

MARK LEVY: Nice to catch up, mate. Bit of a tough week this week – a really tough week – off the back of yet another interest rate rise, and there was the Treasurer and the Prime Minister blaming everyone and everything but themselves for the problems we face at the moment. But I think what the governor Michelle Bullock said, in relation to we have a domestic problem, sums up how a lot of people feel They can't keep lying to us – the Treasurer and the Prime Minister – they need to come clean, and we need some accountability because this is really, really hurting hardworking Australians who are struggling to meet their mortgage repayments and deal with the cost of living crisis.

ANDREW HASTIE: That's right. Aussie families, businesses, and heavy industry are getting smashed by the Albanese government's inflation, and the Prime Minister and the Treasurer refuse to look in the mirror and take responsibility for this. This is the 17th rate rise since we've had Labor in government, and people are paying more than $30,000 a year in interest on the average new mortgage. We now have the RBA Governor, Michelle Bullock, we've had economists across the country, the IMF saying that we have a domestic inflation problem. So, they need to take responsibility. The best thing they can do is rein in their wasteful spending. Families and businesses across this country are getting their books in balance. It's time the government did the same thing.

MARK LEVY: Mark Bouris was on this radio station interviewed by my colleague James Willis the other day, Andrew. Mark Bouris said, "In the private sector, Jim Chalmers would have been gone a long time ago". Has the Treasurer got to go?

ANDREW HASTIE: He does have to go. Mark Bouris is absolutely right. The private sector is ruthless – if you can't balance a budget, you're gone. And what we're seeing from this Labor government – but particularly the Treasurer – is an inability to balance the nation's books. That has consequences for every family out there, for every small business out there. People are hurting. They are hurting across the board. That’s why it's time for leadership and it's time for the Treasurer to go.

MARK LEVY: Would you support the elevation of someone like Andrew Charlton, who has a PhD in economics from Oxford? I mean, there's a bloke sitting there in the Labor Party in the government who's pretty well versed and ran a successful business and then sold it. Yet we've got a bloke who did a thesis on Paul Keating and has clearly got no idea.

ANDREW HASTIE: Exactly. You're talking about Andrew Charlton. If we're going to focus on Andrew's background, he's got a business background – he's actually done very well as a businessman. Sure, he's got a PhD, but the last thing we need is more PhDs. We need someone with real experience, and I think he is, man to man, far superior to Jim Chalmers in that regard.

MARK LEVY: The other people who are hurting at the moment are small business owners, but not only small business owners. The last 24 hours, we've had this devastating news that a retailer that's been trading for 166 years, David Jones, has entered voluntary administration, Andrew. So, it's not only small business – all business. The business community is feeling the effect of the state of the economy right now.

ANDREW HASTIE: Yeah, very sad about David Jones. We lost David Jones a couple of years ago here in Mandurah – they left – so I'm not surprised. But last week, Mark, I was over in Whyalla, in South Australia, to see the steelworks there – a critical piece of our sovereign capability – and the town is really struggling because the blast furnace there is closed. There's a whole bunch of reasons, but the primary underlying reason is energy prices – we just can't compete internationally anymore. That's because this government's pursuing reckless Net Zero policies. They're chasing climate targets rather than price targets, and again, families, businesses, and heavy industries like the Whyalla Steelworks are suffering.

MARK LEVY: You know what's hard to swallow at the moment? Anthony Albanese over at this Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting. Now, look, I'm the first person to say they're important, but he's still there. The Telegraph today has printed the menu of what he's been eating and drinking – all the delicacies of the Caribbean. I'm sure you're like me, Andrew, you don't mind a schnitzel, some chips, and a salad. But you know he's washing down all this fancy stuff with wine from the UK, from Canada, from here in Australia and New Zealand. Is it time for him to get on a plane, get home, and start talking to the Australian people bluntly on how he plans on turning everything around?

ANDREW HASTIE: Well, people are struggling to put food on their own table, so it's a bit tough to hear about the seven-course degustation or whatever he's having over there. Look, the Prime Minister has a job though to represent Australia on the international stage – I think we can all agree with that. But he's got a Treasurer here, and his job is 24/7 to balance the books and create better economic outcomes for the Australian people, and he's failing at that. So, he's left a mess, and he's got to clean it up. We can change Treasurer – he can change his Treasurer – and he can start cutting in spending because a lot of Australians are cutting their own spending.

MARK LEVY: Well, one of the other issues people write to me about is immigration. There are some changes coming, visa rule changes as well. Cost of living pressure has seen a real focus on this immigration. It's been led by One Nation. Now the Coalition has a policy to cut numbers significantly too. Data today says that three in five Australians believe immigration is too high, the most in 20 years. How do you convince people your plan is the right one, and you're not just following the One Nation pitch, Andrew?

ANDREW HASTIE: Our plan is the biggest cut in the nation's history. We're going to take about 650,000 temporary visas out of the overall stock over four years if we're elected, which will significantly reduce pressure here in Australia on housing, on our infrastructure, and it will hopefully help with inflation as well. We have a plan. We've done the detailed modelling and the costing. One Nation announced it, and we don't actually know how they're going to deliver the numbers that they claim to deliver. In fact, we actually don't even know their number. So, we've done the work, and we know how important this is for a lot of Australians. And we're going to do it in such a way as not to damage the economy because the Working Holiday Maker Visa is really important for people in the regions. We also need to look at aged care and healthcare – they're really important sectors. Getting the balance right is critical and that's what our policy does.

MARK LEVY: All right, I'd love your reaction to the US midterms. It's been a disaster for the Republicans. The Democrats taking over the House and the Senate, Andrew.

ANDREW HASTIE: Yeah, that's right. I think Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, the Republican, said it best when he said, "It's like a meteor has hit the US". It’s almost an extinction level event for the MAGA movement and the Republican Party. I think the lesson here is the economic frame is critical. When you read what people are saying – and you can pick up any US media source, and you'll hear Americans on the ground telling journalists what they think – it comes back to cost of living. The economic frame here is critical. People feel worse off after tariffs and after the war in Iran, and Donald Trump has said a few times now that he doesn't really care. Our job is always to deliver better outcomes for the Australian people so the lesson for us is economic – cutting taxes, cutting wasteful spending, delivering cheaper power, getting out of Net Zero, controlling migration, building more homes, and investing in the nation so that we have the resilience to weather global events. That's our mission.

MARK LEVY: It's interesting. I've listened to a few of the voters who were interviewed on the way into the polling booths yesterday, and they were saying, you know, Trump said that we weren't going to start any new wars, and they're pretty angry about the war with Iran. I actually think President Trump finally was someone who was willing to stand up to the biggest sponsor of terrorism in the world and a regime intent on destroying Western democracies. But if they're accusing Donald Trump of lying in terms of not starting any new wars, is there a lesson here for someone like Anthony Albanese who said he wouldn't touch negative gearing and he'd lower power bills? Because I think voters, aren't they entitled to be a little angry, frustrated, and also expressing their frustration that we continually are lied to by our so-called political leaders?

ANDREW HASTIE: Yeah, I think you're spot on there. I think voters really care about the three C's, which is competence – of course, they want a government that delivers for them. They're interested in character – people saying and doing the same thing, being consistent. And then conviction – having strongly held beliefs about the vision and the future for the country. And I think Donald Trump breaking his word on the war in Iran, I think people are upset about that.

MARK LEVY: What's your view on that, Andrew? I started the show this morning talking about giving him some credit for being willing to stand up to the biggest threat facing Western democracies. Does he deserve some credit for that or not?

ANDREW HASTIE: Well, I backed the President in June 2025 when he launched Operation Midnight Hammer, where he sent the bombers to Iran and hit their nuclear facilities. We were told it was job done and then eight months later, he starts a war, doesn't build a coalition, and then expects everyone to just weather the economic impact. So, there might have been a cause – we don't know what the intelligence is - but it's certainly not the way you go around building coalitions and alliances. People are upset because a lot of Americans backed him over Operation Midnight Hammer, and so they were surprised when they went back to war in the February.

MARK LEVY: All right. Not Midnight Hammer, but Midnight Oil. Australian Songbook top 10 songs are out today, or the first 10 anyway. I'm a little outraged. There's no Farnham, there's no Men at Work, Land Down Under. But we've got Beds Are Burning, Midnight Oil, Friday on My Mind, I Am Woman, My Island Home, Treaty, Waltzing Matilda. Thoughts? What's the one song in Andrew Hastie's playlist that you think best sums up our country, mate?

ANDREW HASTIE: Well, mate, I had to you know research some of the songs because I didn't know them – 

MARK LEVY: Oh, turn it up, you didn't know them! What sort of an Australian are you, Andrew Hastie?

ANDREW HASTIE: Well, from that list, Waltzing Matilda, My Island Home, I know. Treaty, I know. Midnight Oil, Beds are Burning. But where was Great Southern Land by Ice House? Where was Down Under by Men at Work? Where was The Voice by John Farnham? Who's putting this list together? That's what I'd like to know.

MARK LEVY: Well, I want you to set up a parliamentary inquiry to look into this. I'm outraged. If that's the first 10 songs, where's Great Southern Land? Where's Land Down Under? And where's some Farnham? Andrew, nice to catch up. We'll do in a couple of weeks.

ANDREW HASTIE: Thanks, Mark.

[ENDS]