THE HON ANDREW HASTIE MP
SHADOW MINISTER FOR INDUSTRY AND SOVEREIGN CAPABILITY
FEDERAL MEMBER FOR CANNING

TRANSCRIPT
INTERVIEW WITH DAVE MARCHESE, TRIPLE J HACK

Thursday 8 October 2026

Topics: Coalition’s immigration policy; One Nation.

E&OE……………………………………

DAVE MARCHESE: Andrew Hastie, welcome to Hack.

ANDREW HASTIE: Thanks, Dave. Good to be with you.

DAVE MARCHESE: Are you worried this plan to dramatically cut the number of people coming into the country is going to tank the economy?

ANDREW HASTIE: No, I'm not, and I think people are being rather dramatic. I think we've taken a good three to six months to get this policy right. Ultimately, though, we're listening to the Australian people, and we've heard their call for cuts to immigration and also for higher standards, and that's what this policy ultimately delivers.

DAVE MARCHESE: There is a lot of concern, though, and it's coming from not just the university sector; it's also business leaders worried about the impacts on tourism, hospitality. Warnings that rideshare and food delivery prices could spike. Is the Coalition risking a bit too much here? 

ANDREW HASTIE: I don't think so. I think big business, particularly, have gotten very comfortable with what could be construed as almost a slave workforce here, of people living on temporary visas – basically are non-unionised and cheap. If we care about workers, we'll actually care about getting the migration system right, which is why we're going to reduce the overall stock of temporary visa holders by 650,000 people and increase the number of skilled migrants coming to this country. I might also add as well, Dave, that the permanent migration figure will remain at 185,000. So, this is about getting it right. There are always trade-offs in policy, but I don't buy the university line or the big business line-that somehow this is going to tank the economy.

DAVE MARCHESE: But away from both big business, university, we've also got former senior immigration official Abul Rizvi saying these cuts are near impossible to achieve – like the drastic cuts to bridging and temporary graduate visas are not achievable, like you can't make it happen.

ANDREW HASTIE: Look, I read his piece in The Guardian yesterday, I also had a chance to see him at the ABC Studios. He's someone who is an authority on these matters. But you know what? We've got to find a way to reduce immigration. Under Labor, it's through the roof. At the peak after the pandemic, it was 550,000 people per year – that was the net overseas migration figure – this year it's 300,000. They're aiming for 225,000 but I don't think they'll get there. We're shooting for 100,000 in the first year, 100,000 in the second year, 130,000 in the third year, and 160,000 in the fourth year. And then we're going to cap net overseas migration to the amount of homes built every year. I want young Australians to have the same dream of home ownership that our parents had. I didn't buy my first property until I was 33, and a lot of us young Australians have just given up hope altogether. So, this is about a number of things. It's allowing the infrastructure to catch up. It's also making sure that our immigration system has some integrity. The universities are at risk of becoming visa mills and making big dollars, but in the end, their primary task is educating young Australians and doing research in the national interest.

DAVE MARCHESE: But isn't that also at risk – all of that research and development, if they're not getting the money they need to fund themselves? Like is it going to mean that a Coalition government would be pumping money into universities to support them because they're not receiving that money from international students?

ANDREW HASTIE: Look, we already give $21 billion per year to the university sector. I'd like to – 

DAVE MARCHESE: Would you [inaudible]? 

ANDREW HASTIE: – Well, I would like to invest more, absolutely, particularly for research in the national interest. I'm someone who believes in a sovereign manufacturing capability. I want to see AI investment in this country. I want to recover a lot of our industrial bulk that we've lost over the last 40 years, that's moved offshore. Because we do know that when you have advantageous industries. like advanced manufacturing, it actually drives productivity and it drives real wage growth. And since the pandemic, people's real incomes have flatlined. People are actually poorer. Universities drive a lot of our innovation, and that's why I want them to be focused on their core task, which is educating young Australians and also doing research in the national interest.

DAVE MARCHESE: A lot of people listening now will be in regional areas of the country, and I'm wondering if the Coalition has thought about some of this recent research that we've seen that by the 2060s, more Australians are going to be dying each year than are born. That we've got this falling birth rate. A lot of regional Australia is shrinking and hollowing out. Like, what in this plan is going to address long term population decline?

ANDREW HASTIE: That's a really good question, David. It gets to the heart of it because we're basically using immigration policy to account for the shortfall in our fertility rates. For a long time now, we've had a declining fertility rate – I think it's at about 1.39 at present. It's the lowest it's ever been in history. We can't even replace our population.

 DAVE MARCHESE: So, is that the time to be really cutting back on migration levels?

ANDREW HASTIE: I think we've got to work out ways to make the economy work for young Australians. I want young Australians to start families earlier. I want them to buy a house and build a home, invest in their local community and feel like they've got a stake in this country. And it's really hard to do that if you're stuck in a small apartment and there's no prospect of you owning a home where you can start a family. But unless we start fixing the economy, unless we start rebooting the dream of home ownership, people are going to have less and less kids. We can't just keep the immigration tap going, I think we've got to work out ways to actually incentivise and encourage family formation too. 

DAVE MARCHESE: But in the meantime, we are seeing some of these regional communities hollow out, and there is concern that by really cracking down on the numbers of people coming into the country, there won't be enough people in some of these regional communities to get everything done.

ANDREW HASTIE: Well, we're actually looking after regional communities. The Working Holiday Maker Visa – at the moment, it's run on a ballot. We actually want to get those visa holders to the regions, whether it's picking fruit, pulling beers in rural pubs and other cafes and restaurants. We're going to increase the cost for sort of an urban working holiday maker visa, and we're going to make the regions exempt. So, we're going to encourage people to go there. 

DAVE MARCHESE: Alright. This is Hack. I'm Dave Marchese. I'm speaking with Federal Liberal MP Andrew Hastie about the Coalition's migration plan. Hearing from a lot of you on the text lines, someone says, "Which Australians are the Liberals listening to? It's not me. I don't think cuts to migration are a good idea." Another person saying, "Young people don't want a reduction in migration. We want more accountability in the housing market." Andrew Hastie. There are a lot of Hack listeners saying this is a race to the bottom. Like when it comes to migration, immigration, the Coalition is waging a losing battle against One Nation. Even One Nation is saying you, the Coalition, are dancing to its tune. Are you?

ANDREW HASTIE: No, we're not, and that's just ridiculous.

DAVE MARCHESE: But you're trying to compete with them on these numbers, right? 

ANDREW HASTIE: Well, we're not actually. If we were trying to compete with them, we would have gone out before them. They went out a couple of weeks ago on social media. They hadn't really done the work. We don't actually know what their numbers are. We took the time to really work through this and make sure that we'd modelled the economic, the fiscal, and the human impacts. And in the end, we believe in a country that has people with all sorts of backgrounds. I mean, I grew up in Ashfield in Sydney, right? So this is not about racing One Nation.

DAVE MARCHESE: What is your message to younger voters who maybe would have voted for the Coalition, for the Liberal Party, for the National Party, but are now thinking they are going to switch to One Nation at a state election or at a federal election a few years’ time?

ANDREW HASTIE: They've got to ask themselves what actual solutions are One Nation delivering? It's all good and well to have cartoons and memes, but in the end, the business of government involves complex policy problems, it involves trade-offs and it involves working in the national interest. And frankly, I just don't think One Nation is offering that. Sure, they're catching the vibe at the moment online, but in the end, if you want to have the dream of home ownership realised, if you want an economy that works for you, if you want a country where you're rewarded for effort and that emphasises mutual obligation, then I think the Coalition, as we build out our policy, will give you those things. Now, it's going to take time.

DAVE MARCHESE: Speaking of cartoons, I mean, you've been the target of One Nation this year, and there was a cartoon that they put up that referred to you as a traitor. How bad have the attacks been? 

ANDREW HASTIE: They've been pretty tough. It's one thing to cop a tune up from the Greens or Labor or even your own colleagues sometimes. It's another thing to have your service record attacked and to be called a traitor. That's why I drew a line under it and I went head-to-head with Pauline Hanson. And as I look back on that time, what I learned is this: that she goes to water under pressure. If she wants to be the next prime minister, I don't think she's got what it takes. I don't think she's got the courage to admit when she's wrong, and I don't think she's got the steeliness to take the pressure of high office. 

DAVE MARCHESE: I know your security was boosted earlier this year. Have you been worried about your safety?

ANDREW HASTIE: I have been worried about my security, and I mean, look, that comes with the job. Let's be honest as well, Pauline Hanson has security as well, as do many of the Labor ministers. I want to live in a country where we don't have security concerns around politics. We've got to dial it down, and that's why I don't want to see an imported MAGA-style form of politics in this country. It's no secret that One Nation have taken direct advice from Donald Trump's campaign, and that's why we've seen some of the really aggressive attacks. The cartoon creator, Mark Nicholson, at the Victorian One Nation launch last week was talking about locking up Dan Andrews and Jacinta Allen before Christmas if they win the election in November. You know, I have a respect for rule of law. I have a respect for judicial process. I don't think that political parties should be celebrating locking up their political opponents. That's something that communist or fascist or dictators do. It's not something that we do.

DAVE MARCHESE: With all of that in mind, do you think that your leader, Angus Taylor, and your party, and more broadly the Coalition, have been fighting hard enough against One Nation?

ANDREW HASTIE: I've worked out that politics has fundamentally changed in the last 12 months, but the last couple of years, and I think we're now in a three-cornered contest. We have a preferential voting system, but unless you finish in those top two positions – one or two on the ballot – you're eliminated. But I'd also say to people who are listening to Hack, you know, I've just turned 44 – I'm relatively young. I've been in the parliament for 11 years. I am a millennial, and I see and hear a lot of the frustration that people are feeling. But more than ever, we need good leadership because we've got AI coming down at us very quickly – we've got to deal with that. We've got all sorts of other strategic challenges, and then we've got an economy that's no longer working for young Australians. These are the things that we need to fix, and you can't rely on cartoons and memes to fix them.

DAVE MARCHESE: Would you like to see your colleagues standing up to One Nation more?

ANDREW HASTIE: I think people are, but certainly the thing I've learned, I thought I could work at a distance with them. In the end, they're trying to take us out. They're trying to nail me, and they're trying to nail the Liberal Party, and that's why the best way to think about this is a three-cornered contest, and we've got to finish number one. I want to defeat the Albanese government at the next election because I want a future for young Australians. But if One Nation are going to be part of the mix, well, we've got to beat them too.

DAVE MARCHESE: Alright, Liberal MP Andrew Hastie, really appreciate you coming on Hack. 

ANDREW HASTIE: Thanks, Dave.

[ENDS]