The Chaser Report - Brisbane 2032, Coates 1932 | Steven Miles

Episode Date: July 22, 2021

We ask Queensland's Acting Premier, Steven Miles, about his boss' trip to Tokyo, and bid for The Chaser to run the Opening Ceremony for Brisbane 2032. Also, Gabbi Bolt watches Annabel Crabb's 'Ms Represented' and discovers that parliament didn't have women's toilets until 1975, and Scott Morrison finally says sorry. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This episode of The Chaser Report is sponsored by mansplaining. Are you worried that a woman doing something has left you not looking enough like a fuck wit? Try mansplaining today. Striving for mediocrity in a world of excellence, this is The Chaser Report. Hello and welcome to The Chaser Report for Friday the 23rd of July, 2021. Charles, you've got a spring in your step for a man who's today celebrating his fourth week in lockdown. Yes, I am because I think fine. Finally, Australia has turned the corner because obviously you haven't heard Dom,

but it's all over the news this morning that Scott Morrison has finally said sorry for the vaccine rollout. That is true, Charles, but did you actually see what he had to say? What? No, I haven't heard it yet. Yeah, I mean, that was the headline everywhere, but I actually went and watched the clip and this is what it was. I'm certainly sorry that we haven't been able to achieve the marks that we had hoped for at the beginning of this year. Okay, well, that's slightly hedged. But Dom, that's sorry, that's the most important thing. Like, if somebody's going to change, then they need to say sorry, accept their mistakes.

And that's how they become better people. An old Morrison, he would have been just spun it and said, oh, but actually the numbers are really good anyway, and I'm not to blame. But no, no, this new Morrison, no, he, he's saying sorry, he's accepting responsibility. He's being a true leader at last. We can do this, we can get out of this pandemic with an attitude like that. Not exactly, Charles, because here's what he said immediately after that, sorry. But what's more important is that we're totally focused on ensuring that we've been turning this around. And if I give you some statistics, just to give you an idea of how much things have been turned around in just the last month.

And then he reels off heaps of numbers that show that, look, it's not a problem anymore, we fix it, it's all fine, it's under control. I don't even know why you were angry. know what you're talking about. I'm lighting a gas fire under you. Oh, okay. Well, that takes the spring out of my step, I suppose. I might just go and have a lie down, Dom, that's all right. On today's show, we speak to Queensland's acting Premier Stephen Miles about the Olympics win and also the new proposal for quarantine in that state. And Gabby Bolt has just discovered that women actually haven't had a very smooth run of it in Parliament in the last 100 years.

What a revelation that is. But first, let's go to Rebecca Deanna Muno in the Chaser Newsroom. Brisbane has been forced to turn down the offer to host the 2032 Olympics over fears that Scott Morrison may not have the country vaccinated by then. Premier Anastasia Palishe said it was disappointing, but it was important to be realistic about just how unrealistic it is to expect Scott Morrison to have done anything at all by then, especially since it is just 11 years away. Prince Harry has renewed his pleas for privacy

by asking everyone to resist all temptation to read his new memoir. The prince noted that the memoir is now available in all good bookstores and he urged people not to buy it for the very reasonable price of $39.95. The prince has reminded everyone that he prefers to keep to himself on his podcast, his Netflix doco, on Oprah and now his internationally distributed book about himself. Full-time coal lobbyist and part-time. Senator Matt Canavan has today moved a motion in the Senate to end all plant life after learning that plants run on solar power. Mr Canavan said that plants were selfishly taking jobs away from

hardworking coal mining communities and that the food supply was being jeopardised by attempting to survive on unpredictable solar energy which is only available 12 hours a day. He called for a natural gas power plant to be attached to every flower and tree so that they can photosynthesize at night. That's the latest in all the completely real news that's not at all made up. I'm Rebecca Deunamuno. This episode of The Chaser Report is sponsored by mansplaining, the leading maker of internal screaming for women. As you will have heard, of course, Brisbane won the 2032 Olympics.

The Games is coming back. People in Queensland are pretty jolly happy about it. And as it happens, we have with us the acting premiere of Queensland, Stephen Miles, of course, Anastasia Palishei is over in Tokyo. Stephen, thanks for joining us. Gail, guys. Thanks for having me. Congrats.

Oh, it's a very exciting day in Queensland. I walked my little girl to school this morning, and the kids were very, very excited. I remember when we won the Olympics, all the work it was. So thank you so much for doing that, so we can all waltz up and see some sport. Yeah, well, we loved watching the Sydney Olympics,

and we're looking forward to doing an even better job than you guys. I just, I remember about eight months before the Olympics, they passed a whole lot of incredible laws that gave the government powers over everything. You remember that, Don, where they literally just drove all the homeless out from under the bridges and it was just, it was all, and it was all, you weren't allowed to use the word Olympics unless you're a sponsor. There was sort of these proto-fascist laws and everything. So are you looking forward to implementing all these newfound powers?

Stephen, are you going to bring those laws forward by about 10 years? So you can just... Well, I don't think we'll need to because we effectively did that with all the COVID laws. So we'll just put the chief health officer in charge of who can use the word Olympics. Great idea. Speaking of that, Stephen, will the borders be open by 2032? Do you think this crisis will be over by the time the games happen? I think we'll have opened the Queensland border, but I suspect WA will still be too concerned

and their border will be closed. I think that's true. Now, while Anastasia's away in Japan, you have all the power, don't you? You're basically the boss of Queensland, aren't you? Yes, although the boss is still on duty over there. So you can only exercise that power in ways that will be supported on her return. Well, so, no, well, so the thing is,

I was just thinking, you know, while she's out, Why don't you let us do the opening ceremony? Like, you know, make that decision now. She gets bagging, and you can just say to her, you don't even have to go into D. Just say, oh, look, I've sorted out the opening ceremony. It's all right. Got some people doing it already.

You know, a long-time fan of the chaser, and I would happily do that, but I'd much prefer to watch you try to disrupt the opening ceremony. You wouldn't be there to do that if we put you in, charge. That's actually true. That's not dead. I was thinking we'd get Bob Catter involved and perhaps just put him on the middle of a pyre of fireworks and just really light the torch in an unforgettable way. Surely they should wheel in like a giant Bobcatter hat, just like we had Matilda for the Com games. I was thinking the entire stadium could actually just be a giant

bobcatter hat to keep everyone's sun safe in the Queensland heat. The hat bowl. Yeah, yeah, we could give that a go. Now look, of course, everyone's talking about John Coates, the remarks to the Premier. Let's have a quick listen. You are going to the opening ceremony. I'm still the deputy chair of the Canada Leadership Group. And so far as I understand that there will be an opening and a closing ceremony in 2032, and all of you have got to get along there and understand the traditional parts of that, what's involved in an opening ceremony. So none of you are staying behind hiding in your rooms, all right? So he was talking to the Queensland Premier about that.

Now, Stephen, you know the Queensland Premier. Is that a sensible tone to talk to Anastasia Palishe in? Is that a wise thing for John Coates to be doing? Well, I probably wouldn't. But I do know that John and the Premier have struck up this great friendship. and I suspect it was part of a wider banter that had been going on between them. But I'm certainly more afraid of my boss than John obviously is. So you don't tend to start your conversations by saying I'm still the Deputy Premier.

I haven't tried that, but I suspect it would be ineffective. Now, the reason we got you on the line today, Stephen, is because overnight, it became apparent. And we're talking about it on the show yesterday. that we need some dedicated quarantine facilities. This is something that's becoming apparent. You know, we're 18 months into a pandemic. Maybe a big idea to sort of move quarantine facilities out of the middle of the city where everyone is.

And perhaps then it won't, you know, keep on infecting our cities and getting out of control, especially in places like City in Melbourne. Now, so we found out overnight that the Commonwealth government has finally got on board with this idea, and they've actually written, they wrote a letter to you saying that they're going to help out

with a dedicated quarantine facility in Queensland. Now, I'm assuming it's away from everyone. It's in some sort of rural or regional place. Yeah, there's a lot of space in rural Queensland. Yeah, yeah. So where is it? It's in Pinkin Bar, which is just near the Brisbane airport. It's in Brisbane?

It's in Brisbane. Yeah, so our preference was a, was a location outside of the city, a regional quarantine centre is what we, what we called it. And that's what we've been suggesting since October last year. They've proposed a location, yeah, you're pretty urban. Yeah, right. And so you proposed this regional centre, and you wrote a 15-page project proposal to them. And they came back and said, well, there's not enough details, we can't possibly do it.

How long was their letter to you? It was about a page and a half, maybe a bit less if you took off the letterhead. Right. It was very detailed, was it? Yeah. So they're working through a feasibility now. And look, I mean, we're so desperate for this that we've said we'll try to work with them on it. But we've also said we've got this other very detailed proposal that's ready to go.

It can be up and ready, faster, cheaper, bigger than the one that they've proposed. And we still can't get anywhere on it, unfortunately. It's a little bit suspicious. I'm just putting it out there. I know you obviously sound very diplomatic like you're wanting this to happen, but it's the only Labor seat in Brisbane, isn't it? Like, it's basically put it in the only place

that there are any Labor voters federally in Queensland. It's certainly the case that Scott Morrison did very well in Queensland, and pretty much the only place we hold seats is in the Brisbane metro area. Yeah, yeah. So basically, do you think maybe they're just trying to kill all your Labor voters by giving them COVID, bringing you strains? Maybe, or maybe it's just that their majority is so small they've got to worry about every backbench or even if they've got a real big majority like, I think his name's Garth or something,

out Grumway. Yeah, right. We're from New South Wales, right? And so what happens with land deals near airports is usually what happens is, you know, some government minister buys it to say $3 million and then resells it to, say, $3 million, and then resells it to the government a few weeks later for $30 million. Do you think that's what's going on here? One of the cabinet ministers has gone, hey, I've got this parcel of land.

Why don't we use that as the location for the facility? It could be. It's a defence property, though, and has been for a while. So I suspect it's more the case that defence aren't using it, and they were happy to get some other part of government to pay for taking care of it. Right. And will you be using, I mean, I know Queensland's pretty strict when it comes to the pandemic. Will you be shooting anyone who has COVID on site, like military style?

Not so long as they follow the rules, but, you know, if the rules are broken, we'll have to take action. Now, Stephen, you weren't actually the first to get this proposal, were you? So it was addressed to you, the letter, but the courier mail somehow got the letter before you. That's true. Their story was online at about the time that the letter arrived with us. What a coincidence. They are the government in exile, though, aren't they? Well, maybe our email was slower.

We're on that NBN, so maybe that was it. Now, Stephen, you're the health minister in Queensland. We'd love to pick your brain. I'm not actually anymore. I was until October last year. Oh, did you get, were you doing too bad a job? My wife suggested that four more years in that role was going to affect our ongoing marital arrangements.

So Stephen, as a former health minister, what would you suggest that we do to stop these pandemics getting out of control? Because Queensland seems quite good at managing these things. What are we doing wrong? Look, it's not all good management, but good management is the bit you control. And so I think we've done a good job of that. But hotel quarantine just isn't working anymore. And we do need an alternative.

Like, I'm actually really proud of hotel quarantine. It's one of the things that got Australia this far. I was part of the conversation to put it in place. Like, I think it's been great. But it was at a time when no one else was using our hotels, as you say, they're right in the middle of really built up areas. All of the cases in Sydney can be traced back to that one quarantine driver that contracted it and spread it.

And we've seen what it's done in Sydney. It's now spread to Melbourne. And I think we all thought we were through the worst of it. And now it looks like maybe not. Now, I'm just thinking Clive Palmer's got that resort that fell into disrepair, that all the dinosaurs around. Maybe everyone could just be shipped there. Maybe.

And maybe they'd be happier to. give clive that money the dinosaurs are still there too so i guess something for folk to look at if you try and break out of the hotel sit the dinosaurs on you well stephen congratulations on the Olympics congratulations on not being in lockdown and it's great to talk to somebody who's running a state so well that he has time to talk to the chaser because i don't think gladys would be able to fit us in her schedule you should give it a go i think should be lots of fun the chaser report is sponsored by mansplaining. Are you the president of an international sports competition

talking to a female state leader and feel the need to explain to her what a budget is despite your organisation bankrupting cities and never paying tax? Well, John Coates, try mansplaining. Now, Annabelle Crab has a new TV series. It's called Misrepresented, and it's all about the history of women in Parliament. And let's just say,

there have been a few problems with that. Gabby Bolt's been watching it. Hey, Gabby. Oh my God, I've just found my new TV obsession. I think I'm one of the only young people in the world. that can say they just binged an entire television series on ABC I view. Unless it's bluey, yeah, yeah. Bluey and misrepresented, that's it. Oh, bluey after misrepresented.

It's the perfect evening. But, yeah, it's one of my favorite documentary series I've ever seen. I said it's all about women in Parliament, in Australian Parliament, and Australian history and all of the adversities that women have faced thus far. It's more of a soap opera than neighbours. Really? Yes. I felt like I was watching a fake story.

It feels like that stuff can't actually happen. Well, what are we talking about? Well, put it this way. There are obviously huge moments in history for women, such as Julia Gillard's misogyny speech and, you know, passing certain bills regarding discrimination in the workplace. But there are also such minute things that men decided to hold on to for so long, such as toilets.

There wasn't even a lady's toilet in the building. The Parliament chose not to install one, seeing as the election of a woman was a freak occurrence and unlikely to be repeated. Unbelievably, this state of affairs dragged on until 1974 when new senators Kathy Sullivan, a liberal, and Labor's Ruth Coleman, mounted a spirited campaign. There wasn't a female bathroom in Parliament House until 1975.

What? So are you telling me that if the Queen visited the Parliament that is constituted in her name, that has the pictures of her all over it, she'd have to do a shit out in the garden? Hope she can aim in a urinal. It was the 70s. That's what you did. What I'm hearing is, if more women were in Parliament,

we could actually get some shit done. Because it didn't matter what party you were a part of. It was just women going, ah, need this. And finally, man, in the 70s went, oh, fuck, fine. The first thing that this show taught me was that there were so many cases of women from all parties, including independents, coming together on issues to get shit done. It's amazing.

I also learnt that Australia was dumb. In 1983, Susan persuaded her male colleagues to support a new bill. Legislation will be introduced dealing with discrimination on the basis of sex or marital status. Busloads of opponents came to Canberra to demonstrate against Susan's sex bill. Susan Ryan, local hero in the Hork government. She is the reason that that bill got passed. And people were up in arms. Simply because it had the word sex in the title,

sex discrimination bill. It was a bill to make sure women could independently get bank loans, get jobs, not get fired on the basis of being a woman, and everyone just heard the word sex and alarm bells went off across the country. The interesting thing about that bill is, again, people crossed the floor to vote for it. Were they all women? A lot of whom were. Kate Sullivan was the main one. Margaret Guilfoyle was a female MP on the Liberal Party side,

and she actually gave words of encouragement to Susan Ryan, saying you're doing very well, Susan, don't let them get you down. This is revolutionary, Gabby. I think we might need to shut you down. But it's not all sunshine rainbows and progress. HR is a thing that Parliament still, to this day, doesn't have. That checks out, frankly, thinking back on the events of the past year, I'm pretty confident that that's true.

But even for the staff, like surely there's an HR department. Oh, you would think. Yes. But no. It is not the place of governance and order and control you would expect. And it doesn't have any of the sophisticated, institutionalised procedures or policies that every good corporate organisation has. Who knew?

But you know what's really funny? Even if you, like, you would think that most women across all parties would be all for getting a HR department in the building so they can work without, you know, feeling afraid for losing their job or their reputation. but Bronwyn Bishop had some different views. Well, is it better in politics if you feel you've been treated differently because you're a woman or you've been harassed or discriminated against? You mean have a whinge?

Right. No. They wouldn't have let her get the helicopter, I'm thinking. Classic. Classic Bronwyn Bishop vibes there. But yes, and then the biggest revelation I found and something I had never, ever, ever in my lifetime heard about, despite the fact that I work for, you know, the highest level of journalism possible with you guys, was the John Howard Bride Harrodine abortion drug deal.

In 1996, the newly elected Prime Minister, John Howard, is keen to deliver on his campaign promise to sell off part of Telstra. But he doesn't have enough Senate votes. Harrodin sees an opportunity. He'll vote for the partial Telstra privatisation in return for the banning of a new abortion drug. That drug was banned for 10 years.

To put that in perspective, I was born in 1996 and until I was 10, that drug was banned. That's extraordinary. I feel like I shouldn't be that surprised given what this current government has said about women. It still is baffling to me, though, that they made an abortion drug illegal for 10 years without any input from a single woman.

When it got reversed, however, Over four different parties, women got together and reversed the bill. In 2005, Brian Harrodin retires from the Senate. A handful of women spot their chance. The Democrat Senator Lynn Allison said, do you realize it's 10 years since we passed the IU 486 proviso? An extraordinary alliance forms between four female senators across four parliamentary parties. crazy to me. If you were to hear a story now about Scott Morrison, Albo, Adam Bant and

Bob Catter coming together to vote the same way on one subject, it would make headlines. Look Gabby, on the bright side, I mean, it's clearly a tale of progress, slow, frustrating progress, but it all builds up, things get better, it all improves until 2013 Tony Abbott becomes Minister for Women. Hello everyone and welcome to the Parliament House Sexual Harassment course. Wait, there's only two people. Well, maybe I should wait to start until everyone's joined the call. No, Scott said it was optional. We're the only one's here. Oh, did he? Yeah, he said no one should have to be in a situation where they feel uncomfortable. Oh, well, hey, I mean, that's a good point, sort of, in a really sad way. But yeah, no one should

be made uncomfortable at the workplace, no matter their gender identity. Oh, no, sorry, I meant that no man should be made to feel uncomfortable in the workplace. I forget that women work here too. Of course. My bad, I guess. Okay, well, I'm not used to doing it with only two people, but hey, I guess this is parliament. Oh, God, no. Let's just get started on the regular course then. Okay, welcome to this one-hour seminar on sexual harassment. What now? You tell the...

Is it Sammy? Jesus, I pray this hour is short. Okay, well... That reminds me. We have some questions that we want answers to so that everyone can pretend to a have done the course when the media asks us. Whatever. Okay, what do you want? So speaking of praying, how many hookers should I bring to work

in the prayer room? Wow. Okay. First of all, they're called sex workers and second, none. None at all. Ah. Okay, similar question. How much jizz is like too much jizz on a co-workers' desk? Gross. What the fuck? Any jizz is too much. What the fuck? No, that's not an appropriate question, mate. That's out of wine. Thank you. Yeah, a better question would be.

how many litres of ejaculate are you allowed? Nope, nope, still not okay. No sexual liquids at the workplace. What? Anything else? Okay, what if someone is, how do I say it's tactfully, a raped at work, what's the best way to cover it up? No, just don't!

What happens if a woman gets all offended over us just being a little grab-assie and wolf-whistling? Boy, well, then they should take it to HR so they can put a stop to it. Oh, is that why nothing ever gets done? We need one of those HRs. We don't have one of those. What do you mean you don't have HR?

Everyone has HR. What the fuck is this course meant to do then? How are you supposed to stop sexual harassment? Wait, wait, wait, wait, sorry. I might have misheard. Did you just say stop sexual harassment? Oh, shit. See, I wanted to get better at it.

I'm out of you. Me too. This episode of The Chaser Report's been brought to you by mansplaining. Ladies, if you can't wrap your pretty heads around the idea, it's when... Oh, there you go. Sorry, there seems to be a bit of a mistake here.

This episode of The Chase Report is actually sponsored by shutting the fuck up. Charles, just quickly before we go, have you seen what they've done in France? What, no. Well, you know how here everyone's been saying, oh, you can't have a vaccine passport, you've got to have the right to move freely around your whole country and all that kind of stuff?

Well, in France, they've gone the other way. What they've done is they've said that without vaccination, you can't go to cafes. Oh my God. Yeah, you can't go to bars. You can't go to La Restaurant. You can't even go on the fast train. You're screwed if you're not vaccinated in France.

Yeah, right. And so that means that only 12% of their population can do anything. Yeah, no, I think the number significantly higher in France, Charles. As soon as this happened, there was a massive rush to get vaccinated. You can't keep me from my cafe, you know, my short black and my siggy in my local cafe. I love it. Suddenly all the anti-vaxer principles just evaporated, did they? No, I mean, we've got to do that here. Surely, Charles.

You know, all the stuff about liberty and so on. We just need to make it say you can't have a beer in a pub unless you got your vaccine. Yeah. The actual worst areas of low immunisation rates in Australia are, in fact, in the wealthiest areas. Did you know that? So it's Sydney's eastern suburbs, Sydney's northern beaches, have the lowest vaccination rates in Australia. So I've actually got a different proposal, which is no vaccination, no negative. gearing. I reckon that would solve the problem immediately.

And go even a step further. And if you don't go, if Burmers don't go and get their Astra, they immediately surrender an investment property to someone in their 20s. That's right. And they don't get their franking credits. Oh, that would send it chill. That'll hit him where it's. There's plenty of news round the clock, chaser.com.com. We have a big team publishing stuff up there. We always ask you for a five-star review in Apple podcast. It really helps us if you can do that. Today's code word, if you'd be so kind, is Uh, well, isn't it sorry? Oh, yes, you should, you should say sorry.

The show's got Morrison How It's done. That would be great. It's Friday. So we get to read the reviews on Friday. I actually haven't been keeping up with them this week. Let's have a look at them. They are enjoyable to read. Fuck you very much.

I've run out of bog roll. Says Diana from Melbourne. Sorry, Diana. Oh, well, you can actually buy a chaser toilet paper at chaser.com. Like Brad says, congratulations on being the number one podcast in the whole world ever. Just such a beautiful podcast. It's wonderful. Anyone who says otherwise will be put against it all.

and shot, peace and love. That's the spirit. A daily chuckle, eye roll and face pump. This is from Aspero Boy. Given the state of the world today, you've got a laugh ride. Podcast is a great way to get the grin happening at the delicious irony of it all. I don't like the nice ones. I don't like these positive reviews.

Now, Charles, speaking of toilet paper, in a recent episode, you promised to send toilet paper to a whole bunch of people, if they correctly typed out, the name of the Wikipedia page that you mentioned. Something like methyl, methyl, methyl, co-enzyme, yeah. Reductase or something. A lot of people seem to have got that right. The problem is we didn't realize there's actually no way of working out who wrote Apple reviews. So just send an email.

Send it to editor at chaser.com. You can somehow prove that it was you. Charles will send you some toilet paper. Maybe just a couple of people. Gee, that's actually, it's interesting. Because some of them have got it right. And some of them have spelled it wrongly. You idiots.

Actually, this is a great one, which is they've gone. Because what was the molecule? It was a molecule for... I'd never heard of that before. Yeah. Yeah, it was coenzyme, sulfo, methae, I tried to do that. But some smart ass has gone, actually, it's also known as methyl coenzyne M reductase. That person should get a tobacco, baby.

If they can explain what that means, maybe try that. Our gear is from road microphones. We're part of the ACAST creator network. Catch you next week.