Kieran Gilbert: Let's go live to Port Moresby. Joining me is Minister for Pacific Island Affairs, Pat Conroy. You've met with the Prime Minister of PNG today. The head of the NRL is - Are all things heading in the right direction when it comes to the establishment of the PNG NRL team? What's the latest?
Minister for Pacific Island Affairs, Pat Conroy: Absolutely, Kieran. We’re on track. Today, the Prime Minister Marape of PNG announced the inaugural board for the franchise. He also announced a naming competition for the people of Papua New Guinea to name the team. Money is flowing through the project, and we're on track for the team to enter in 2028 and importantly, be successful from day one in 2028. This will bring the two peoples of our two nations together. It's underpinned by strategic trust, and it will be also a very important economic development tool for Papua New Guinea. So, this is world's first, world's leading use of sporting diplomacy to bring two countries together, underpinned by strategic trust. And so today's announcements were really important, and I had a very good meeting with Prime Minister Marape.
Kieran Gilbert: Yes. So, give us an update if you can, Minister on. It's the thing that a lot of footy fans, rugby league fans raise as one of the questions: what's the security like? What will that be like for those that say that travel to watch their team play, but also for the players themselves? We know that Port Moresby is not one of the safest cities in the world. What sort of things will be in place to help secure the games, the fans, the players?
Minister Conroy: Well, it's like any city. It's where you choose to go at what time of the day. There are thousands of Australians who live and work in Port Moresby already, and they go about their business every day. There's something like four or five thousand Australian businesses who do business up here every day. So, this is an important tourism initiative as well as sporting initiative. We signed a bilateral security agreement with Papua New Guinea last year, where we're helping uplift the capability of the Papua New Guinea police force. And the Papua New Guinean government is investing significant amounts in the PNG police. So, I'm very confident about security. I talk to Australian expats regularly who work and live up here, and they are also similarly positive. This is reshaping our relationship with Papua New Guinea. This announcement not only makes Papua New Guinea more prosperous and unites the nation in what I call Prime Minister Marape’s Nelson Mandela vision to unite the country through sport, but it makes Australia safer because it's underpinned by a shared strategic trust. It's underpinned by commitments from Papua New Guinea that they'll continue to partner with us for their security needs. So, this is an initiative that makes not just PNG safer, but Australia safer.
Kieran Gilbert: And in your discussions with the Prime Minister, you've got the NRL, the sporting diplomacy on the one hand, but negotiations. So, if we talk about that, as you know, the soft power, but the hard power was there as well, obviously, I'm sure a big part of the agenda, the negotiations towards a Defence Treaty. How significant and important is that, and where is it at in terms of the discussions?
Minister Conroy: The negotiators are making good progress on the Defence Treaty. It is a very important initiative that I'm confident will be landed, and it will hang underneath the bilateral security agreement that is broader and has a much bigger, broader view of security. So, the Defence Treaty is a really important initiative. I got an update on negotiations this morning. I’m really confident that it's going well. It's a good spot, and it's been pushed along very smartly by both sides because it's in the national interest of both countries to get this done.
Kieran Gilbert: Is this all about China? When we talk about the Pacific and we talk about our friendships, it is in large part about security. Do you see it all in the context of China and trying to push back against that influence in our region?
Minister Conroy: Well, we've been very open with the Australian people that we're in a permanent contest in the Pacific for influence and to be the partner of choice. China is seeking to establish a military base in the region, and that's why, since 2022, this government has been so strong and positive in our Pacific policies and have repaired so much of the damage done under Scott Morrison and the Liberals and will continue to do that. But this is about the relationship between Australia and our closest neighbour, a country only four kilometres away from Australia, a country you could swim to if you weren't worried about crocodiles - and you should be - a country that was once a colony of Australia until 1975. So, this is about the security of our two countries and making both countries safer and more united in a prosperous and peaceful Pacific.
Kieran Gilbert: And it's fair to say that there is a bipartisan support for our relationship. There is a very close people-to-people connection as well, I think PNG to Australia, maybe not as much in bipartisanship when it comes to the Solomons. You're travelling there this afternoon. What's the latest when it comes to that contest of influence in the Solomons? And are you confident that you've been able to shift the balance there?
Minister Conroy: Well, again, we've repaired that relationship significantly. I've been the Solomon Islands four or five times. This is my tenth visit to Papua New Guinea. Prime Minister Manele, his first visit after being elected Prime Minister was to Australia as a guest of Prime Minister Albanese, where we announced support for a tripling of the Royal Solomon Islands police force as a key security initiative. And the relationship is getting stronger. And it's been built on not just security cooperation, but economic cooperation. 50 per cent of tourists to Solomon Islands are Australian, we’re the biggest buyer of Solomon Islands goods when you exclude illegal round logs. So, we've got a strong economic as well as security partnership. But I have to disagree with you. I'd love to say it's bipartisan, but the Coalition in the last election continued to undermine our position in the Pacific through things like refusing to agree to take strong action on climate change by refusing to back our revolutionary Pacific Engagement Visa. That would grow the diaspora, Pacific diaspora in Australia, through cutting foreign aid as one of their policies. So, this is too serious for petty politics. But the Coalition continue to undermine our security and safety in the region by not being serious about climate change, not being serious about international development, not being serious about things like the Pacific Engagement Visa. And I urge them, under their new leadership, to do a reset and actually get serious about national security.
Kieran Gilbert: Minister for Pacific Island Affairs, Pat Conroy. You've got to go and get that plane. We thank you.