SUBJECT/S: Severe Tropical Cyclone Narelle, fuel

HOST KATHRYN ROBINSON: I'm joined by the Minister for Emergency Management, Kristy McBain. Minister, thank you very much for joining me. You've just emerged from a briefing. What is the latest?

MINISTER FOR EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT KRISTY MCBAIN: Yeah, I've just taken part in the Queensland Disaster Management Committee meeting with the Premier and relevant Ministers and agencies. Obviously that tropical cyclone has now made landfall and we continue to, you know, await its passing so that we can get some assessments in those areas. But we've already pre-positioned a range of assets including Ergon Energy who have got 200 personnel that have already moved into the area pre-deployed. We've worked with telcos and fuel providers to pre-position a range of assets into the area as well. So, we'll continue to work with the Queensland government and industry to make sure that as soon as available we can get supplies back through to those areas that are going to be impacted.

HOST: Minister, you mentioned some of that pre-positioning that the Federal Government has made and is working in counterpart with the States. What are some of the other areas and other places that you're pre-deploying or you're deploying some Federal Government assets.

MCBAIN: We've got ADF that is working on evacuation from Numbulwar in the Northern Territory, about 500 people that will be evacuated starting this morning and moving into Darwin. We've had ADF liaison officers sitting with Queensland and with Northern Territory for any request for support, which is really important. But also we've got our National Emergency Management Agency officials already in Queensland and Northern Territory to help with coordination. Obviously, we've seen floods across most of Queensland from late December as well as those flooding areas in the Northern Territory at the moment too, across the Daly River and Katherine. So, a lot of these catchments are already really wet. So, Tropical Cyclone Narelle has the potential to see some of those rivers rise again and potential flash flooding. So, it's really important that community members keep aware of their surroundings and up to date with emergency warnings as well.

HOST: Minister, you mentioned what has been going on in the Northern Territory. This system comes on top of extreme flooding there. The Daly River region and Katherine ADF deployment has been there for cleanup. Can they extend for longer than were anticipated to be there for that 10 to 14 days. Just how stretched are the federal resources?

MCBAIN: Look, we'll continue to work with both the Northern Territory and Queensland governments in regards to any requests for support from ADF. It goes through the usual process and the chain of command and assets are deployed as soon as possible. We've seen obviously that support for cleanup across the Katherine region. Already they've got RAAF base Tindal in Katherine. So, a number of our ADF personnel are already volunteering in the community helping with cleanup. It's now just an official capacity that are doing that. As I said, any request for support will go through our system like it always does and we'll action that as soon as possible.

HOST: I believe that there is Disaster Recovery Funding Arrangements already in place for more than 50 local government areas in Queensland. How likely are you to enact other arrangements if they are called upon?

MCBAIN: Yeah, you're right. Our Disaster Recovery Funding Arrangements are already enacted across 59 local government areas in Queensland because of the extensive monsoonal rains and flooding we've already seen in this high risk weather season. We've worked really closely with the Queensland Government and we've extended out this issue to be an event that's eligible. And once those assessments are undertaken, we can in action those requests for support as soon as possible. It is really important, I think, that communities can feel confident that we've got three levels of government working together to address a whole range of issues that we know that they are currently facing, but that they will face in the recovery phase as well. We've worked really seamlessly as levels of government because at the heart of this is about community safety and we're all prepared to get in and do what's necessary to make sure that that's relevant to all of us.

HOST: Just given that you have just emerged from this emergency briefing, just how widespread and destructive do you expect Narelle to be across Queensland?

MCBAIN: Yeah, obviously there's been a range of updates already from BoM about this, but obviously, you know, the concern at the moment is Coen and how much damage may potentially happen across that community. Further down to Cooktown where we are going to experience a lot of rainfall, wind gusts up to 280 kilometres in some parts of this cyclone, will be significantly impacted. As I said, we've already got a lot of wet catchments around, so the number of trees down is probably going to be quite severe and extensive. The tropical cyclone will downgrade a little bit, but these things are pretty dynamic and can change rapidly, which is why it's important to understand your surroundings and keep up to date with the advice from your local emergency services.

HOST: Minister, if I may, before we end the conversation here, just speak to you about other Federal Government issues at the moment. The fuel situation in Australia. The ABC understands that the Prime Minister's office has requested options to impose a new tax on the gas giants to essentially shield Australia from any economic shock from the war in the Middle East. Is that something you'd support?

MCBAIN: Look, there's obviously a pretty dynamic situation happening with fuel. We've seen all of our supplies still entering the country as normal, which is critically important. It's the distribution of those supplies across some of our rural and remote areas that haven't been working. Largely the contract market has held up, but the spot market which supplies independent stations, farmers and a range of our industry, has not worked. It's really important that companies play a role in this. Unfortunately, we've seen in some cases service stations rising prices three times in a day, which is just not on. An international crisis shouldn't be an opportunity to profiteer from hard working Australians. So I'm sure that there are going to be many options on the table as we go through the coming weeks and months and as we understand how this Middle East crisis will play out.

HOST: But Minister, more to the question about those big oil and gas companies, should they be paying more tax when they are potentially getting windfalls from this situation in the Middle East? And through the lens that the government, we're looking at deficits from the Federal Government up to the mid-30s.

MCBAIN: Now obviously our budget will be handed down in mid May and I'm not going to front run anything that the Treasurer announces. But I think everything's on the table at this point in time because most importantly, we want to make sure Australians aren't paying the price for a crisis in the Middle East.

HOST: Ok, we've seen the appointment yesterday of a fuel Task Force coordinator after National Cabinet was held. The ACCC is also investigating allegations of anti-competitive behaviour in the sector. But prices are still going up. There are reports today that the average price of a litre of petrol is $2.19 according to the Australian Institute of Petrol. Doesn't more need to be done?

MCBAIN: Yeah, and I think that's what you're seeing us do. I mean, we've legislated to have more stocks on Australian soil because that's incredibly important to Australians. But we're also introducing additional powers and penalties for the ACCC. At the moment they're investigating four companies in regards to price gouging. You've seen the Treasurer come out and say we'll lift those penalties to $100 million per breach. And I think, as I said, Australians, you know when crisis happens overseas that there's always going to be some shocks in our country. But the rate at which we've seen petrol go up and gas and diesel go up I think doesn't align with what's already happening. As I said, we've got some service stations who have had fuel in the ground now for a long period of time and they are raising petrol prices up to three times in a day. It's still the same fuel in the tank that they've got there in the ground. So it's really important that people understand how to that to the ACCC. There's four investigations currently underway and we need to make sure that, as I said, this international crisis doesn't lead to price gouging hard working Australians dollars.

HOST: Minister for Emergency Management Kristy McBain. Really appreciate you stepping out of your meeting to speak with us.

MCBAIN: Thank you.