SENATOR THE HON KATY GALLAGHER
MINISTER FOR FINANCE
MINISTER FOR WOMEN
MINISTER FOR THE PUBLIC SERVICE
MINISTER FOR GOVERNMENT SERVICES
SENATOR FOR THE ACT

E&OE TRANSCRIPT
TV INTERVIEW
SKY AGENGA
SUNDAY, 30 NOVEMBER 2025

SUBJECTS: Prime Minister’s wedding, public service funding, environment laws, budget/MYEFO, hospital funding

ANDREW CLENNELL, HOST: From one powerful woman to another: joining me live is the Finance Minister, Katy Gallagher. How are you, Katy Gallagher? You were at the wedding. Good morning, our viewers. Can't wait to hear about the wedding, tell us what happened. Did you have a few Albo ales? Albo and Jody ales?

FINANCE MINISTER, KATY GALLAGHER: I'm not a beer drinker, Andrew, but I saw plenty of other people enjoying that. Look, it was lovely. It was, you know, a pretty small, intimate wedding, and just, it was lovely to share that day with them. They were very in love. You've seen the photos. Toto played a key role, all of that. It was just a lovely day and a privilege to share it with them.

CLENNELL: Are you expecting any blowback at all concerning the fact it was held at the Lodge? I mean, I guess I could see both sides, a lot of people pay a lot of money to hire a venue, but you can have a wedding in your garden at no cost. That is his garden. He says he paid for everything. Do you think there'll be any blowback in relation to that?

GALLAGHER: Look, I think, you know, it would be difficult if you're Prime Minister to get married anywhere, to be honest. I think there was certainly some advice taken about security that needed to be taken into consideration, very clearly looked at, you know, the appropriate use of the Lodge and paying for all of the, you know, essentially the event. I think it meets all the necessary guidelines, but I think the Lodge also provided some safety and security for the event. And, you know, those things just have to be taken into consideration nowadays.

CLENNELL: I think a commentator pointed out this morning: look at Kirribilli House, it would have been a worse look. You've got those beautiful harbour views. Do you think that came into consideration?

GALLAGHER: Look, I don't know. The PM and Jody decided that they would like to get married in Canberra. The PM has been a very proud Canberra PM. He loves being in the nation's capital, sees it as a real part of his job to govern from Canberra. And, yeah, they made the decision that that was the appropriate venue.

CLENNELL: Well, I wanted to turn now to a story that broke during the week: the letter that your head of department is writing to all, or reported to be writing to all, cabinet ministers and heads of departments, suggesting they find 5% of savings, or up to 5% on top of the 1% efficiency dividend you always have in there. We've spoken about this during the election campaign, you might recall. Can you confirm this is the proposal? Do you feel any level of hypocrisy here, given you attacked Peter Dutton mercilessly during the campaign with that quite effective "he cuts your pay" slogan?

GALLAGHER: So, Andrew, what's happening, and there's been different reporting on this, except, I mean, a journalist, I think, got this indication that we were going through this exercise of finding savings, essentially, or looking at resourcing across departments. I mean, the problem I've got is that there's a lot of ministers wanting to do a lot of things, a lot of departments wanting to do a lot of things, and they come requesting more money for those things.

And at some point, you know, you have to say, well, you know, we can't just keep giving you more money for these things. You need to look at what you're doing now and reprioritise within your existing budgets. And in order to convince, I guess, myself, Jim, the ERC, that departments are doing that and they are constantly looking at their existing budgets, we did ask for them to come forward with their, essentially, 5%, their lowest priority work across their department, so that we could make sure that when they are asking for more money, they're thinking about the things they're already doing and whether they can reprioritise.

There hasn't been any suggestion that we would cut 5%. This is not an exercise in that at all. But it is an exercise in asking departments to look at what they're doing and make sure that they are allocating their resources properly.

CLENNELL: Well, how much are you actually cutting, then? So in the election campaign, we said we would reduce the APS by $6.4 billion in order to, and really looking at that from consultants, contractors, travel, those kind of non-staff related costs that departments have, and we will be allocating that. We were clear about that in the election campaign. But going forward, and as we head into budget and all the other things, we're going to continue to look for savings across the APS that can be managed in a responsible way.

GALLAGHER: We've already found $100 billion worth of savings and reprioritising across the APS since we came to government. So, it's an exercise in making sure that we're making sure every dollar counts and that we're not just continuing to layer in extra money into departments at a time when our budget is under such stress, which it is.

CLENNELL: Can you admit, can you admit you're cutting above that $6.4 billion? And I interviewed you during the campaign and we discussed this, that there would be no choice, given the budget situation, but for Labor to cut if you were re-elected.

GALLAGHER: Well, we'll continue doing what we've been doing, Andrew, which is, as I just said, we found $100 billion in savings and reprioritisation since 2022, and we will continue to look for those opportunities across the budget. But the difference in the election campaign was that we had the opposition saying they were going to cut 41,000 jobs from Canberra. If you remember, we were always saying we're going to drive efficiencies and look for savings wherever we can, but we weren't going to take that approach and that we are being absolutely consistent with that.

CLENNELL: Will there be public service redundancies as a result of what you're looking at in the budget process?

GALLAGHER: Well, I think in the election campaign, I said I thought the public service was roughly the right size, where it was, where we'd got it to. And that remains my view. There will be ups and downs across the public service, you know, as you, as has always been the case, but I think the size it is now is roughly the size that it should remain.

CLENNELL: So, there won't be, so, you're ruling out redundancies? Are you ruling out redundancies?

GALLAGHER: Well, if you're asking me if that 5% is going to, you know, this exercise that we're doing is going to result in job losses, I can say that is not what this exercise is about. As to whether there are, you know, ups and downs, and I've said this consistently over the last three years across departments, that will fluctuate a little, but it won't, you know, as programs come to an end, as departments change what they're doing, all of that does matter on how many, you know, individual ASL they have, which is the average staffing level they have in their departments. But broadly across the APS, I would expect the APS to remain largely the same.

CLENNELL: Will we see any cuts or evidence of cuts in the mid-year economic outlook out in a couple of weeks?

GALLAGHER: Well, we've certainly been putting together the final decisions. So, that'll be out in the next couple of weeks. We haven't finalised all of our decisions yet. It's not going to be a mini-budget or anything like that. Jim and I said from the start it's around delivering on our election commitments, where we need to get started on those, but also on urgent pressures, essentially things that can't be left until May. And so you'll see, I guess, the combination of all of those decisions in the next couple of weeks.

CLENNELL: There was a story over the weekend that as of October, the budget deficit was looking at $32.9 billion. Are we looking to a $30 to $40 billion deficit this financial year?

GALLAGHER: Well, that remains to be seen. We're looking, we're tracking the monthly results. We had the monthly results out for October that showed a slight improvement on what had been forecast. So, we'll track that through the year. You know, these are a combination of a range of factors, but the budget is in deficit, as you say, and there is pressure in the order of around that $30 billion. You know, this is the work we have to do to try and improve that as we go forward.

CLENNELL: So, how important does this make this hospital's NDIS deal with the States? I mean, what happens if you can't come to an agreement on that?

GALLAGHER: Yes, so we're in pretty intense negotiations across the board. Health, obviously, is a big priority for all governments. It's a big, yeah, it is a big deal. We want to get a good deal on hospitals and we want to get a good deal on the NDIS. Obviously, states have their focus on, ours is making sure we do what we need to do on hospitals, but also fund primary care and aged care, which are both two very significant pressures on our budget. And all of those things are interrelated. If you've got primary care working well and aged care working well, that should work in the interest of the hospital system as well.

And then, of course, we've got NDIS, we've got it down from 22% growth when we came to government. It's now just growing at just over 10%. So, we've seen really significant and welcome progress there. But there is more work to do. We can't have a program growing at that rate because it becomes, again, such a big pressure on the budget.

CLENNELL: It's not long till Thriving Kids are supposed to come in. Are you starting to get worried there's not going to be this deal which allows you to get to the 5% to 6% growth of NDIS? As Finance Minister, are you sitting there going, gee, I mean, cutting this fine?

GALLAGHER: So, Mark Butler is doing a lot of work, and Jenny McAllister on Thriving Kids. This just makes a lot of sense. So, we want to get it done. I mean, we want more children to not head into the NDIS, if that's possible, and manage some of their support requirements outside of that. So, getting Thriving Kids in place is really important. There's some of that we can do from the Commonwealth point of view, and we'll look at that, so, what we can do, provide through the programs we already run. But ideally, it's to work together with the States to build the system that used to exist outside of the NDIS.

I mean, there used to be all of these early intervention programs that particularly those under the age of five could go and access, and we had plenty of them here in the ACT. Once the NDIS started, all of those services are gone. And so for parents who need that extra hand, a bit of extra support, there is one pathway and that's into the NDIS, and the Thriving Kids will rebalance that, in a sense, rebuild the system we had before.

CLENNELL: I wanted to ask now about the environmental laws. Business isn't happy because it's very difficult under these to sack the EPA CEO. So, if you end up with someone there who doesn't really want to approve much, they could put a real brake on projects, is the argument to me. What do you say to that?

GALLAGHER: Well, I think there are powers there to remove the head of the EPA once it's established, if there are grounds to do so, as you would see in other independent office holders. I think there was, you know, certainly, I think there was a disagreement, Andrew, between how much power the Minister has versus how much power an independent body has. And, you know, accept that not everybody landed that where they wanted it. But I think there's certainly, you know, you're not going to have a situation where you have an EPA commissioner who's not doing the job that can just continue on in that way. That will not happen.

CLENNELL: And the concessions to Greens on coal and gas, the two-tiered system for fast-tracked approvals, and the concessions to them on forestry, you don't see them as a real handbrake on business?

GALLAGHER: Not at all. On forestry, I mean, what's happening there is we're saying that forestry should be treated the same as any other industry. So, native forests, plantation forests, meeting national environmental standards and being treated and assessed in the same way as every other industry brings some consistency to the Act. Obviously, we've got some investment going in to support the adjustment of those new arrangements to make sure that the jobs, particularly in those areas where that continues, in Tasmania and some parts of NSW, that those industries are supported. That's really important, was really important to the PM as part of these negotiations. You know, we're the Labor Party, we support workers, and these investments do that.

And on the fast tracking, look, the reality is the Act was, nobody liked the existing Act. They said, you know, whether you're an environmentalist or in business or any state jurisdiction or the Commonwealth, everyone accepted it wasn't working, it wasn't fit for purpose. And I think the big breakthrough that comes with this legislation is, you know, speeding up the assessment pathways, whether you're on the fast track or whether you just have your proposal ready to go with all the work that needs to be done, that the assessment process will be faster and simpler, and that is good for business. And I think, you know, all credit to Murray Watt, actually, for getting this bill through. You know, we needed to change the EPBC, it wasn't working for anyone. There was universal agreement about that, and now we've got a new arrangement in place.

CLENNELL: Do you think politically, given the way energy prices are going, energy CEOs are warning the transition could mean rising power prices for a decade, do you think politically, you'll have to keep some kind of rebate when you make this MYEFO decision on it, or are you just going to cut that cord?

GALLAGHER: So, the rebates were never built in as a permanent feature of our budget. Obviously, we look at these things from budget to budget to make those decisions, and we've been very clear we want to help households through the transition, whether it be through these rebates or things like our very successful and popular batteries program, where we see, you know, hundreds of thousands of houses trying to get, put batteries on their house to support their solar. So, we'll always think about how we support households through the transition, you know, and that will continue. We've done it in the last couple of budgets. That will continue.

CLENNELL: Look, I do have to ask you about the Brittany Higgins case because there's a lot of publicity concerning you in connection with it and court actions and the like. I know you're restricted from talking about court matters, but do you have a view on former staff of Fiona Brown's predicament going to court on this? And do you have a view with Linda Reynolds quite doggedly pursuing this matter through the courts?

GALLAGHER: Andrew, there are these matters underway for both Ms. Brown and Ms. Reynolds. And, you know, because of that, I'm not really in a position to add anything further to what I already have on the record.

CLENNELL: Just briefly, is there any doubt in your mind in terms of whether or not the compensation payment to Brittany Higgins is above board?

GALLAGHER: Well, that matter, I think, was referred to the NACC, and they're the appropriate body to have any decisions, you know, to cast a view on that. And they have, you know, in relation to at least one of those matters had a decision based on that. I mean, I think that's what we set up the NACC for. If there was any concerns, it's gone there, and it's appropriate that that authority deal with it.

CLENNELL: Katy Gallagher, thanks so much for your time.

GALLAGHER: Thanks, Andrew.

ENDS