: Prime Minister, a very Triple M welcome to you.
ANTHONY ALBANESE, PRIME MINISTER: What a wonderful welcome. Thank you so much guys.
DITTMAR: Now, a big twenty four hours in the future and the history of the city of Whyalla and the state of South Australia. 4000 jobs saved. Creditors will be paid. From what we can see a figure of $2 billion from the federal government. How have you arrived at that figure? Why is it so big?
PRIME MINISTER: Well, we'll be making the sort of detailed announcements with the Premier in a little while when we head to Whyalla. I'm in Adelaide this morning. Beautiful morning here, I've got to say.
DITTMAR: Perfect.
MARK RICCIUTO, HOST: It is.
PRIME MINISTER: And about to head across there to Whyalla. We need to do a few things. Firstly, we need to make sure that the funding of the administration is looked after. There's been that intervention, people have been aware that Whyalla Steelworks is so important not just for that town, but it's important for the nation. It builds essentially 75 per cent of Australian structural steel comes from there. It's only place in Australia that produces steel long products. And they're so important for things like our railways, our bridges, construction like high rise towers, transmission infrastructure, for our defence assets as well. So we can't afford for it to just disappear. And my government and Peter Malinauskas' government are combining to make sure that doesn't happen, to protect those local jobs, protect that local economy, but also protect the interests of the great state of South Australia and the national interests.
RICCIUTO: The mail is that money's been pouring out of Whyalla and going to his other assets and the plant's very tired and run down. Is it feasible to spend a heap of money and get it back up into good condition and find another buyer relatively quickly, Prime Minister?
PRIME MINISTER: It certainly is feasible. It won't happen in a day or a week, but it certainly is. This is a good business. Producing steel is something that's a requirement, it's not like we can just make it disappear. And the potential there as well for green iron in the future is so important and there's great prospects. The quality of the magnetite there around Whyalla is extraordinary. You've got a fantastic port, you've got a whole lot of infrastructure there that is important, and a skilled workforce that have worked for a long period of time there that deserve our support. And unlike the previous government that basically told the car industry to bugger off, we understand that manufacturing in Australia is really important. That's why at the centrepiece of our last Budget was a Future Made in Australia. Because we can't be an island continent located where we are that just relies upon other countries to make things. We just dig things up, send it overseas and wait for the value to be added. We want to make more things here and this is an important component of it.
LAURA O'CALLAGHAN, HOST: Now that we know how important this is to Australia and South Australia and how much money is being put into it. I'm not saying you should go and make a citizen's arrest yourself or anything, but are you going to make sure that people are held to account here? I mean, this could have been absolutely cataclysmic for us and now taxpayers are going to have to bail them out.
DITTMAR: Yeah, where is Mr. Gupta? How do you bring him to account?
PRIME MINISTER: Yeah, well look, we're focused on the future of the workers there at Whyalla rather than getting into the personalities that have been involved in this.
DITTMAR: You don't think that's important?
ANTHONY ALBANESE, PRIME MINISTER: Look I think these things will play out and there are processes that no doubt will play out. But my focus is on, okay, how do we make sure those jobs are maintained? How do we make sure that we continue to produce steel? How do we make sure that Whyalla has a great future? And how do we make sure that that contributes to the economy here in South Australia and nationally as well? So that certainly is my focus.
DITTMAR: Alright Prime Minister, thanks so much for joining us this morning. He's in Adelaide flying to Whyalla. And hey, at the end of the day the positive is it looks like it's been saved.
