U.S. – Australia Relations

Prime Minister [Rudd] Transcript of Interview with Melissa Doyle [on] Sunrise

Canberra — 19 March 2010

19 March 2010

Subject(s): Barack Obama; Road Safety; Water Safety; Church of Scientology

DOYLE:

Well, Prime Minister Kevin Rudd joins us now. Good morning to you. Is it locked in for June?

PM:

Well, I'm going to be very happy any time the President chooses to visit. As I said the other day, I'm pretty relaxed about all that. I know President Obama pretty well. It would be nice to have him and Michelle and the kids. We had a conversation on the phone this morning. He'd like to have a more relaxed visit than the 24-hour, whip in, whip in out that the last one had come down to.

DOYLE:

So, does he just ring you personally? How does that work? And tell you that he's -

PM:

Gets on the mobile to say 'G'day, Kevin. How are you?'

DOYLE:

Does it pop up? Have you got his name in and it pops up 'Barack Obama'?

PM:

If that was the case I would have to shoot you.

DOYLE:

Okay, fair enough. So, maybe, what, maybe bring the family, spend a bit more time here?

PM:

Well, that's what he wants to do, and you see, what's going on in the United States, there's this huge health debate. It's massive. And in America there's no Medicare, the public hospital system is not really available to poor people, so as a result there are literally tens of millions of Americans who don't have any form of health care. So what he's trying to do is to get this through the American congress. He's having a huge job.

I said to him I sympathise with him in two respects - one, I've got a Senate, too, and it blocks most things I try to do, and the second is we're trying to get some new healthcare changes here in Australia as well, so we had a good conversation, but it's going to be good to see him later in the year.

DOYLE:

I know you might have to shoot me, but can you give me a snippet? What do you chat about? Is he a good bloke?

PM:

He's a lot of fun, actually. We talk from time to time and he's got a great sense of humour, but it would be breaching all protocols to actually go to the content of conversation. But it's a good relationship and he's doing great things for America, and for this part of the world. He's going to Indonesia as well, so it's Indonesia, us, and so he's got to schedule it with both countries.

DOYLE:

He'll need it after June in Canberra. He'll want to go somewhere a tad warmer.

PM:

June in Canberra, yeah. Port Douglas is sounding good - back to Queensland.

DOYLE:

He'd like that. Alright, let's get onto some of our viewer questions for you this week. We've got Nicky Chadburn in Adelaide. Nicky, good morning to you. Go ahead.

[Excerpt only of Q&A about President Obama]

Original document from www.pm.gov.au.

Last update: Thursday, 25 March 2010 GMT+1100