VIRGINIA TRIOLI, HOST: The Prime Minister is between Parkes and Forbes in Western New South Wales right now, Prime Minister, good morning.
ANTHONY ALBANESE, PRIME MINISTER: Good morning Virginia.
TRIOLI: And you were touring some of the flood affected areas here in Victoria over the weekend. Are there any more announcements you can make about payments or support that you can offer? Or perhaps boots on the ground to these flood affected communities?
PRIME MINISTER: Well, we're adding further boots on the ground. As of yesterday, there were over 100 Australian Defence Force personnel on the ground there in Victoria providing support and assistance, everything from sandbagging to helping with evacuations, to helping to clean up, and that will continue in the future. There'll be more people on the ground there this week. In addition to that, of course, we announced over the weekend, the centre at Mickleham will be made available with 250 beds for those people who've lost their homes. And we of course, have also announced the disaster recovery income support of $1,000 for those most affected, but in addition to that as well other support for people in local government areas as well. And those applications people can apply for support there through the my.gov.au website or through other means through their local emergency service centres. So we'll continue to respond to all requests for support from Victoria. I was able to tour with Daniel Andrews yesterday, we flew over tragically over Rochester, that was still substantially underwater. And we met with emergency services personnel in Bendigo, but also in the headquarters there in Melbourne.
TRIOLI: I've got a request here or a question from someone who wonders whether one little township which has been flood-affected and is flooded at the moment, a little town called Darraweit Guim, it falls in the Macedon Ranges Shire, not the Mitchell Shire, it actually cuts across the two shires there. And they don't believe that the support has been announced for the Macedon Ranges Shire. I don't know if you're able to answer that or know whether that's included in the shires that have been announced as getting that support Prime Minister?
PRIME MINISTER: I'm travelling as you know, unfortunately, in the car on my way to Forbes, looking at the damage that's in Western New South Wales, I don't have that in front of me. But I assure you that we are providing support as the requests come in. We added four local government areas in Victoria to the list just yesterday. And we'll continue to make sure that those people who need support get it. And in addition, as well, as we move to the recovery phase, there'll be a need for further support as well.
TRIOLI: Oh, yeah. So I mean, look, I didn't know whether off the top of your head you'd have that. We'll check in with your office and also see if that little area is covered there by the Macedon Ranges Shire. At the moment, there are so many communities just watching and waiting, Echuca in particular, waiting to see whether their extraordinary sandbagging there can survive the rise. But it does look as if, according to the State Emergency Service here in Victoria, that we're looking at potentially a four to six week slow-moving flood now for communities either side of the border of the Murray, once all those tributaries and rivers feed into the Murray, and that turned into a Murray riverine flood. Is Australia prepared for that?
PRIME MINISTER: Well, unfortunately, the review that was conducted and announced yesterday was grim news. Because what you have of course, is the areas around the Murray there, further south and further north, all being flooded. It coming down from New South Wales, from where I am now, will flow down into the Murray and also the rivers that are flowing up like the Campaspe and others into the Murray as well. So you'll have that increase in flows from both sides, it will take many weeks, we're told three to four weeks for that to flow through, down into South Australia. And so it is a very difficult period ahead. In particular, more rain is expected later this week, Wednesday, Thursday and beyond in Western Victoria and the area around the Murray and that's why these warnings for places like Shepparton and Echuca face difficult days ahead. Australians though are showing once again, that at the worst of times, you see the best of Australian character. They're showing their resilience, they're showing their support. And just a huge shout out to the volunteers in the SES, the emergency service workers and others who are working around the clock on these issues. I received a briefing today from Brendan Moon, he's only been on the job for a couple of weeks, in charge of our emergency management nationally. And certainly he was up till all hours, we were still getting requests from Victoria as late as midnight last night, but also requests from Tasmania and New South Wales. The scale of this is enormous. And it requires, of course, a commensurate response from governments and I'm working very cooperatively, whether it be with Daniel Andrews in Victoria, but also I'm about to be meeting with the New South Wales Premier, here in Forbes, when I arrive there shortly, and also the Tasmanian Premier I've been in contact with this morning.
TRIOLI: Anthony Albanese, the Prime Minister is on the line this morning, as he says, somewhere between Parkes and Forbes, I'm about to speak to the Victorian Farmers Federation, Prime Minister, what are you being told, and what updates are you getting about how our food growing areas and our agriculture is being affected, particularly here in Victoria, by these floods, we've got high food prices already, are they about to go higher because of what we're losing?
PRIME MINISTER: Well tragically, I could see for myself yesterday, on the chopper flight that I had with the Victorian Premier, Daniel Andrews, the impact that that it's having. And tragically, there had been such a good harvest anticipated in wheat, in fruit and vegetables, in so many of the products that the Victorian food basin there is such a rich area, as well as in areas like poultry and other areas will be affected as well. So we just have to work with farmers and with the sector. They of course have done it tough in recent years. And we're just very hopeful, but there's no doubt that there will be an impact on this. And the impact will feed into higher prices, most unfortunately at a time where inflation has already been rising.
TRIOLI: So inflation will rise further, do you think?
PRIME MINISTER: There's no doubt that this will have an inflationary impact, as well as another hit to the budget. These are costs that are necessary in order to provide support for people.
TRIOLI: Anthony Albanese, I know you have to run but I appreciate your time. Thanks so much, good luck.
PRIME MINISTER: Thanks very much, Virginia.