And their words will return to haunt them - transcript of Four Corners 'Howard's End' episode

Like other North Coast Voices contributors, I switched on to the ABC Four Corners program which discussed Liberal Party views on last year's federal election defeat.

If you missed the program or cannot bring up the video, the transcript of Howard's End can be found here.

 

It is worth reading for a chance to revisit such self-serving gems as:

 

"JOHN HOWARD: Mr Costello obviously would like to see a leadership change in his favour before the election. I have indicated to him that, as I've always indicated, that in the end it is the will of the party and the interests of the party that is paramount."

"JOHN HOWARD: It is the very strong view of the Liberal Party, indeed the overwhelming view of the Liberal Party that the current leadership team with me as leader and Peter Costello as deputy leader should remain in place through to the next election."

"JOHN HOWARD: Do we need to lower carbon emissions over time? Of course we do. But to say that climate change is the overwhelming moral challenge for this generation of Australians is misguided at best and misleading at worst…"

 

"ARTHUR SINODINOS: I suspect the view within the Coalition at the time was, well, he's a new leader, he's a bit inexperienced, come out of left-field in one sense, and we'll wait and see what he's like. But I don't think there was a sense of panic when Kevin took over the leadership of the Labor Party."

 

"TONY ABBOTT, MINISTER FOR HEALTH & AGEING 2003-2007: We didn't have the option of providing a fresh face. We could've provided a different face but not a face that was fresh in the sense that Kevin Rudd was fresh."

 

"JOE HOCKEY: Quite frankly when I took over the job I don't think many ministers in Cabinet were aware that you could be worse off under WorkChoices and that you could actually have certain conditions taken away without compensation. And once I started to raise those issues with colleagues and they became more informed of the impact of WorkChoices we introduced the fairness test."

 

"ALEXANDER DOWNER: We were doing very badly and we were, John Howard and I were of the view that we might lose the election and I was certainly pretty concerned about it. And after all the election had to be called within weeks, within a very few weeks. And it was a reasonable thing that he wanted to sound out the views of his colleagues as to whether we would be better off changing the leadership and I did that."