Malcolm Turnbull (Wentworth, Liberal Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Prime Minister, and I refer to my previous question and his answer. Given that the account of the leak of the telephone conversation with the US President has been published around the world and given the inescapable implication in every publication that the Prime Minister or his office were responsible for that leak, how will the Prime Minister convince world leaders he is a person who can be relied on to keep a conversation confidential when he has repeatedly failed to deny any responsibility for that leak?

Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

On the part of the question which refers to my conversation with the President of the United States, I would refer the Leader of the Opposition to my earlier answers. On the question of Australia’s engagement with the global negotiations leading up to the G20 meeting in Washington and beyond Washington, the government has been engaged for quite some weeks in high-level coordination with other governments on how we approach the future regulation of the global financial system. We have been doing that at official levels. At present, the Treasurer is in Washington and has just been at a G20 meeting in Sao Paulo in Brazil. The purpose of these meetings—

Malcolm Turnbull (Wentworth, Liberal Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Speaker, I rise on a point of order. The standing orders require the answer to be relevant to the question that was asked, not the question the Prime Minister would like to ask himself.

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Prime Minister is responding to the question.

Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The honourable gentleman’s question went to the government working with other governments, and that is what I am responding to. It goes to the question of the agenda which is being framed for the G20 meeting in Washington and the intense preparatory work which is underway in relation to that between us and the other governments participating in this meeting. One of the things on the agenda will be the future regulation of the global financial system, and that will also deal with the future, I believe, of executive remuneration and other such considerations. Long term we have to look at appropriate regulation under the Basel arrangements and, beyond that, we also need to look at the capacity for coordinated action on fiscal policy and, where possible, on monetary policy. These are the big agendas for the future. We will be participating in this meeting, as we have been at an officials and a ministerial level in the preparatory meetings. This is important for Australia. We are playing a positive role and will continue to do so.