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TRANSCRIPT OF INTERVIEW WITH DAVID KOCH AND NATALIE BARR, SUNRISE

THE HON KATE ELLIS MP
MINISTER FOR EARLY CHILDHOOD EDUCATION,
CHILDCARE AND YOUTH
MINISTER FOR SPORT

TRANSCRIPT OF INTERVIEW WITH
DAVID KOCH AND NATALIE BARR
SUNRISE, CHANNEL 7
Monday 17 May 2010
E & O E  PROOF ONLY

Subjects: FIFA World Cup in South Africa; Australia's 2018-2022 World Cup Bid

DAVID KOCH: Sports Minister Kate Ellis is one of the thousands of Aussies heading over there to support our Socceroos. Morning to you Minister.

KATE ELLIS: Good morning.

DAVID KOCH: Now the Socceroos are arriving in that city, Johannesburg next week, what sort of security is being provided for our players and are you happy with it?

KATE ELLIS: Well look we've been advised by FIFA that they have put every resource into security over in South Africa. We've also seen the local organising committee out there, their spokesperson came out last week and said that their security arrangements had been checked 147 times and that they were very confident of them.

But of course I mean we work very, very closely with the Football Federation of Australia to make sure that they've got all of the latest travel advice and information and that they can then put in place every arrangement necessary on top of that to look after our team.

NATALIE BARR: And Minister that's for the players, obviously a lot of Aussie supporters, families, heading over there. They won't have access to that type of security, what do you say to them? They're almost packing and ready to go with their kids. Will they be safe?

KATE ELLIS: Well I guess the first thing I'd say is, I think reports like last night's are another demonstration that not everywhere in the world of course enjoys the peace and the security of Australia and when you're travelling everywhere of course you need to be aware of what the local concerns are.

The DFAT travel advice for South Africa is to exercise a high degree of caution because of the high crime and I hope that all of those Australians travelling over there will also look out for one another. I've seen this - the statistics that on a per capita basis there will be more Australians travelling to the World Cup than from any other nation except for South Africa itself, so there will be a lot of Aussies there and we certainly hope that they will be responsible, they'll keep up with travel advice, register with DFAT and look out for one another as well.

DAVID KOCH: You're going to have to be really careful, unlike most other World Cups in other countries in the past that have been big parties, this sort of adds a darker element to it.

But while we've got you, you've just come back from Z�rich, delivering our bid for the world - hopefully the World Cup bids in 2018 or 2022, if we win those bids, part of our bid is saying we're going to spend nearly $3 billion on more infrastructure, can we afford that?

KATE ELLIS: Well the first thing I'd say to that Kochie is that we won't actually know the costs until much closer to the event and that there will obviously be cost sharing arrangements in place and that we will seek to minimise any of those costs.

The other thing is that this is actually the biggest sporting event on the planet, taking place right around the country if we have a successful bid and there are in turn some huge benefits from that. We saw in Germany just the number of millions of international visitors and the flow on effects that that has on the economy and employment so we've had a look at all of this. It is a huge event. It would be a huge infrastructure build but it would also leave a lasting legacy for Australian sport where we would have state of the art facilities in place right for the future as well.

NATALIE BARR: And just finally quickly Minister, what are our chances do you think?

KATE ELLIS: Well it's a contest, but I think that we are absolutely in it to win it and we're very serious about it and we're being viewed internationally as a serious contender.

DAVID KOCH: Good to know.

NATALIE BARR: Okay.

DAVID KOCH: Thanks very much for join us this morning.

KATE ELLIS: Thank you.

[Ends].

Minister Ellis Media Contact: Jamila Rizvi 0438 644 603

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