2GB Sydney Live - Interview with Ben Fordham

JOURNALIST: On the line from Western Australia our Foreign Minister Julie Bishop. Minister, good afternoon.

JULIE BISHOP: Good afternoon Ben.

JOURNALIST: I gather you've been on the phone most of the day to the United States trying to get a hold of how the Aussies are doing but also offering as much support and assistance as we can possibly offer?

JULIE BISHOP: That's right. I have been in contact with our Consul-General in Los Angeles throughout the night and we are still not aware of any Australians who have been injured or killed as a result of the mass shooting. This tragedy is the deadliest mass shooting in US history and as we've heard from those on the ground, the scene was beyond horrific. We do know from stories emerging in the media and via social media posts and through contact with our consular people directly that Australians have been caught up in this situation and will certainly know more as the day unfolds, but it's too early to know if any Australians have been admitted to hospital. We are still checking with each hospital, we are still in contact with the local authorities but the Australian Government is deeply shocked and saddened to hear of this tragedy where 59 people were killed and up to 527 injured. It really is a tragic day in the United States' history and I have conveyed our condolences directly to US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and he's come back to me and thanked me for our thoughts and sympathies, but we really do feel for the families of the victims, those who have been injured and the American people. As I've said, this is the deadliest mass shooting in US history.

JOURNALIST: We spoke yesterday afternoon to an Aussie who was hiding in a toilet at Caesar's Palace casino. This morning on the Today Show I interviewed an Aussie who was in the room next door to the gunman. It will be a miracle, won't it Foreign Minister, if we get to the end of this whole thing and find out that no Aussies have been at least injured in this massacre?

JULIE BISHOP: Given the sheer number of people involved, I mean there were tens of thousands of people at the concert, there are thousands of tourists in Las Vegas at any one time, we hope and pray that no Australians are involved but it is too early for us to rule that out completely. We have been urging people if they have got concerns for the welfare of family and friends in the Las Vegas area to contact them directly, if they are unable to contact them and still hold concerns then they should call our hotline on 1300 555 135. We've had over 200 calls so far but we've managed to account for everybody that we know of but of course there might be people that we don't know are there.

JOURNALIST: Sure.

JULIE BISHOP: We were told that last year the Las Vegas Visitor Authority estimated that 365,000 Australians visited the city in just one year, so there would be a number of Australians there.

JOURNALIST: Is it appropriate for us, Foreign Minister, to give advice to our friends in America about gun control considering what we've managed to achieve here Down Under?

JULIE BISHOP: I think that the debate will be continuing for some time in the United States, we've already seen opinion pieces in newspapers, on social media, on the media more generally, policy makers, law makers, members of the public are raising this debate on US gun laws. Different states have different laws relating to gun control. What we can do is relate our experience and as we well recall, we had to confront the issue of gun-related violence in the late 90s after the massacre of 35 people by a lone gunman at Port Arthur. Then John Howard introduced the National Firearms Agreement in relation to automatic or semi-automatic weapons, and then we had that national gun buy back that saw about 700,000 weapons turned in and destroyed. So we can share our experience as we have in the past, but it will be up to the policy makers, the legislators, the American public to tackle this issue.

JOURNALIST: Just lastly Julie Bishop, would it be worthwhile for us to have a fresh think about how we define terrorism? I mean it strikes me that if this was a Muslim bloke with a machine gun or an automatic weapon firing down at people below in Las Vegas, we'd be very quick to label it terrorism, but the word terror hasn't been used today and I know that traditionally we say "oh well, it's got to have some kind of political or religious motive" but it seems to me that the bloke in the pub or the person on the street would say "that is terror, what we witnessed in Las Vegas is the definition of terror".

JULIE BISHOP: The US authorities haven't yet given it a label. The suspect took his own life, he appears to have acted alone, the motive for Stephen Paddock for this shooting is not known and while ISIS, the terror group, have claimed responsibility for the attack, the FBI says that Mr Paddock has no links to the terror group. So I think the US authorities are being very careful given that there is still an investigation underway, they have no motive for the shooting, the perpetrator has taken his own life so it's going to be very difficult for them to get to the bottom of why he did this and what was involved and what was behind it. I think that it's a debate that we have to have. When we know more, and we'll of course support the US in any way we can with information about this matter if Australia has any – I mean there was a reference to an Australian woman but she's been found not to have had any involvement, she wasn't even in fact in the country – but I think that given that he's taken his own life, it's going to be very difficult to find out what drove him to it.

JOURNALIST: We appreciate your time this afternoon, Foreign Minister. Thank you.

JULIE BISHOP: Thanks Ben.