Robert McClelland (Barton, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Foreign Affairs) Share this | Hansard source

This is an important matter. Today is the fourth anniversary of the invasion of Iraq. Two days before that invasion occurred, the Prime Minister gave a speech to the parliament. One would expect that speech to have been appropriate, given that Australians are entitled to absolute precision and certainty when it comes to the deployment of young Australian men and women in the service of their nation. On 18 March, the Prime Minister said:

The engagement of our defence forces will be limited to the period of the conflict ...

I think any reasonable Australian would assume that the conflict he referred to there was the immediate invasion of Iraq and not its aftermath in terms of peacekeeping or stability operations. Indeed, that was confirmed on 4 May 2003, when the Prime Minister, who was then in New York, was interviewed and said that we would be bringing back the troops. He continued:

When we bring back the SAS and the Hornets and some other force elements, we will still have during the transitional period some 1,000 to 1,200 personnel in the area ...

He then said:

... the president reiterated his clear understanding all along we would not be providing a significant peacekeeping force.

Then he was asked, in that context:

Do you see it as months or years ...

He said:

Well I certainly don’t see it as years.

Here we are, four years after, with our combat forces still involved in Iraq. The Prime Minister says that in no way are those public statements of his misleading or inconsistent, because the Al Muthanna task group was deployed in Al Muthanna in March 2005, which corresponds with my recollection. But, on any reasonable analysis, statements by the Prime Minister and many statements by the Minister for Foreign Affairs confirm that it was never the intention that Australia be involved in a protracted occupancy of Iraq—and that is certainly what has occurred.

In terms of what the government’s plans are for Australian forces to be withdrawn from Iraq, quite frankly, it is anyone’s guess. I asked the Prime Minister a question today. The text of my question was:

Is the Prime Minister aware of reports of the preparation by the Pentagon of a plan for a phased withdrawal of United States troops in the event that the current ‘surge’ of United States troops fails to stop sectarian violence in Iraq?

I also asked:

Does the Prime Minister have a similar contingency plan of phased withdrawal in place for Australian forces?

Subject to the transcription of his answer, the Prime Minister, as I recall, said, ‘The answer is yes, it is normal for such a contingency plan to be prepared’—or words to that effect. In answer to the follow-up question asked by the Leader of the Opposition—which basically was, ‘What is that contingency plan?’—the Prime Minister accused the Leader of the Opposition of misleading him, because, he said, he had been asked about the United States plan.

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