Patrick Secker (Barker, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I second the motion. It is a great honour for me to support my colleague from the other side, the member for Braddon, who I count as a friend in this House.

In February 2001, in my home state of South Australia, a Collins class submarine was commissioned, the HMAS Sheean. The HMAS Sheean’s motto is ‘Fight on’. She is the only Australian naval vessel to be named after a sailor—Ordinary Seaman Teddy Sheean. Teddy Sheean was no ordinary Australian. In late 1942, during World War II, 18-year-old Teddy Sheean was a sailor posted on the corvette HMAS Armidale on a dangerous mission just off the Timor coast. On 1 December 1942, the Armidale came under Japanese air attack by 13 Japanese aircraft. The Armidale was hit by two aircraft launched torpedoes. She began to sink fast and the crew were ordered to abandon ship.

Teddy Sheean was wounded and could have tried his luck to swim to the Timor coast. Instead, seeing his shipmates being picked off in the water by Japanese aircraft, wounded, he made his way across the deck of the Armidale and strapped himself into his Oerlikon gun. Teddy Sheean started firing at the enemy, forcing some of the planes to sheer away from the stricken vessel and its crew in the water. One of the fighter planes was shot down. Sheean was again hit in the chest by bullets, the ship was sinking fast and the water was lapping his feet. This is what survivors say of that day:

The men in the water gasped in amazement as they saw the blood-stained, desperate youngster wheel his gun from target to target, his powerless legs dragging on the deck.

As the gun was dragged into the sea its barrel kept recoiling and shots kept pouring from it.

Even as he sank below water, Sheean’s gun kept shooting. Teddy Sheean died that day, aged just 18. Only 49 of the 149 men on board survived the attack and subsequent ordeal on rafts and in lifeboats, many saved by his heroic actions. Teddy Sheean died fighting to the end against impossible odds. He epitomised the phrase ‘Fight on’, a common saying uttered by those trying to encourage their fellow sailors, or by the tired sailors themselves, and it is this motto that the HMAS Sheean took as its own.

Many consider that Sheean’s actions deserved the Victoria Cross. I do. He was not recommended for the VC at the time because commanding officers of RAN ships at the time were not entitled to specify the nature of the award. Unbelievably, while AIF and RAAF awards were recommended and decided by Australians in Australia, RAN awards were not. A recommendation had to be sent to the Royal Navy Admiralty in London, where an awards and honours committee made the decision. This discrimination meant that no member of the Royal Australian Navy has been awarded the Victorian Cross. Sixty-six years later, bureaucratic madness dictates that Teddy Sheean remains ineligible for the honour, because supposedly end-of-war lists for World War II cannot be reopened.

When I think of how I was at 18 years of age and of Teddy Sheean’s courage and valour in sacrificing himself to save others, it is abundantly clear that his actions deserve nothing less than the posthumous award of a Victoria Cross. Australia has retained the Victoria Cross as the supreme award for military heroism. It can be given on a recommendation from the Australian government to the Queen. It can be legislated for and/or recommended by this present government. The only thing that stops Teddy Sheean from receiving this country’s highest military honour for bravery is an unwillingness on the part of the government to tamper with a bureaucratic filing process. Teddy Sheean is remembered and honoured in a variety of ways by family, friends and supporters. He gave his life for his country and his mates in the true Australian tradition. It is now time for Australia to honour him with our highest award for gallantry, the Victoria Cross.

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