James Bidgood (Dawson, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to support the honourable member’s motion that this House recognises and commends service undertaken by all those who have served the Australian Defence Force and the people of Australia in the name of Australia. No official role as the member for Dawson makes me prouder than honouring our men and women in uniform, whether it be by a richly deserved medal of service or by welcoming home troops from active operation in the Middle East and elsewhere with a handshake and a ‘Welcome home, we are proud of you.’

I have participated both in my electorate and in Townsville as a representative of the federal government and the minister on many occasions. I have been able to say thank you and look our men and women in uniform directly in the eye and say, ‘Yes, we are proud of you. Well done and thank you. You serve our nation with honour and integrity. You deserve the respect of our nation and I know from my own experience that you have the respect of other nations with whom we have had joint operations.’ Army, Air Force and Navy play a vital role in the defence of our nation. Our regular and reserve forces form the backbone of our national defence.

I further feel a sense of pride in our men and women in uniform after seeing firsthand their active service overseas just recently on a parliamentary program I undertook to the Middle East. I spent 10 days on the Australian Defence Force Parliamentary Program with five colleagues. We went into various live operations. One of them, which was particularly pleasing for me, was doing reconnaissance and surveillance for quite a few hours on an Orion P-3 and having firsthand demonstrations of all the surveillance equipment and everything that is onboard. Truly, we have some excellent technology being operated by highly skilled men and women. They really do serve us with integrity and honour.

It was particularly pleasing to go out to the Warramunga, an Anzac class warship, for three days and experience operations there as they were watching what they call the ‘hash highway’—with the poppy season in Afghanistan in full bloom and the harvest on. I was able to watch them monitoring the movements and transition of those drugs. It was particularly pleasing to meet someone from the electorate of Dawson—the chef. I was very impressed with the quality and the nutritional value of the food he was serving. I was particularly pleased to spend time with many other Queenslanders on that ship. I happened to notice that almost half the ship’s company were Queenslanders, which was even more pleasing.

It was a fantastic community experience because a ship is a whole community. Looking at all the facilities—the living and working conditions of our men and women in uniform—we must never forget that they are workers like any other worker in society and they deserve health and safety conditions and top-quality equipment, terms and conditions just as the rest of our society does.

Our men and women serve the government and the people of Australia. We should recognise their service in whichever form that takes, whether it can be revealed or not revealed. The most important thing anyone can do in life is recognise and appreciate the service of others to the community and for the common good of the nation. I believe the government recognises the service in many ways, including through an honours and awards system. In warlike situations the Australian Active Service Medal or the campaign medals, for example the Afghanistan Medal or the Iraq Medal, give recognition to those who have endured long and arduous periods in war operations. For non-warlike operations the Australian Service Medal and the Service Medal with a Special Ops are also awarded.

An election commitment of the Rudd Labor government was to establish an independent tribunal to consider longstanding defence honours and awards issues. This was established administratively in July 2008 with legislation to be introduced this year. This tribunal has already completed two inquiries and another five are underway.

In conclusion, I would like to say that we cannot do enough to recognise and appreciate the gallantry and the service in whatever aspect it may be—on the frontline or behind the scenes. Our military services are a whole community and every part of that community is important and deserves to be recognised and appreciated. I can think of no better example of this than one of my constituents, Keith Payne, who received the VC. He is an outstanding man and it has been a pleasure to get to know him, to hear his stories of bravery and of the tremendous work he has done over the years since Vietnam serving people across this nation. He truly is a people’s hero, one who has been recognised and appreciated around Australia. I am so glad that people like Keith are being recognised. I continue to say that, whoever they are, whether they are, prominent people like Keith or people behind the scenes like the chef who comes from Andergrove in Mackay, they all deserve to be recognised and appreciated equally. I commend the motion.

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