Michael McCormack (Riverina, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

This crosses both defence and veterans affairs, but I will ask it in a veterans affairs way. When Bruce Scott, the member for Maranoa, was the veterans affairs minister, he came to Wagga Wagga to open the refurbishment of the Wagga Wagga war cemetery. I will start, in the spirit of bipartisanship, by commending the minister for the Anzac centenary grants; $100,000 is going to be well used in each and every electorate. Applications for my committee in the Riverina closed last Friday, and the minister will be pleased to know that we received 30 applications from interested people, many ex-service people, who are very keen to ensure that that $100,000 is well spent.

I would like to see a statue dedicated to John Ryan, the Victoria Cross winner from Tumut, who won his Victoria Cross on the Hindenburg Line in 1918. He enlisted on the Kangaroos march, which took off from Wagga Wagga in 1915. I know the minister would be well aware of the Kangaroos march and the work being done by Graham Brown and others from Exeter to re-enact that wonderful historical event in which so many people from the 55th Battalion and others marched out of Wagga Wagga, ended up in Sydney and went to the Great War. Many of them did not return. John Ryan was one who did return. Unfortunately, he did not have a happy life after he returned. It is sad to say that his latter years did not treat him well. He found it hard to get employment. I hope that now, thanks to the government’s initiative, we can remember him in death perhaps better than we looked after him in life. I commend the government for that initiative.

I would like to ask the minister whether there has been a creeping reduction in the number of regimental bands in the Army. Many veterans have contacted me about this matter. As the minister would be well aware, Kapooka is the Army Recruit Training Centre; all the Army recruits go through Kapooka. It is a wonderful Army base. My city of Wagga Wagga is a tri-service city, with the Navy, the Air Force and the Army Recruit Training Centre.

In 1972, in its first year, the Whitlam Labor government said that it was going to disband the Kapooka band. A spirited group, led by Bruce Pinney and the late alderman Helen Frisby, started a Save the Band campaign. I do hope that we do not have to do that again. The number of Kapooka band members has reduced from something like 28 to 20, and that is a great concern. Not only does the Army band play at all the march-outs; it also plays an integral role in many fundraising activities in the community. I know how focused the current commandant, David Hay, whose posting is due to conclude at the end of this year, is on community efforts. First and foremost, the priority of the band is to play at the army march-outs. They do a wonderful job. Many of the band members have been to Gallipoli and Villers-Bretonneux in recent years to play at various Anzac Day ceremonies. They are renowned bandspeople, great musicians.

There is a great fear that, because of the government’s cutbacks in defence and the government’s cutbacks—they are called savings—in veterans affairs, the band is being reduced, along with bands right throughout Australia. I would like the minister to answer that question. I know it is a Defence portfolio question, but many veterans have asked me about it. I know the minister is well aware of an ex-Kapooka service soldier, Bert Hoebee. Minister, Bert is dismayed by the tone you used in your 15 May discussion about the DFRDB and DFRB and would like an apology on behalf of the ex-servicemen who he thinks have been slighted by your attack on them over the superannuation and veterans affairs entitlement issue. Thank you, Minister.

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