Tim Watts (Gellibrand, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I am very pleased to second the motion before the House today put by the member for Hinkler. As he mentioned, in April this year I joined the member for Dobell, the member for Gippsland, the parliamentary secretary, the member for Solomon and Senator Lisa Singh in the other place in travelling to the Middle East region and Afghanistan to see firsthand the work being done by our Australian Defence Force personnel overseas. You do not know how unfit you really are until you take part in an ADF training session. On our arrival in Afghanistan, the parliamentary delegation was taken outside and put through our paces in a series of gruelling drills. Our drill was one that ADF personnel practice routinely—dragging someone out of an army truck 150 metres down the road by their bulletproof jacket while strapped with 30 kilograms of military kit yourself. The ADF practice this exercise because attacks on their trucks and heavy armoured vehicles are commonplace in the region and it helps to be able to drag an injured comrade to a secure zone. In our case, we did not drag a burly soldier but a poor logistics clerk, who I expect did not wake up that morning thinking that her day was going to involve being dragged across the turf by Australian parliamentarians. However, this was one of the many experiences that helped me grasp the kinds of challenges and pressures that our ADF personnel endure, which we would not be able to understand fully in this place without the ADF Parliamentary Program.

While there I saw the ADF's missions Operation ACCORDION and Operation OKRA. We visited the ADF personnel involved in the Air Task Group, running airstrikes against ISIS in Iraq, and Task Group TAJI, doing important training work in Iraq. This experience was made all the more confronting when, on our journey over, it was announced that we would be sending 300 troops as part of Task Group TAJI to contribute to the international effort to train and build the capacity of Iraqi security forces. Although we did not visit troops on the ground in Iraq, they are there as we speak, along with 100 Kiwi fellow servicemen. Those Australians are just 80 kilometres from the ISIL occupied city of Ramadi, which was captured by ISIL forces in May this year. One cannot really imagine what life would be like working in the Taji camp under those circumstances.

In Afghanistan we met ADF personnel from Operation HIGHROAD, our major presence in the country and contribution to Resolute Support, the international post NATO-led ISAF mission in Afghanistan. The Australian ADF personnel I saw there were very keen for me to bring the message back to Australia that ADF members are still serving in Afghanistan. We had the welcome-home parades in Australia this year, but there are still hundreds of Australian servicemen doing us proud in Afghanistan.

It is not easy being a member of the ADF. At the very least it means being separated from your family for significant periods of time and flown to isolated areas with little to no outside contact. We in this place know something of this, but I could hardly imagine leaving my young children for six months or nine months at a time. Seeing the work of our diggers up close gave me another perspective of the ADF than the one I have as a parliamentarian. This year we celebrate the Centenary of the Anzacs and it is clear to me, after visiting our ADF personnel overseas, that the values that we celebrate in the Anzacs are very much alive today.

The ADF Parliamentary Program has helped me and hundreds of other members of parliament broaden our understanding of the ADF and its operations abroad. Since the program started in 2001, over 120 senators and 240 members of the House of Representatives have taken part in the program in some form or another. Not all participants went to Afghanistan or the Middle East. Many spend weekends with the Reserves or take part in the Army Aboriginal Community Assistance Program, another essential part of the current operations of the ADF.

The member for Hinkler, who I am proud to work with in seconding this motion today, spent four days on the HMAS Newcastle a year ago. The HMAS Newcastle is one of the frigates that served in the Persian Gulf in 2002-03 and in East Timor from 1999-2000. I am very proud to say that the HMAS Newcastle was constructed in my electorate, at the Williamstown shipyards—something that we are all very proud of in Melbourne's west.

The ADF Parliamentary Program has enjoyed bipartisan support since its inception so that parliamentarians can better understand the Defence Force and we can make informed decisions about it. The program is certainly not a one-way street. I look forward to meeting some of the members of the ADF who are due to spend the next parliamentary sitting week learning the ropes of our workplace—somewhat less dangerous, I can assure them. The program promotes a better and more informed conversation about defence policy in our parliament, and, as a strong supporter of it, I hope that it continues for many years to come.

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