Andrew Wallace (Fisher, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to support the member for Fowler in this motion, and I join with the remarks that have been made by both sides of the House in relation to remembering the importance of the men and women who serve our communities in uniform, particularly around National Police Remembrance Day. The case of Constable Dennis Green this year, the death last year of Senior Constable Brett Forte and the unfortunate death of Senior Sergeant Victor Kostiuk just last Friday remind us of the dangers involved in being a policeman or an emergency service worker. I want to thank my good friend the member for Wide Bay, who gave so much of his life to serving his community as a policeman before taking a higher calling to come into this place—although some might argue with that! But I think it's important on days like this to really acknowledge the service of those who have pulled on the uniform. We often talk in this place about the importance of recognising our ADF personnel, which is very, very important and should be done. But, when you look at the carnage and the horrible things that people like the member for Wide Bay will have seen over their years in the police service, compared to what a member of the ADF might see if they deploy, it's very, very difficult to compare the two when you deal with death and destruction every single day over a 30-year period.

My brother is a MICA ambo in Victoria, and he and I have often spoken about the pain and agony that he goes through just by virtue of the sheer weight of numbers of the death and destruction that he has seen. I've only been involved in that in a very small way as a counsel assisting in coronial inquiries, and I have been impacted by just the photographs—let alone actually turning up to the incidents with all your senses and the sights and smells. I was only seeing it in 2D, months and sometimes years afterwards. I can't imagine what it's like to be there on the day or on the night.

It's very, very important that we acknowledge these guys. Equally, it's important that we acknowledge them after the event, after they leave the service. We care for our veterans to a very high quality standard. Sometimes that standard doesn't meet our joint expectations. How we care for our emergency service workers after they leave their service is equally telling.

I want to acknowledge a gentleman in my electorate by the name of Neil Reid, who approached me very early on in my extensive parliamentary career of 2½ years, trying to get support for emergency service workers like the support we provide to ADF members. When you look at that life of service and what they go through over a long period of time, we as a nation—we as a collection of states and territories—do not look after our emergency service workers anywhere near like we look after our ADF personnel. I've met with numerous ministers to try and look at this issue, to look at some sort of uniformity of approach about how we care for our emergency service workers once they hang up that uniform, because many of them do struggle. If we are able to help them post—I won't say 'discharge'—service, we will reduce the number of suicides by these men and women. It's the least we can do as a community and as a government to try and push for better access and better service for these men and women who have given us so much.

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