Peter Dutton (Dickson, Liberal Party, Minister for Defence) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the honourable member for his question. The only thing that I'd add to the Prime Minister's comments is, firstly, obviously, the government of the day takes the advice of the Chief of the Defence Force and all of those experts that form part of the National Security Committee, looking at our domestic and our international equities, and makes decisions based on the best advice.

I think the best message at the moment, frankly, if I can say with respect, for our troops to hear—the 39,000 that went to Afghanistan and those that have served in Iraq or in Middle Eastern campaigns in recent years—is that their country is incredibly proud of their service. I don't think those troops, their families or their loved ones want to hear political pointscoring at this point in time. They want to hear that this country has their back, and this government does. They want to hear that their service in our country's name is in our national interest, and it is.

We will continue to provide the resources to those troops, both those that are serving and those that have served, and we will make sure that we make the future investment decisions to give them the best capability to defend our nation. We live in an uncertain time and we do need to take tough decisions from time to time, to make sure that we protect and keep safe the Australian population. The Prime Minister and the members of the cabinet on the National Security Committee will always make those decisions based on those criteria—to keep our country safe and to make sure that we can protect and defend ourselves—as you would expect an elected government would do.

We are well and truly served and greatly honoured by the service of the men and women of the Australian Defence Force and our other security and national intelligence agencies. I am extremely proud of the work that we're doing in Afghanistan at the moment, in harm's way, and I wish godspeed to all of those there. I want them back home safely as soon as possible.

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