Sophie Mirabella (Indi, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is addressed to the Minister for Foreign Affairs. Will the minister update the House on the government’s aid program to the Pacific, and are there any alternative policies?

Alexander Downer (Mayo, Liberal Party, Minister for Foreign Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Indi for her question. I appreciate the interest she shows in the Pacific region, which is so important to Australia and which she has visited from time to time. Of course, the government has a very strong interest in a stable and prosperous South Pacific and we accept, as the Prime Minister has often said, that we have special responsibilities in the region.

Bernie Ripoll (Oxley, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Industry, Infrastructure and Industrial Relations) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Ripoll interjecting

David Hawker (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Oxley has already been warned!

Alexander Downer (Mayo, Liberal Party, Minister for Foreign Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Pacific island countries are facing many challenges, so inevitably we are generous. Australia now provides nearly $1 billion a year in effective aid to the South Pacific, if you include Papua New Guinea. One of the keys to our policy is good governance, which in our view is a cornerstone of sustainable development. The quality of government underpins economic prosperity, quality of life and also security.

Our aid program has included restoration of the rule of law and justice in the Solomon Islands and Bougainville; the introduction of the Enhanced Cooperation Program in Papua New Guinea, parts of which are working very well; regional leadership to tackle HIV-AIDS; and the establishment of the Australian Youth Ambassadors for Development Program, which has been great for many of the Pacific island countries and wonderful for a lot of young Australians, as many members on both sides of the House will know.

The honourable member asked if there were any alternatives. There are. The member for Maribyrnong, as the shadow minister for overseas aid and Pacific island affairs, has worked tirelessly on this issue. I remember warmly the time he travelled with me in December 2004 to the Pacific islands.

Bernie Ripoll (Oxley, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Industry, Infrastructure and Industrial Relations) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

How warm were you?

Alexander Downer (Mayo, Liberal Party, Minister for Foreign Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

He showed interest, enthusiasm and decency. I was very impressed with him and got on very well with him, if I may say so, to interject a personal element here. He produced very recently a policy which, let us face it, had a few less than flattering things to say about the government, but I suppose that is the work of an opposition. But he put a lot of work into it, and whether you agree with all of it or not you have to admire a man who went to that much trouble. The Leader of the Opposition said yesterday of the member for Maribyrnong that he was an outstanding shadow minister who had developed an encyclopaedic knowledge of the affairs of the region. I think that is right, which makes me wonder why the Leader of the Opposition did not support him—

Bernie Ripoll (Oxley, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Industry, Infrastructure and Industrial Relations) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It sounds like love. You are not admitting something, are you?

David Hawker (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The minister will resume his seat. The member for Oxley will remove himself under standing order 94A.

The member for Oxley then left the chamber.

Alexander Downer (Mayo, Liberal Party, Minister for Foreign Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

As I was saying, such a good and successful shadow minister, a member of this House with such experience, deserves the support of his leader. And he did not get it, despite the fact that his leader thought he was outstanding. Either he said he was outstanding but did not mean it, which is why he did not support him, or he did not think he was outstanding at all but thought he may as well say it. It is either one or the other. Those are certainly not the words of a strong man and a true leader.

So, as his colleagues are taken away one by one to political execution, the Leader of the Opposition washes his hands like Pontius Pilate and just allows them to be taken away. ‘It’s nothing to do with me, Officer,’ I suppose is his message.

Duncan Kerr (Denison, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Speaker, on a point of order: the minister commenced his remarks with generous comments about his opposition counterpart but plainly now is entering into irrelevancy with a denigration of the Leader of the Opposition. It is not in his portfolio area. It is a tactic and it should be resisted by the chair.

David Hawker (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Denison will resume his seat. The Minister for Foreign Affairs is in order.

Alexander Downer (Mayo, Liberal Party, Minister for Foreign Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Let me in conclusion go back to what I was saying about alternative policies. The Leader of the Opposition is prepared to dismiss the member for Maribyrnong—he was not prepared to support him—yet the member for Maribyrnong put more effort into policy in his short period as shadow minister than the Leader of the Opposition has put into policy in his endless years as Leader of the Opposition.