Arch Bevis (Brisbane, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Aviation and Transport Security) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I want to add to the remarks of my good friend the member for Barton on the Prime Minister’s statement today on the deployment of Australian troops in Iraq. At the outset, I think it is important in a debate of this kind to place on record what I know are the genuine and deep-felt views of all members of the parliament on both sides of the chamber—that is, that those Australian men and women who serve in our defence forces and are deployed return safely to our shores at the earliest possible opportunity.

There are, however, a lot of unanswered questions about the way in which this deployment has been handled. I was amazed at the display of appalling arrogance by the Minister for Defence, who thought it was appropriate to answer a dorothy dix question two days ago in this parliament and to use that as the means for announcing to this parliament and the people of Australia that Australian troops were being committed to a theatre of conflict over and above any previous commitment that the Australian parliament had been made aware of and that it involved additional troops being located in a different part of Iraq to that which they had been involved in previously and that they would be tasked for different things. The fact that the Minister for Defence could think, in his arrogance, that it was appropriate to make such a profound announcement through the means of a dorothy dix question obviously even fell through to the Prime Minister, who at least today has done the proper thing and made a ministerial announcement to enable this parliament to have a debate, albeit after the event, when we return in August. It is a matter of some interest to note that it was the Prime Minister who made that statement today, not the Minister for Defence. You would have expected questions of deployment of troops to have involved the Minister for Defence more directly.

There are very serious questions left unanswered, even after the announcement of the Prime Minister today in this parliament. The member for Barton raised all-important questions, but no detail has been provided—as there was on the earlier deployment—to this parliament and the Australian people but, most of all, to the men and women of the Australian Defence Force, about the units with which they would be operating and the support they would be provided.

We all remember, when the deployment to Al Muthanna province was announced, the advice that the Australians would be working with British forces in particular but with other coalition forces that would provide heavy armour support, air cover and medical evacuation capabilities should the need arise. None of that advice has been provided to this parliament in the offhanded, cavalier way with which the government have treated this most important matter.

The government have continued that approach with the situation in Iraq. The Prime Minister and this government committed Australian troops to that conflict originally, they said, because of weapons of mass destruction. When that failed to be borne out in fact, the government then changed their view and said that the Australian troops were there to effect regime change. It is worth noting that regime change was specifically ruled out by the Prime Minister at the start of the deployment of Australian troops for the identification and removal of weapons of mass destruction. The Prime Minister ruled out Australian troops being involved in a regime-changing exercise.

In fact, the Prime Minister went further than that and said that regime change was not an appropriate reason to commit Australian troops to Iraq. Barely months later, it became the sole reason. Then the goalposts were shifted again and we were told that Australian troops needed to be in Al Muthanna to protect the Japanese engineers who were there. Now that that task is complete and the Japanese are leaving, the government has shifted the goalposts again and a new role described as Security Overwatch—whatever that may mean—is now the task that the Australians have been set. This is not the way in which Australian troops should be committed to areas of conflict.

The government are not treating the Australian men and women in Iraq with the courtesy and respect that they deserve. I only hope they are providing the support on the ground so that Australian men and women who are there in the service of our nation receive the full level of support they require in equipment and command structures and that they are able to return to Australia at the earliest possible opportunity, all of them in good health and in good time.