David Bradbury (Lindsay, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for Foreign Affairs. Will the minister advise the House of the Australian government’s approach to Iraq? Is consistency of public policy important in this matter? How is Australia engaging with the United States administration on its approach?

Stephen Smith (Perth, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Foreign Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for that question, on the five-year anniversary of the commencement of the Iraq war. The Australian government is committed to improving the capacity of the Iraqi government and the wellbeing of the Iraqi people. We are currently giving consideration to additional non-military assistance for Iraq, including humanitarian relief and training in critical capacity-building areas. For example, Australia is already delivering training in law administration and the rule of law to Iraqis, in partnership with the Iraqi and United States governments and the United Nations.

So far as military support is concerned, members would be aware that the government has confirmed its election commitment that Australian troops in southern Iraq, the Overwatch Battle Group, will be withdrawn in the middle of 2008. This is being done in consultation with our allies—the United States and the United Kingdom—and the Iraqi government. These plans continue to be on track.

I was asked about consistency. The government have always been absolutely consistent in our approach to Iraq and that election commitment. Regrettably, this clarity and consistency has not been evident elsewhere. Before the election the previous government, the now opposition, said that such a withdrawal—the implementation of such an election commitment—would be an enormous victory for terrorism. Before the election the then Minister for Defence, the now Leader of the Opposition, said that such an implementation of an election commitment would be a ‘disaster of mammoth proportions’. Regrettably, there is no longer any consistency or clarity on the part of the opposition—as we now find, for example, reported in the Melbourne Age on 7 December last year:

Opposition Leader Brendan Nelson has backed Labor’s plan to withdraw Australia’s combat forces from Iraq by June, breaking from his past insistence that it would be dangerous to set a timetable for troop withdrawals.

There is no consistency there but also no clarity. In the same report, some of Dr Nelson’s new frontbench team appeared to be caught off guard by the move. New shadow foreign affairs spokesman, Andrew Robb, yesterday urged caution over ‘Labor’s plan for a premature withdrawal of troops’. He argued that arbitrary dates for withdrawal did not take proper account of whether the Iraqi government could prevent a return of genocide. So before the election it is ‘Troops stay there’; after the election, so far as the Leader of the Opposition is concerned, it is ‘Troops out,’ but not if you are the shadow spokesperson for foreign affairs. This goes right to the heart of the matter. Neither the Leader of the Opposition nor the opposition themselves actually know what they stand for. They have, again, completely lost their way. They do not know what they stand for.

One element of the question was: how is Australia engaging with the United States on this matter? We are engaging very well with the United States administration on this matter. We have made it crystal clear that that will be our approach, irrespective of which United States administration we are dealing with. So far as we are concerned, our relationship with the United States, through our alliance, transcends whatever administration might be in power in the United States, whether it be Democrat or Republican. Regrettably, that is not the view of members opposite. In February 2007 the then Prime Minister, John Howard, said:

If I was running al-Qaeda in Iraq, I would ... pray, as many times as possible, for a victory not only for Obama, but also for the Democrats.

Patrick Secker (Barker, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Speaker, I rise on a point of order. It goes to standing order 75. This speech is full of tedious repetition.

Stephen Smith (Perth, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Foreign Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

In February 2007 the then Prime Minister, John Howard, said, effectively, to the Australian people and to the American people that the Democrats are the terrorist candidates, and this was backed up 110 per cent by the Leader of the Opposition. The following day he came to the dispatch box and backed up the Prime Minister, saying that so far as the then Australian government was concerned—the Liberal and National parties—Obama and the Democrats were the terrorist candidates. The Labor government will deal professionally with whatever administration is in charge in the United States, unlike the Liberal and National parties, who say that the Democratic Party in the United States is the candidate of the terrorists. And some of those opposite talk about judgement in foreign policy matters!