Ewen Jones (Herbert, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

When the then Minister for Defence David Johnston rang me, he did not sound happy. He went on to tell me that the ADF pay deal had been struck and there would be a 1.5 per cent per year pay rise for the next three years. There was some trade-off as well when it came to leave and allowances. I had my say and I lost the argument; the decision was made. It is a team game here. I could have threatened to cross the floor or move to the cross benches but I did not. My leader Tony Abbott fronted the cameras and he said he wished it was not so but the mess we were left meant that everyone had to carry some of the load. He also said at the time that as soon as the budget position improved we would act on Defence pays.

In a city like Townsville you do not have to go too far to meet someone who wears a uniform. While they will not publicly complain, they will tell you what they think in private. I also have a significant veteran population in my electorate. They said they were not happy with the pay deal but they would cop it sweet. What they could not understand was the loss of benefits. It had no economic impact—if it had an economic impact they could understand, but these did not. I went back to Minister Johnston and talked about it. I went to the PM and I spoke to him about it. He said the members for Solomon and Ryan, Natasha Griggs and Jane Prentice, had also raised the issue with him. He was able to reinstate the leave provisions immediately.

I attended a rally at Townsville City Council forecourt organised by a former soldier who was also member of the ALP. There were a large number of ALP organisers and public sector union members there, and they were the ones making the most noise. When I pointed out that the last two years of Labor's ADF pay deal were below inflation, they booed me and howled me down. When I pointed out that the previous government had left Defence with the lowest defence spend since 1938, they howled me down. When I asked the organiser why he did not organise a rally then for any of those things, when Labor was in power, they howled me down. That is okay. That is their right. I went there because I owned the decision. I made my objections to the people who could control the issue and I got a very good hearing but I was not successful. Since then, whenever I met with the Prime Minister, the Treasurer, the Minister for Defence, the Minister for Finance or the foreign minister—anyone I could talk to—I spoke about the need to get a better pay deal than the one we had for ADF personnel.

I spoke to former and current officers, NCOs and the rank and file. One message came through to me loud and clear—we have a highly skilled and intelligent ADF. We do our best to provide for them with the best possible equipment but they told me that if we continued with the pays and allowances like we were, and governments past, present and future kept chipping away, we would lose good people. Recruitment of the best people will be harder and more difficult and then we will not need to provide the best equipment because we will not have the people with sufficient intelligence to use it. That is a self-fulfilling prophecy. That is what came through to me the most.

The Prime Minister, the Treasurer and the ministers for defence, both Johnston and Andrews, have never forgotten about this. It has never gone away. The Intergenerational Report being released today will show that the budget has improved and that we have been getting on with addressing Australia's budgetary problems.

This proves a few things. Our budget has a spending issue and we are all part of the solution to get that right. But we also have a Prime Minister and a Treasurer who listen. We also have two Ministers for Defence, both Johnson and Andrews, who will listen to their backbench. We have MPs such as you, Madam Deputy Speaker Prentice, we have the member for Solomon, the member for Hughes and me—we live with, work with and represent our people. I owned this decision when it was first made, because I am part of a government that is facing challenges. I own this new decision because I, and every MP with Defence personnel in their seats, never stopped working for our communities. That is what we do in this place. I thank the House.