Andrew Wilkie (Denison, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Prime Minister. The Iraq war has raged for 12 years and created the circumstances for the rise of Islamic State, and all on the basis of the lies about weapons of mass destruction and Osama bin Laden. Seeing as we helped to start this war and create the Islamic state threat, will you acknowledge the Howard government got it very wrong and agree to a proper war inquiry?

Tony Abbott (Warringah, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I appreciate that this is a matter which is very important to the member for Denison. I appreciate that he had deeply held views on that particular conflict. I would probably be prepared to concede that he was right to feel a little bruised by some of the treatment that he was given at that time. But I do not want to dwell on the past. I would rather deal with today's problems than yesterday's problems. I would rather prosecute the conflict against the Daesh death cult than try to re-prosecute a fight that is finished against Saddam Hussein. That is my honest response to the member for Denison. I would rather focus on the threat we currently face than on a threat that you can argue about endlessly from a decade or more ago.

I am pleased to be able to say to the member for Denison and members opposite that this government—with, I think, on this matter at least, bipartisanship support—is doing everything we can to disrupt, to degrade and ultimately to defeat the Daesh death cult in Iraq, as we should, because this is a conflict that is reaching out to us here in Australia. It is reaching out to us here in Australia. We know that there are about 110 Australians fighting with terrorist armies in the Middle East. We know that there are about 150 Australians here actively supporting them with financing and recruiting. We know there are some hundreds of high-priority counter-terrorist investigations going on right now against people who have been brainwashed by this death cult.

One of the important ways of countering the terrorist threat here in Australia is to attack it at source in the Middle East, and that is exactly what we are doing. What we want to do is to remind everyone that this is a warm and welcoming society. This is a country which has been happy to accept people from the four corners of the earth to make a home here and to build a better future for themselves and their children—and that, thank God, is what just about everyone who comes here wants to do. I want to say thank you to all the people who have come to this country from other cultures, from other countries, and have joined our team to make a better home here in this country and to make Australia the great country that it is today.