Nicolle Flint (Boothby, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

In the introduction to her book, Well may we say ... the speeches that made Australia, author Sally Warhaft observes:

Even when we know that words are not enough, sometimes, offered humbly and humanely, they are all we have.

I cannot think of a more appropriate sentiment with which to begin this speech about 65 brave Australian nurses who endured the unthinkable 75 years ago today. There are no words that can truly do justice to these remarkable women who experienced atrocities and tragedies so awful they are difficult to recount.

The story of these 65 Australian nurses begins with their evacuation from Singapore as it fell on 12 February 1942. It was on the 12th that they boarded the small ship the Vyner Brooke along with many civilians and children. On board the Vyner Brooke and under the direction of matrons Olive Paschke and Irene Drummond, the 65 nurses gave up their quarters to civilians and took charge of serving food from the limited rations. The matrons determined early on that, in the event of an evacuation, the nurses would be the last to leave the ship. The ship was loaded far beyond its capacity and being small and alone on the sea, it was a target for the Japanese, despite the best efforts of the ship's captain to hug the coastline of the islands of Indonesia as they fled.

And so, 75 years ago today on Valentine's Day, the little Vyner Brooke was attacked by nine Japanese aircraft who bombed it no less than 30 times in five minutes, before damaging it so badly it began to sink. Many were killed during the attack. Even though the ship was quickly sinking, as per the orders of the matrons, the nurses ensured all other passengers left the Vyner Brooke before they jumped into the sea to cling to debris. Many of the nurses could not swim. All were at the mercy of the current. Injured and drifting, 53 nurses somehow made it to Bangka Island; 12 did not.

I acknowledge the wonderful work of the Australian Mint for releasing a coin today, which I have here with me, to commemorate the anniversary of this terrible tragedy. Of those who did make it to shore, some were captured by Japanese troops and taken to Muntok on Bangka Island, where they were held with civilian women and children. Eight of these nurses would tragically die in 1945 just before the end of the war. Nearby, 22 nurses, including several who were badly injured, along with civilians and servicemen from other ships, were washed up on Radji beach, Bangka Island. Matron Irene Drummond coordinated the 100 or so survivors. It was Matron Drummond who held her nurses together, when upon their surrender the Japanese troops proceeded to first kill the servicemen, who were surrendering with them, and then the civilians. It was Matron Drummond who said to her nurses as they marched into the sea to be machine-gunned, then bayoneted to death by the Japanese, 'Chins up girls. I'm proud of you and I love you all.'

Miraculously, Sister Vivian Bullwinkel survived this atrocity. Wounded and in shock, she not only dragged herself out of the sea but after coming across a badly wounded soldier cared for him for days until he was well enough to walk with her to the village of Muntok. Sister Bullwinkel survived the conditions in the internment camp that claimed the lives of eight of her fellow nurses and later gave evidence to war crimes tribunals in Australia and Japan. I cannot summarise the courage and dedication of these nurses better than Dr Brendan Nelson, the Director of the Australian War Memorial, in his address to the Bangka Day Memorial Service at the Women's Memorial Playing Fields in my electorate on Sunday, 12 February 2017. Describing the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, Dr Nelson said:

The most prominent image chosen in the centre facing Anzac Parade across the lake to the parliament is neither the light horseman nor a Naval Officer.

It is a nurse.

In her hands is a basin containing instruments. Immediately above her head is the Red Cross—universal symbol of charity. Further above it is a pelican feeding her young directly from her bleeding heart, the ultimate symbol of the quality named below—Devotion.

To completely subsume yourself into the people and the cause to which you have committed.

Straddling Anzac Parade are our nation’s sacred Memorials.

The nurses’ memorial simply says, Beyond all praise.

The brave and selfless actions of the 65 nurses who boarded the Vyner Brooke on 12 February 1942 demonstrated their courage, stoicism and devotion beyond all praise. It is our duty in this place to remember them and commemorate their brave and selfless actions.

In my electorate of Boothby, we do so through the Women's Memorial Playing Fields. The playing fields sit in the middle of the 130 square kilometres of my electorate. The playing fields' eight-hectare site was established by Liberal Premier Sir Thomas Playford in 1953 to encourage women's sport and as a war memorial to our servicewomen, particularly the 21 nurses massacred on Radji Beach. The service held to commemorate these women has been running for seven decades, and on Sunday we were honoured to be addressed by Dr Nelson to mark the 75th anniversary of the Bangka Island massacre.

The memorial at the Women's Memorial Playing Fields is one of the few Australian war memorials dedicated to women. As Dr Madeleine Turner writes in her honours thesis, Unsung heroes: the Australian Service Nurses National Memorial and the politics of recognition, it was not until the late 1990s, after a long, hard-fought struggle, that Australian service nurses were honoured with their own national memorial on Anzac Parade in Canberra. The Women's Memorial Playing Fields in my electorate of Boothby are more than just a war memorial. Through the presence of women's sport they are a living memorial, mainly to the 65 nurses of the Vyner Brookebut also to all servicewomen who have given their lives for our nation and our freedom.

Unfortunately, the playing fields and the memorial are in desperate need of an upgrade so they can continue to recognise our servicewomen and support our sportswomen in a fitting way. The memorial service and the memorial to Australian nurses and servicewomen is administered by a small but dedicated group of local volunteers, none more so than the president of the memorial playing fields, Mr Bruce Parker OAM, who received his honour for the work he has done there. Each year, volunteers from the trust and the sports clubs cater for hundreds of people at the service, as they did on Sunday with Dr Nelson and the trust patron, Mrs Lan Le, wife of our governor, His Excellency Mr Hieu Van Le AC. Each year, they make the case for assistance for funding to upgrade the modest memorial and the playing fields. Both are desperately in need of a refresh so they can cater for more visitors to the memorial, so more people can understand the importance of the site and so more women and, I would hope, men can play sport at the site.

I was disappointed to learn that the trust's attempts to gain tax-deductible gift status were refused. Like so many grassroots community groups who are doing invaluable local work and who want to raise significant amounts of money from within their community to fund local projects, they could not gain tax-deductible gift status. This is a policy issue I intend to pursue so that our local volunteers and local community projects can get the assistance that they deserve. I recognise this may be a difficult task. The area of law relating to charities is complex and carries the weight of centuries of case law and now federal legislation. However, I believe the true meaning of charity has strayed from where it began: in our homes and in our local communities.

Today, too many big charities have no grassroots members, do no work in our local communities, often benefit from generous government grants and often exist almost exclusively to attack our local businesses. These big charities reap the generous rewards of tax-deductible gift recipient status and associated perks like fringe benefits tax exemptions, while our community groups are reduced to begging governments for money for local sporting or war memorial upgrades. The best example I can give of this phenomenon is the Foundation for Alcohol Research and Education, otherwise known as FARE. They were created with a $115 million federal grant; have no grassroots members; spend most of their time attacking our family-owned pubs, wineries and breweries; and claim all the benefits of charitable status, including tax-deductible gift recipient status.

As the member for Boothby and the first woman to have ever held the seat since it was established in 1903, I believe it is my responsibility to do all I can to fight for the Women's Memorial Playing Fields and the memorial to our Australian servicewomen. I may not succeed, but I owe it to our Australian servicewomen and our Australian sportswomen to do my very best.

Julie Collins (Franklin, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Regional Development and Local Government) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

As children go back to school in Tasmania, as parents go back to work and as our tourist season has reached its peak in recent weeks, Tasmanian infrastructure is under strain. Tasmanian infrastructure is under strain for two reasons. One, because of the amount of road works, which were funded by the former Labor government back in the 2013 budget, that are finally being done to our roads. They were delayed by the state Liberal government. Two, because of the state Liberal government's lack of investment in tourism infrastructure, particularly in our national parks, but also in dealing with the traffic congestion around Hobart's streets. It has been many years since we commissioned a study, under the former Labor government, to look at the traffic flow in Hobart. It recommended some extension of clearways in peak times. The state Liberal government have done absolutely nothing about that for the last three years—nothing. Just 12 months ago they commissioned a committee to tell them what needed to be done to deal with congestion in Hobart's streets. It recommended the extension of clearways in peak times, which we had told them the year before. Today, very little has happened in terms of dealing with peak hour traffic in Hobart. Due to our geography, because of the large mouth of the Derwent River and because the southern outlet of the Tasman Bridge and the Brooker Highway are the main inlets in to Hobart, there are constraints about what can be done, but the state Liberal government has done absolutely nothing about planning for this.

Over the last three years they have also invested very little in our national park infrastructure. It was former Labor governments, state and federal, that invested in infrastructure in our national parks. At the last federal election federal Labor committed, as part of our tourism package to Tasmania, a $42.5 million package where were we were going to invest in the Three Capes Tracks, but also in Cradle Mountain for the upgrading of infrastructure, which everybody says is needed. Unfortunately, the Liberal Party did not match Labor's commitment during the election campaign. They committed $1 million for Cradle Mountain, but that money has also not been forthcoming. So tourism infrastructure in Tasmania is under great strain and our road infrastructure currently is being developed, but late and badly planned by the state Liberal government. Indeed, some of the construction of the Midland Highway has had to be repeated because of bad weather and the timing of it. In 2013, federal Labor committed $500 million to the Midland Highway upgrade. The current Liberal government committed only $400 million, so it is spending $100 million less on the Midland Highway, and all we have seen with the projects is delays.

I want to talk, in particular, about a delay that is incurring in my electorate. On 31 January the state Liberal minister turned a sod on the Summerleas Road-Huon Highway intersection. Again, this was money that was committed in the budget in 2013 by federal Labor. Indeed, we committed $17.5 million for the upgrade of this section. In estimates in 2014 we asked the government what it was doing about that and whether it had negotiated with the state Liberal government. There has been great failure by state and federal Liberal governments to get this road construction underway. I was pleased to see a turning of a sod on 31 January, but unfortunately since then very little has happened. I think the minister went and turned a sod simply because he knew that I was watching him and he knew that the community was watching him. Indeed, there is very little major construction work happening at all in that area, and having wasted the quiet summer break, when they could have done the work, they are now, as school is going back, trying to start construction. It was clearly a stunt by the Liberal state minister to go and turn that sod at the Summerleas Road-Huon Highway intersection and pretend that something was happening, because local residents tell me that there is still no significant work underway—none at all.

The state Liberal government has a bad record for planning and it is compounded by the federal Liberal government cutting funding from Tasmania for infrastructure—for example, the Midland Highway cut. We have also had a cut to rail revitalisation. We have not seen the investments that we need for Cradle Mountain. We have seen the Hobart airport runway extension delayed—that too is now underway, thankfully. It seems that the state and federal Liberal governments just cannot get it together to properly fund infrastructure in our state.

At the last federal election there was again a commitment for the Hobart airport roundabout. Labor committed $32 million and the Liberal party committed $24 million.

Given that the Summerleas Road-Huon Highway intersection has now taken almost four years—before anything has happened—I am really concerned that we are going to wait another four years before we deal with the Hobart airport roundabout and the flyover that is needed there.

They just cannot get it together. We have congestion in Hobart. We have tourism infrastructure under strain. We have delays on infrastructure in my electorate. We have delays on infrastructure that has been promised elsewhere. We have had cuts to rail infrastructure. They just cannot get it right. One might ask, 'Why can't they get it right?' I think it is because the federal Liberal government is no longer committed to Tasmania. They lost some seats there, so they seem to have given up on Tasmania. We saw that this week when they wanted to move a major approvals office out of Tasmania. My colleagues here, the member for Braddon and the member for Bass, have called them out on that and asked what is going on. But clearly there is no commitment from the federal Liberal government to plan long-term infrastructure in Tasmania, and we have seen that via the cuts that I have talked about.

We have also a state Liberal government that seems completely inept. It appears to me that they have now sacked so many public servants in the Department of State Growth, and the roads and transport section, that they do not have anybody left to plan anything. Indeed, there was a situation where we had some issues with the timing of lights where they had to hire some consultants to come and tell them how to get the timing right for the lights. They did this and now we have another problem and it still cannot be fixed because there are not enough public servants in our state departments.

Federation Chamber adjourned at 18:5 7