Mark Bishop (WA, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Defence Industry, Procurement and Personnel) Share this | Hansard source

My question is to Senator Ian Campbell, the Minister representing the Minister for Defence. Can the minister confirm that yesterday’s audit report into the ADF’s military police concluded that the system is so seriously flawed that even with ‘unremitting resolve and commitment’ it will take ‘no less than five years to correct and remedy’? Don’t these findings echo Ernst and Young’s report into the Army military police in 2004, which identified the same deficiencies of a lack of qualified military police and expert forensic skills? Given that two reports have found the same problems, can the minister explain why the government rejected the unanimous recommendation of the Senate military justice inquiry to transfer responsibility for criminal investigations to the Australian Federal Police? Why has the government continued to fail ADF personnel and their families by allowing the current flawed system to continue?