David Johnston (WA, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Defence) Share this | Hansard source

I want to deal with a very important issue in terms of Australia's national security that has evolved—particularly over the last three years but more broadly over the last four—since Labor was elected to government in 2007.

Labor has cut $25 billion from the Defence budget since the Defence white paper of May 2009. In the latest budget cut they cut spending by 10.5 per cent, reducing the share of GDP spent on defence to 1.56 per cent. That is the lowest level in 74 years. Next year, 2013-14, will see that share of the vote for defence go to 1.49 per cent. That is the lowest share of the national budget since 1937. This government is taking us back more than 70 years in defence funding. In 2009 the Labor Party boldly put forward a plan of three per cent real growth, indexed at 2.5 per cent out to 2017-18 and at 2.2 per cent thereafter to 2030. They also put forward a strategic reform program and a very bold defence capability plan. Not for one second has this government funded that plan. They put on the table a very significant plan for Australia's national security and defence funding—a plan which the opposition supported. Then we see, four days prior to this year's May budget, the Minister for Defence announcing a $5.5 billion cut from the Defence budget into the forward estimates. Coupled with these cuts, deferrals and delays, there has been a total of $25 billion taken out of Defence since the release of the 2009 white paper. The minister seeks to insult our intelligence by telling us that this will have no effect on front-line capability. We have young men and women in forward operating bases in Tarin Kot, Al Minhad, Kandahar and Kabul who are fighting the war against terrorism for all of us. It is an insult to our intelligence to think that budget cuts of these magnitudes will not affect their training and their equipment—and their training with new combat equipment. This is delusional.

I want to draw the Senate's attention to the words of Dr Mark Thomson, a very esteemed and respected commentator from the Australian Strategic Policy Institute. In the latest budget analysis he said:

The plans set out in 2009 are in disarray; investment is badly stalled, and the defence budget is an unsustainable mess.

That is what the defence minister has delivered to Australia: an unsustainable mess in defence funding. So inept are this minister and this government that they actually returned to general revenue $1.5 billion they were unable to spend last year. This is a scandal.

This week we have seen a further incident. A very highly respected, esteemed and experienced man was transferred from his post as Secretary of the Department of Defence—a man laden with corporate knowledge, former Major General Duncan Lewis, the former Special Operations Commander and Australia's National Security Adviser. This very esteemed, knowledgeable secretary had a five-year contract. One year into that contract he was taken from Defence and moved sideways. This is a significant negative event for Defence on top of these budget cuts. Why did this happen? What is it all about? Looking back through what has gone before in recent weeks, I see that former Major General Lewis told an ASPI dinner recently:

As things stand I don’t think we are structured or postured appropriately to meet our likely strategic circumstances in future.

He then went on to say:

We have come a long way since Mr Tange harangued the services in 1973, but if we don’t go further—much further—we run the risk of becoming irrelevant.

These are not words this minister could possibly wish to hear.

Can I say that one of the reasons why the opposition is so concerned about Defence funding is that this government's budget plans for a surplus—a notional surplus; a mythical, Walt Disney surplus—are in complete and utter disarray? They are founded upon a carbon tax that this government has decided not to go forward with in the technical sense that it was designed. This budget surplus is founded upon a mining tax that has had the guts cut out of it by the states increasing their royalties and by declining coal and iron ore prices. This has left the government with nowhere to go and a massive black hole in financing.

What really worries me is that the next round—the midyear financial economic statements—is going to take further money from the Defence portfolio. This minister and this government treat Defence as nothing more or less than an ATM. When they ring up the numbers on their calculator and they do not come in as they would like, they reach into Defence and pull out billions of dollars. This must have—logically and with common sense—a very significant impact and effect.

Can I very briefly talk about Navy? We have recently had two very damning and significant reports. The Rizzo report says that in terms of engineering all of our Navy ships are in a very poor state of repair. Then we have Mr Coles telling us about submarines. Both reports detail gross technical and cultural failures. I pause to say that Mr Coles's second instalment is due as of now. I have it on reasonable authority that his second report is so damning and so condemning of the administration of this government and this minister that it will be restricted. The report will not be released for public consumption.

The minister himself has been critical of Defence when he found he had no amphibious capability in the face of Cyclone Yasi in Queensland in 2011. We have seen vessels that have fallen into complete disrepair and which have had to be cashiered long before they were expected to be:Manoora and Kanimbla, two of our most significant amphibious assault ships. They are tied up in Sydney and are to be put down, if you like. The Choules was purchased at great expense—$100 million. The first time we took it out of the Heads in Sydney we burned out a transformer and it is out of action for six months.

Can I tell you that Success is in urgent need of being replaced? We have spent approximately $100 million on Success and it will not go sailing ever again. It has instability problems and the whole of the second skinning of it has been a failure. It is everything that you look at in terms of Navy's management: I think we really only have three surface capital ships that do not have some form of major engineering or mechanical fault. And what is the minister doing about all of this? While there is massive investment in the maritime on the North-West shelf of Western Australia, we are a trading nation. What is this government doing? What is this minister doing? Nothing more or less than cutting the Defence budget.

We have had 25,000 people coming to our shores in unauthorised fashion this year, and this government cuts Defence— (Time expired)