Brendan Nelson (Bradfield, Liberal Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Hansard source

I join the Prime Minister in offering the condolences of the opposition at the death of Lance Corporal Jason Marks. He was killed on 28 April while wearing the uniform of the Australian Army as a 4RAR commando. He was 27. He leaves behind his parents, Paul and Sharon, his wife, Cassie, and his two children, Connor and Ella. We should also remember, in reflecting on his life and his service, that there were four other Australian soldiers who were wounded in the same battle in Oruzgan, Afghanistan, with small arms fire and rocket propelled grenades.

Lance Corporal Marks was born in Broken Hill. He grew up in Yeppoon. As Cassie, his wife, said of him, he had dreamt of being a soldier since the age of 12. He finally achieved his dream in 1999, when he joined the Australian Army. He first saw his way through the Royal Australian Army Medical Corps and finally achieved his ambition of becoming a commando, very much the elite of the Australian Army. In the days after his death, every Australian should remember that he is the fourth Australian who has died in Afghanistan over the last six months. He joins Luke Worsley, Matthew Locke and David Pearce as Australians—Australian men, Australian soldiers—who gave their lives in our name, on our behalf and for everything that we hold dear.

Our generation is engaged in fighting a resurgent totalitarianism, the epicentre of which is in Afghanistan, which is the path and the crossroads to Central Asia. All of us should remember that 88 Australians were murdered in October 2002 by three men who trained with al-Qaeda in Afghanistan under the support and patronage of the Taliban. That is why we are there. That is why he gave his life. We are fighting people who have hijacked the name of Islam to build a violent political utopia. They are fundamentally opposed to political and religious freedom. Their attitudes to the treatment of women are incompatible with a peaceful world, let alone a civil society, and they are fundamentally opposed to the liberating power of education because it most seeks to undermine the dogma to which they have signed up. This country is enormously proud of Jason Marks, the sacrifice that he has made and that in particular of his family, and arguably it is the families that make the greatest sacrifice.

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