Kevin Andrews (Menzies, Liberal Party, Minister for Defence) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the honourable member for Ryan for her question. I think the number of defence personnel in her electorate actually exceeds those in the member for Herbert's electorate.

An honourable member: We were talking quality, though. The quality is higher in Townsville!

I believe the quality is equally good in both electorates. I would say the quality in the member for Canberra's electorate would be equally good, because when it comes to defence personnel there is no question of their outstanding quality. Indeed, one of the things I have to say is that, in coming to this portfolio six months ago, what stood out for me personally perhaps more than anything else—and there are many things that one can be impressed about so far as the Australian defence forces are concerned—was that the professionalism of the members of the Australian Defence Force was outstanding. Wherever one goes around Australia, they are highly committed men and women who do a wonderful job for this country, and we should never forget that. As I said, about 7,000 defence personnel are in the member for Ryan's electorate.

There are currently over 2,500 Australian defence personnel serving in operations, including several hundred from the 7th Brigade in the member for Ryan's electorate. As she said, she observed that the Prime Minister and I and, indeed, the Leader of the Opposition were there at Enoggera a month or so ago to farewell a deployment going to Iraq. That deployment of some 300 regular forces from Australia was complemented by about 100 to 107 from the New Zealand Defence Force. They are currently at Taji, which is about 25 to 30 kilometres north of Baghdad. Taji is a very large base. It measures about six kilometres by seven kilometres, so we are not just talking about some small area. It is a major defence base and it is playing a major role in the conflict in Iraq, because it is there that the Australians and the New Zealanders are part of a building-capacity partner program. We are training regular forces in the Iraqi army. Ultimately, the defeat of ISIL or Daesh must occur on the ground.

We are making significant contributions in the air. We have six Hornets there at the present time flying out of the UAE. We also have an air refueller, which is flying out of the UAE, and a Wedgetail Eagle, which is a command and control aircraft. That is a very significant contribution, the Hornets having replaced the previous rotation of Super Hornets.

In addition to that, we have about 170 special forces, and related forces, on the ground at the international airport compound at Baghdad. They have been there since about September last year and they have been engaged in the training of the counter-terrorism special forces in Iraq and have been doing a very significant job. The combined contribution in Iraq—through the 300 in Taji, the 170 in Baghdad and the air component—is a very significant contribution so far as the conflict there is concerned.

Operation OKRA in Iraq is not our only commitment to the Middle East. Around 1,000 personnel support operations HIGHROAD in Afghanistan and ACCORDION in the broader Middle East region. Three hundred more personnel are supporting Operation MANITOU, promoting maritime security and stability in the Middle East region, while hundreds more are deployed as part of Operation RESOLUTE to keep our maritime borders secure.

This contribution of some 2½ thousand personnel is a very significant, ongoing contribution. Many Australians would not realise that the contribution in Afghanistan, which went for a decade, was our longest military involvement since the beginning of the Commonwealth of Australia in 1901. Some 34,000 Australian defence personnel rotated through Afghanistan over that decade-long period, which means that a very significant number of our defence forces actually served in that decade, in Afghanistan, during that period. This is a major contribution that the defence forces are making.

Then on top of that there is the humanitarian and disaster assistance, which we have seen most recently in Vanuatu, where C17s went in, where defence personnel went in, where HMAS Tobruk took supplies up there and where other contributions were made in Vanuatu. With the earthquake in Nepal, a C17 went there taking in supplies and bringing out people from that troubled region. Then closer to home when natural disasters occur in this country, as we have seen in North Queensland, our defence personnel are there as well. This is a magnificent contribution.

See this speech in context