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

I reiterate that under Labor 2800 jobs were lost in Defence alone and, indeed, 14,500 across government all without any plan in place at all. In fact, as I said, Labor cut a thousand APS jobs in the 2011-12 budget, another thousand in the 2012-13 budget and a further 800 in the 2013-14 budget—2800 jobs in Defence. If you look at the ADF permanent head count, it has actually increased by approximately by 1398 positions from approximately 56,273 in September 2013 to 57,671 as of 1 April 2015. As I said earlier, the combination of the First Principles Review and the Defence white paper—particularly the Defence white paper, in which a key component will be the enablers that we need in the future—will be a good news story, because there will be, I think, great opportunities for people with specialist skills to join Defence in the future and add to the professionalism of Defence at the present time. The enterprise bargaining agreement is underway at the present time. I know the secretary of my department is keenly interested in that, and I am sure he will do a very good job so far as that process is concerned.

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