Phillip Thompson (Herbert, Liberal National Party) Share this | Hansard source

I really appreciate being able to contribute today and take part in this consideration in detail. I will take some time to highlight the work that we've been doing in the Pacific, particularly with regard to the COVID-19 pandemic. Of course, the Pacific nations are extremely important partners and neighbours of ours, and it's our duty to be good neighbours. Being from Townsville, I live a lot closer to the Pacific than most. We are the largest garrison city and the 3rd Brigade at Lavarack Barracks has done a lot with the Pacific. A lot of members have deployed to Papua New Guinea and Fiji, helping and building the forces which, as the PM has said, now have the ability to take on bigger responsibilities and work hand-in-glove with the ADF towards regional stability and security. In fact, the PM gave a speech at Lavarack Barracks to the members of the 3rd Brigade a couple of years ago. I spent many years there as a soldier. In his speech, he spoke about how important our partnership is with the Pacific, because it is a part of the Pacific family. He said we need to make sure that the South-West Pacific is secure strategically, stable economically and sovereign politically, because a strong, stable region helps keep us more secure and enables our economies to grow and our peoples to prosper.

In that vein, this budget outlines a significant amount of spending which will be helping during this difficult time of COVID-19. This global pandemic has impacted the Pacific profoundly. Managing the social, economic and health impacts of COVID-19 is now the overriding challenge for the region. The region has done extraordinarily well in managing this crisis. I want to congratulate the Pacific governments, with the many nations in the Pacific still completely free of COVID-19. That is why I was proud to see the recent launch of our COVID-19 response plans. While working hard to keep our own health crisis under control and supporting our own people and our own economy, we haven't forgotten about our Pacific partners. We are very fortunate here in Australia to have been in a very strong budget position, which in many ways prepared us to weather the storm a bit better than many other nations. It wouldn't be right for us to just look after ourselves and not give any thought to the Pacific nations. Our COVID-19 response plans provide a pathway for the region out of this pandemic. These plans provide a detailed blueprint for the implementation of Partnerships for Recovery and have been tailored to reflect the unique COVID-19 context for each of our partners in the Pacific, Timor-Leste and South-East Asia. These plans build on the comprehensive package of support that we announced in the budget for the Pacific and Timor to respond to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The package announced in this budget includes a record $1.44 billion to the Pacific, $1 billion to South-East Asia, and an additional $304.7 million in temporary support to the Pacific and Timor-Leste for recovery efforts from the impacts of COVID-19. We responded to more than 120 requests from our region for assistance in January. We are providing comprehensive assistance to the Pacific, including continuing to provide COVID-19 testing kits, PPE, critical care equipment, and other medical supplies to our region, including AUSMAT specialists to Papua New Guinea. There is funding for health authorities in PNG for health infrastructure and service delivery and frontline health workers to support in the provinces. And there is support for the Kiribati Women and Children Support Centre to provide ongoing service delivery during COVID-19, including establishing the Orange Door initiative, a shelter for women and children during lockdown periods. In addition, the government has announced a further government commitment of $23.3 million in support of the Pacific and South-East Asia market. My question to the minister is: how will we continue to ensure the Pacific is supported during the COVID-19 response?

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