Andrew Wallace (Fisher, Liberal National Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to support the Defence Home Ownership Assistance Scheme Amendment Bill 2022. I want to acknowledge in this place the member for Solomon and members on both sides of the House—I'm not sure if there are any on the crossbench—who have served our country in uniform.

We live in interesting times, as the Chinese proverb goes. We are now in a period of the greatest geopolitical instability since the end of the Second World War. Many pressures are being brought to bear on the geopolitical situation right across the world. Who would've thought 12 months ago that there would be a war raging in Europe right now with the illegal and appalling actions of President Putin and Russia with its most recent invasion of Ukraine, which of course follows its invasion of Crimea in 2014? Of course, closer to home we see a greater contested space in the Indo-Pacific region. All of these pressures that are being brought to bear across the world are having significant impacts on the stability and security of our world. At this time it is critical that we as a nation do everything we possibly can to properly equip, tool, recruit and retain our members of the ADF.

We are a very small country when it comes to population. We have only 25 million people. We have a military force of only about 85,000 full-timers and reservists. That is a very small military. Whilst it is small, it is very capable. But there is a certain quality in quantity, and quantity is something that we really do lack considerably. That's why I was very pleased to see—I think it is a step in the right direction—in March of this year, the then Prime Minister announce a 30 per cent increase in our full-time ADF, taking the full-time ADF to 80,000 people, so an increase of 18,500 people at a cost of some $38 billion. But one is still left with the overriding concern that the ADF is still nowhere near big enough. I saw with great interest former Liberal prime minister Tony Abbott talk about the importance of bringing in a form of national service for our young people. Now, whether that is in the ADF or whether that's in some form of civilian service, I think these are things that need to be considered.

The reality is that Australia has been left with its pants down from a military perspective, in many instances. If you look back to World War I and World War II, the writing has been on the wall and yet Australia has simply been unprepared, from a military size—

The bells having been rung—

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