Vince Connelly (Stirling, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for Defence. Will the minister outline to the House how the Australian Defence Force is continuing to bring back Australians and Australian visa holders from Afghanistan?

Peter Dutton (Dickson, Liberal Party, Minister for Defence) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the honourable member for his question and really highlight the fact that not only has he served his country in uniform but he is one of the greatest advocates in this place for men and women who serve in uniform today. He is on the backbench committee for defence and veterans affairs, and I work very closely with him and I'm very grateful for his advice.

We are all incredibly proud, of course, of the work of the Australian Defence Force personnel, our intelligence agencies, the Home Affairs staff and the DFAT personnel who are in Kabul right now. They are saving lives, as we know, but it is important to recognise that they are working in perilous circumstances. As we know, there are credible threats in relation to the prospects of terrorist attacks. We know that ISKP and others have the intent to cause harm not only to our people but to the Afghan nationals and to the Taliban itself. It is a very, very dangerous situation.

We have over 250 personnel across the different agencies who are supporting this effort. Since last Wednesday, in less than a week, we've been able to shift 1,700 people to safety, and that has only been possible because of the brave actions of many of those who serve our country this very day. I want to recognise the family members and the mates who are here watching anxiously, with their loved ones and their friends serving in Kabul at the moment. We want them to return home as quickly and as safely as possible. I was speaking, again, with the Chief of the Defence Force this morning, talking about our evacuation plans and ways in which we can move our equipment, our assets and, most importantly, our people out safely and in a timely way. But we are, obviously, in the back end of this campaign now and the situation does continue to deteriorate, over the coming hours and in the next couple of days.

I want to make sure that we do everything we can to recognise, as a government, the efforts that have been made, particularly by the home affairs department, DFAT and Defence in recent months as well. It has been quite remarkable, the number of people that we've been able to bring out of Afghanistan since April and, indeed, over the last eight years. I think that most Australians recognise this and realise this fact, that Australia is second only to Canada on a per capita basis in the numbers of people we settle permanently under our refugee and humanitarian program in this country. Eight and a half thousand people have come out of Afghanistan over the course of the last eight years and, of course, that is supplemented now by our current efforts.

There is, and always will be, more to do and we commit ourselves to that task.