Lee Rhiannon (NSW, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I ask that general business notice of motion No. 777 standing in my name for today, requiring military logistical support not to be accounted as foreign aid, be taken as a formal motion.

Gavin Marshall (Victoria, Deputy-President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Is there any objection to this motion being taken as formal?

Mitch Fifield (Victoria, Liberal Party, Assistant Minister for Social Services) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Yes.

Gavin Marshall (Victoria, Deputy-President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Formality is not granted, Senator Rhiannon.

Mitch Fifield (Victoria, Liberal Party, Assistant Minister for Social Services) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Deputy President, I seek leave to make a short statement.

Gavin Marshall (Victoria, Deputy-President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Leave is granted for one minute.

Mitch Fifield (Victoria, Liberal Party, Assistant Minister for Social Services) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

As has become the practice in this place, we do not think complex foreign affairs matters are appropriate to be dealt with by way of a simple binary motion, but I should take the opportunity to indicate that the motion that was put forward by Senator Rhiannon is factually incorrect. Nowhere in the Minister for Foreign Affairs' speech did she state that Australia could count military deployments as foreign aid. OECD guidelines are clear on what can and cannot be counted as official development assistance. The minister stated that the delivery of humanitarian aid or development services by the ADF should be acknowledged alongside other forms of assistance. In countries like the Philippines, Vanuatu and Nepal, the ADF has played a key role in Australia's humanitarian response. It is only right that Australia's full contribution to these international efforts is recognised. This is something that Senator Rhiannon would know if she had read the minister's speech.

Lee Rhiannon (NSW, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Deputy President, I seek leave to make a short statement.

Gavin Marshall (Victoria, Deputy-President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Leave is granted for one minute.

Lee Rhiannon (NSW, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The refusal of the government to have a vote on this important motion should be noted because of the words that have been used here again—the weasel words that we are hearing more and more when it comes to foreign aid. We have seen foreign aid treated as an ATM, with huge amounts of money taken out of it. In the two years that this government has been in power, $11 billion has been taken out of the budget for poverty alleviation. Now we are seeing attempts to change the definition. There is a weakness in how the OECD definition is set out, but we know there is proposal coming from the government to include military logistical support as a form of foreign aid and to be able to define it in that way, which would then allow the government to make out that its aid budget is bigger than it is. This is misrepresenting the aid budget at a time when they are actually ripping millions out of it. (Time expired)