Ms WORTH (8:10 PM) —The present debate on this UN resolution on East Timor reminds us that in Australia we take for granted a freedom of political expression which does not occur in Indonesia and does not occur in East Timor. It was 24 years ago when Indonesia invaded East Timor; it has been there for that time. Now, I understand, only 1,500 of its troops are left there.

Of course every Australian has been positively dismayed at the scenes that they have watched in the news on television. I have not had the opportunity tonight but I understand, having phoned home, that the pictures are still of people finding trashing of buildings and trashing of areas as the TNI pulls out. I understand that photographs have been found linking some members of the TNI with the militia. This has all been most unfortunate and most extraordinary. But, as the Prime Minister has said as recently as today in the parliament, governments of both political persuasions have made mistakes in their foreign policy in relation to East Timor and also to Indonesia.

I am reminded of just how important that vote for independence was: East Timorese being given, for the first time in their lives, the opportunity to vote and have some say in their future. I think there were very few people around who thought that this was all going to go smoothly. The fact that the ballot took place at all was nothing short of extraordinary. The opposition has chosen to attempt to score cheap political points on this but there is no way, as we have heard time and time again, that Indonesia would have allowed a peacekeeping force in to supervise that election. It was held with United Nations observers, including some of our own members of parliament. But what we have seen since, some people are saying, was predictable.

The Prime Minister, in speaking to this motion, said that there was no more serious decision that any government could take than to commit Australian military forces abroad. There was a great seriousness in the chamber as we all listened to what he had to say, but then I was quite genuinely dismayed to hear the Leader of the Opposition attempt to turn this into a political debate, because this was not a subject for one political party over the other. It was something for the Australian parliament and it was something for the Australian people. It was a very serious commitment to be committing young, well-trained men and women of the Australian armed forces to combat in another country—extremely serious. Yet even on that occasion we could not have a situation where the Leader of the Opposition would join in a bipartisan way with the Prime Minister of this country to discuss this motion.

I regret having to bring politics into this at all, because I think we are the most fortunate people, in the most fortunate country, in the world. But I remind those on the other side who wish to make this a political issue that it was the previous Prime Minister, Mr Keating, who signed the Timor Gap treaty with no parliamentary debate, no usual process. He was making foreign policy work in that area in what he considered was a relationship built on his special relationship with the leadership of Indonesia. And a previous Prime Minister, Mr Whitlam, while not endorsing Indonesia's invasion of East Timor 24 years ago, certainly understood it and publicly said so.

It is unfortunate that today, and during this week as we speak to this motion, these things have to be raised at all. I would like to think that Australian armed forces in East Timor could be sure in the knowledge that every member of the Australian public and the Australian government was behind them wishing them a safe and speedy return and that they were being prayed for every day. There would not be a mother in Australia who would not be concerned that her son might at some stage have to fight to serve his country. These are very serious times, and we do not know when they will finish. It has been very important that Australia act with the United Nations, that we act with the countries that are friendly in this region and that we be part of a multinational force.

Growing up after the Second World War, I remember discussions at that time that the United Nations was to be our great hope—the great hope for having nations around the world working together to ensure peace. The United Nations has taken part in 42 peacekeeping operations since 1948, and Australia has participated in 20 of them. They include operations in India and Pakistan from 1950 to 1985, a Federal Police presence in Cyprus from 1964 until the present, operations in Iran and Iraq from 1988 to 1990, in Cambodia from 1991 to 1993, in Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina from 1992 to the present, in Somalia from 1992 to 1995, in Rwanda from 1994 to 1995 and in Mozambique in 1994. All these efforts are reminders of what Australia has been doing as part of our United Nations obligations. But this is different. This is our troops in large numbers. This is Australia leading a force in our own part of the world.

The founders of the United Nations were determined that it would work to save succeeding generations from the ravages of war. Peacekeeping has perhaps been the most visible way in which the international community has tried to meet this objective, but there have been other ways, too. There has been increasing interest in the provision of electoral assistance, and Australia has been increasingly involved in this area—as we were in the ballot that took place on 30 August.

Like other members of this parliament, I have been influenced by what I have heard from my constituents. Working in my Adelaide office sometimes well past 8 o'clock at night, I know that people ring the number on instinct—probably not expecting it to be answered—because they have watched the news that night and have seen what has been occurring. It has always been beyond my comprehension how one human being could slice up, torture or put another to death. It is something I have not really been able to understand—unless one was protecting one's own family and one's own life. But that has not been the case. The East Timorese, like other oppressed peoples around the world, have suffered and are suffering.

But Australia is doing its best. To every man and woman in our armed forces who is there serving their country, doing what they are trained to do and representing all other Australians in East Timor, I wish a safe return. I trust that this matter will not be a long time in the settling, but I fear otherwise. I think there will be a high financial and personal cost to Australia being part of this peacekeeping force—or trying to install some kind of peace before it can be kept. I wish our troops well, I wish the East Timorese some peace in the future and, also in the future, I hope that, as we debate these issues, we will do so as a parliament and leave cheap political point scoring out of it.