Mr HOWARD (Prime Minister) (3:20 PM) —Just as there is a name of a world leader missing from the Labor Party's rhetoric in this debate—and the name is that of the courageous leader of the British Labour Party, Tony Blair—

Honourable members interjecting—

The SPEAKER —I remind the member for Wills and all other members on my left that I expect the same courtesy to be extended to the Prime Minister. The member for Werriwa is warned!

Mr HOWARD —so the name of another person is missing from the censure motion. This is not a motion censuring me. It is a censure of the New Zealand High Commissioner. I have in front of me the transcript of an interview this morning between Steve Price of radio station 2UE and the New Zealand High Commissioner. The compere, Steve Price, said to the New Zealand High Commissioner:

Kate Lackey said:

This is very interesting. By joining New Zealand the Leader of the Opposition has blown his argument out of the water, because New Zealand's position on this issue has been different from Australia's. New Zealand has not been in favour of predeployment. If he claims that this has blown the foreign minister out of the water because it is not talking about the Multinational Interception Force, he is saying, in effect, that New Zealand is part of the forward deployment. He cannot have it both ways. He cannot say that the Multinational Interception Force is part of the forward deployment in relation to a possible war against Iraq but then acknowledge that New Zealand is part of that effort, as verified by the High Commissioner. He cannot have it both ways. New Zealand has made it very clear that she will not be involved in forward deployment in advance of a United Nations decision.

I notice that the frontbench of the Labor Party nods in agreement. You cannot have it both ways. You cannot approve of the fact that New Zealand is not part of the forward deployment but then allege that something that New Zealand is part of is part of a forward deployment. That is fundamentally what has been argued by the Leader of the Opposition.

Let us return to the central charge that has been made throughout all of this. The Leader of the Opposition says that I have misled and deceived the Australian people, that I have not been open and honest with the Australian people, that I have given a private commitment to the President of the United States and, perhaps by extension, to the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom that, come what may, no matter what the circumstances are, Australia will be there alongside the United States in military action against Iraq. I want to say to the House very calmly and very deliberately that that is not the case. The truth is that we have forward deployed forces. We have taken a diplomatic stance, and we have backed that diplomatic stance to a much greater extent than other countries, with the exception of the United Kingdom. The truth is that Australia and the United Kingdom, more than any other countries, have been supporting diplomatic pressure being put on Iraq through the United Nations process. The forward deployment that we have made is part of that process and part of that pressure.

I do not apologise; I do not qualify, I do not seek to place conditions in any way on that central reality. It remains the case that a final decision to commit to military operations has yet to be taken. One of the reasons it has yet to be taken is that the process in the United Nations has yet to work its way through. Indeed, no final executive decision has been taken by the United States. I constantly hear from leaders of the United States that no final executive decision has been taken. Certainly the United States has congressional authority—their constitutional processes are different than ours. There is nothing strange, unprecedented or unusual in a country deploying forces in advance of a final decision being taken. That was the case in 1998.

Just as we do not hear Tony Blair talked about much in this debate, we do not hear very much from the Labor Party about the circumstances of 1998. The reason we do not hear much about them is that in 1998 the Labor Party was led by somebody who understood this country's international obligations. The Leader of the Labor Party at that time supported the forward deployment of 150 SAS and two 707 refuellers—a significantly greater contribution than Australia had made under Bob Hawke's leadership in 1991. He explained the reason he supported it then. He said that it would bring pressure on Saddam Hussein, it would re-energise the United Nations and it would particularly re-energise Russia and France—he singled out two permanent members of the Security Council of the United Nations as countries that would be energised at that time. He understood the realities of what we were doing. He also understood that those troops, as I said at the time, were being deployed in advance of a final decision.

Clearly—and I have never denied this—by making a predeployment, by taking the stance we have, we have been a lot more up-front in support of this process than any country other than the United Kingdom. I do not deny that, and I have never denied that to the Australian people. I have made it plain for months that we are part of contingency planning, both in relation to contact with the US military and also within the ADF. I made it very clear in my CEDA speech that we were involved in contingency planning. The Leader of the Opposition knows what that means: it means that you are getting troops ready in case they might be needed, it means that you are training them, it means that you are familiarising them with the circumstances in which they may be called into combat. That is the only right and decent thing to do. It is not about making a final political commitment.

There are many examples over past decades where troops have been forward deployed. Their use has been planned and then at the last minute, because of changed political and diplomatic circumstances, they have not been used. Thankfully, that happened in 1998. We sent our SAS to the Gulf in 1998 fully expecting them to be involved in dangerous search and rescue activity. We thought that was going to happen. We took that decision in the full knowledge that that could happen, believing that we had the legal authority to do so and knowing at the time that we had the bipartisan support of the Australian Labor Party. Thankfully, at that time they were not needed and they were brought home. But the circumstances were almost exactly analogous: no specific United Nations resolution and a forward deployment against the possibility that they might be needed. In the end they were not needed and they were brought home. That is what we are doing. We are getting ready, so that if we do decide in the end to commit those forces they will be able to play a very constructive role.

I would have thought that the Labor Party would have agreed with us, as they did in 1998, but they did not. But, even if they do not agree with us, as they did in 1998, surely they would agree with the concept, in the appropriate circumstances, of predeploying troops against the possibility that they will be needed, even if they do not agree with the circumstances on this occasion.

The Leader of the Opposition's constant charge is that I have privately given a promise to the President of the United States. That is not the case, and it is not demonstrated by anything on the public record. The fragile basis of what the Leader of the Opposition has alleged in this censure motion is destroyed by no other authoritative source than somebody who was there. I know the Leader of the Opposition has great powers of perception. I know he has understandings of the deep meaning of things that I say and members of the front bench say. I have to remind him of one thing: he was not there. But two people were there. There was my honourable friend from Mayo, the Minister for Foreign Affairs, and there was the New Zealand High Commissioner. Both of them together have said that they were talking about the Multinational Interception Force which, by courtesy of the member for Brand, we are reminded was there not for containment purposes but for enforcing of sanction purposes—in other words, under the 1991 resolution.

Yet, despite that evidence—despite the fact that he was the man who wasn't there—the Leader of the Opposition knows, of course, that we were really talking about the upcoming war against Iraq and that we were not talking about the Multinational Interception Force.

The SPEAKER —The Leader of the Opposition is under the same obligations that the Prime Minister was when the Leader of the Opposition was delivering his speech.

Mr HOWARD —The truth of this is that the Australian Labor Party is grasping for an argument to try to discredit a government that has had the courage to take a difficult decision in the long-term national interests of Australia. Let me say this to the Leader of the Opposition: if, as I know you are, you are furiously reading the opinion polls on this issue at the moment, I know what is driving you on this. He has had a pretty ordinary 12 months and he picks up the Australian newspaper with its Newspoll and he says, `You beaut; I'll grab hold of this.' There it is, on the face of it: all of these people are opposed to what the Prime Minister is doing.

I have always said that I have an enormous respect for public opinion. I have an enormous regard for the views of the Australian people and I am a very careful listener to what the Australian people say. I know that on this issue there are a lot of people raising questions and expressing concerns, which is very natural. All of us naturally recoil from the likelihood of any kind of military conflict. It is against our nature to want violence; it is against our nature to want war; it is against our nature to want military conflict. As I said to a reverend gentleman in this capital yesterday, nobody has a mortgage in Australia on a hatred of war. Every person who sits behind me hates war just as much as people who sit opposite me hate war.

War has visited evil, devastation and death on millions of people over the last 100 years. It is an evil thing. I would like to be able to walk away from this. I would love to be debating something else. I would like to walk away and forget about Iraq; forget about the weapons of mass destruction; and forget about the fearful possibility, as Tony Blair said, that those two things will come together with terrifying consequences for the world. I would like to do that, but unfortunately the world we live in does not permit us the luxury of being able to do that. History is replete—as the member for Brand, who is a student of military and political history, would know—with examples of the community of nations, out of fear for the short-term consequences of something, walking away from difficult decisions and difficult issues, only in the end to be required to confront those same issues and those same difficulties at an infinitely greater price and with infinitely greater consequences.

I am constrained by the office I hold to take those considerations into account. I cannot play fast and loose with the cheap jibe; I cannot play fast and loose, as the Leader of the Opposition has done. I cannot afford to respond to every last opinion poll on this. I have a responsibility. I believe that what I have done is right. I believe that what this government is doing is right. I believe that it is in the interests of the world to ensure that Saddam Hussein is disarmed. I believe it is overwhelmingly to be desired that that be done by the Security Council of the United Nations. I have ensured, by the actions I have taken, that I have put the men and women of the Australian Defence Force in the best position to do, in a professional and effective and safe way, what they may be asked to do if in the final analysis the Australian government commits military forces to conflict. I make no apology for anything I have done. I believe I have served the interests of Australia by what I have done over the past few months.