Estimates Debate — Vote Defence Force

Every day in this Chamber as we look around the walls and at the plaques that are displayed there, we can feel and take pride in the courage and the achievements of the New Zealand Defence Force. It is therefore with enormous sorrow that I witnessed at the estimates hearing on defence the enormous damage that has been inflicted on the New Zealand Defence Force by this National Government—by actions contrary to promises made at the 2008 election. I remember the campaign, where the National Party was saying that it would strengthen the New Zealand Defence Force. It has done exactly the opposite. It has cut its funding, it has weakened it, it has demoralised it, and people have left in droves. That is a real shame.

What we have found—actually in one of the Minister of Defence’s answers to a written question, although he denied it—is that the real operating expenditure on New Zealand defence has been cut this year. The Government has cut the operating expenditure for defence. The army and the navy have had $100 million taken out. That is not chicken feed; it is $100 million from the army and the navy. There was a $63 million cut in salary payments. Do you know how it got the salary payment cuts? It got them by cutting the New Zealand Defence Force by 1,269 personnel since it became the Government. It never promised that at the 2008 election. It has cut the Defence Force and it has reduced the capacity of the Defence Force to act on our behalf. The Minister in the chair, the Minister of Defence, denied that last year, and he denied it again this year, but I have the actual transcript from the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee hearing. This is what the Chief of Defence Force said: “We’re accepting that that loss of people does degrade capability”. That is what Rhys Jones said. He has fronted up and admitted what the Minister would not—that the cuts have degraded the capability of the New Zealand Defence Force.

It is not even just across the board. Anyone who has served in the military here knows that the vital ranks in the military are at the NCO level. The first lieutenant always depends on the sergeant. It goes back a long time in history. It is the warrant officers. Do you know, Minister, that at the warrant officer level the attrition has increased fivefold since your party became the Government—fivefold attrition at a warrant officer level? It takes 15 years for somebody to get to that level and develop the skill and the experience they need. That is what this Government has done.

In 1 year the Government increased the attrition of the New Zealand Defence Force from 8 percent to 21 percent. Between one in four and one in five in that year alone left the New Zealand Defence Force—a level of attrition never seen before. To misquote Churchill, never in the history of the New Zealand Defence Force have so many people left in such a short period of time. That has damaged our Defence Force.

Forget the party politics; let us have a look at what the Auditor-General says about that, because she put out a report in the last year. She said that the Government has damaged the bonds of camaraderie, integrity, and commitment that are part of the New Zealand Defence Force—damaged those bonds. She said that the Government has chosen “a course that led to a drop in morale and an increase in attrition resulting in reduced capability.” The Chief of Defence Force says there is reduced capability, the Auditor-General says there is reduced capability, and the Minister says no, it has not affected what the Defence Force can do. Who do you believe? Do you believe the Chief of Defence Force or do you believe the Minister of Defence, who is making excuses for his Government’s own inadequacy?

The Auditor-General said that civilianisation had been a disaster. She said that, actually, people were treated in a way that was almost a calculated insult. Do you know that the people who were being made redundant got letters? Those letters—I will not take up time, but I have got them here, and I can table them if you want to read them—told people who were being dumped from the Defence Force to save money that they were being dumped because they lacked commitment, they did not have potential, and they were not as good as their peers. That is what it said in blunt terms. The Defence Force hung its head in shame and said: “Yes, we told good people they were bad.” So, Minister, you have made hundreds of people redundant, and you have told them through the Defence Force that it was their own fault because they lacked commitment and they lacked potential. Come down to the RSA and talk to some of the people who have served for 10 or 20 years who have been made redundant. Your Defence Force leadership, Minister, said that they were being made redundant because they lacked commitment. These are people who have given their lives to New Zealand, and that was the loyalty that was reciprocated to them.

I want to say that when you put the Defence Force under pressure, that puts lives at risk and well-being at risk. I want to draw on the court of inquiry report into the death of Corporal Douglas Hughes. Do you know what that court of inquiry report told us? You will know this only because I am telling you. The Government will not release the court of inquiry report. The Hughes family wants it released, but the Government will not release it. Do you know what it said? It said that it cut the pre-deployment training going into Afghanistan from 5 to 3 weeks. Outcomes were not achieved. The Defence Force rushed through things like stress management and stress identification. The report said that the commanding officer and the warrant officer were not confident that people were adequately trained, but they had no choice but to deploy them. It said that the deployment went on for 2 months longer than it should have and that people were exhausted at the end. It said that the forward operating base at Romero did not have enough defibrillators, so if there were mass casualties, they would not have been able to cope. And the Minister will not admit to those things.

Do you know what they did at the select committee? It was really interesting. They got poor Lieutenant Colonel Brett Wellington, who was the commanding officer of that crib, up to the table to try to rebut what I was saying. But I have got the transcript in my hand of what he said. Here it is. Lieutenant Colonel Wellington said: “I believe the pre-deployment training was reduced, and it did put pressure on us in respect to achieving the competencies that we would ordinarily achieve before deploying overseas.” I asked him whether he was misquoted in the court of inquiry report. He said no. We had Gerry Brownlee in this House speaking on behalf of the Minister, and he said I was wrong. Here is the commander of the crib at the select committee saying exactly what he thought. I asked him about the risk of the longer deployment and he said: “Yes. Me and my commanders had to manage that risk, and we did that in several ways.” I asked him whether the court of inquiry was right about the Romero operating base, and he said: “Absolutely. We would have been challenged if we had mass casualties.” Is that good enough, Minister? Is it good enough, when we put the lives of our people serving our country at risk in Afghanistan, that you cut corners and they cut corners? That court of inquiry said it, and that is why the Government continues to suppress it.

I want to go on to another aspect of another court of inquiry and the impact of low morale and high attrition, because that does create greater potential for mistakes, mishaps, and things not being done well. Private Michael Ross died in the lake near Waiōuru last year. The court of inquiry report in this case was released. It said it was not a freak accident. It was not even an accident caused by a couple of errors. It was an accident that was absolutely avoidable. It listed the things that the Defence Force was not doing well that led to his death. There were 12 different things, Minister, 12 different causes. You have a life jacket where the canister is empty and it does not inflate when you are carrying a minimi machine-gun, and it drags you to the bottom. The life jackets were not fit for purpose. They had never been trained in the use of the life jackets. The life jacket was not inflated properly, and that caused the accident. The safety boat was not alongside it, and when it turned up it had one person, not three people. There were 12 major errors. That is a sign, Minister, of a Defence Force that is dysfunctional. It is dysfunctional because of the pressure that this Government has put on it, and that is a disgrace.

I am really proud of the men and women who serve in our Defence Force, but they are not being treated well. Their loyalty to New Zealand is not being reciprocated by the Government’s loyalty to its men and women in uniform, and that simply is not good enough.

I want to finish on this point. It came out over the weekend that the defence operating manual said that someone was subversive if they brought the Government into disrepute. I guess I have just been subversive. Worse still, it said that journalists were subversive because they did that. How did the Minister of Defence respond? First of all, he would not front up, and when he did front up—and I heard him on Checkpoint—he wanted to know who had leaked the document. He did not express outrage that this document, which has been around for a number of years, had that clause in it; he wanted to know who leaked it.

I feel very lucky that I have come down to the Chamber and happen to be here, because that was a speech that needs knocking back. It was a speech that quoted many things out of context. It was a sad speech, actually, from a once-good Minister and a once-good member of Parliament who has, frankly, seen much better days. Frankly, it was a shabby—

💬 Hon Phil Goff: I am sorry to interrupt the Minister, but since he has questioned my integrity and what I quoted, I seek leave to table the entire transcript of the estimates hearing before the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee a couple of weeks ago.

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): Is there any objection to that course of action being taken? There is none.

Document, by leave, laid on the Table of the House.

💬 Hon Phil Goff: Secondly, I seek leave to table the document from the Auditor-General that makes the points about the drop in morale and increase in attrition, resulting in reduced capability.

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): Is there any objection to that course of action being taken? There is none.

Document, by leave, laid on the Table of the House.

It was a sad speech because that member continued to quote selectively from the select committee transcript, and he made many points that, actually, were refuted at the select committee itself.

💬 Hon Phil Goff: The Minister said I was correct. It’s in the transcript.

I think what this man is doing is continuing to undermine the morale of our troops.

💬 Hon Phil Goff: No, no, this Government has done that.

The fact that now he will not let me speak and he is determined to try to shout me down actually proves the point. Phil Goff is no longer a member who deals in facts, and that is very sad. What he said there was that the Government has cut funding in defence. That is actually incorrect. We had this debate at the select committee. It is absolutely true. If anyone goes away and reads it, they will find that Phil Goff was taking figures out of context and he was twisting them. In actual fact, there was not a cut.

When we talk about the numbers in the Defence Force, Phil Goff knows full well that there was a defence white paper in 2010 and that it looked at the priorities that the Government set for defence and it looked at the force configuration that is needed. The number of 8,500 people across the three services that we have full time is actually the number that is needed to act on the Government’s priorities, so for him to continue to make out that there have been deliberate cuts in numbers to save money is plain wrong.

The other thing that he continues to state is that there are issues around the training of troops in Afghanistan. He mentioned specifically Lieutenant Colonel Brett Wellington, who took the stand and said that our people were well trained in Afghanistan on that crib mission when he took command. It is a bit sad, really, that Phil Goff is out there trying to stir up trouble, exploiting the deaths of soldiers like Private Ross and Corporal Hughes to make political points, because he knows that many of the facts he is quoting—or so-called facts—are absolutely incorrect.

He was talking there about the Defence Force order that listed journalists alongside extremist groups and foreign intelligence services, but what he forgets to tell you is that for the whole time he was Minister of Defence that order was there, and that that order was signed by the Labour Government. So anything you hear from Phil Goff, you have to know that he is a sad, disillusioned member who, frankly, at his time of life and at his trajectory in his career should be leaving. What I will tell you here—

💬 Darien Fenton: Now he’s started being nasty. Here he comes, “Mr Nasty”.

Darien Fenton calls me “Mr Nasty”. Well, that is an interesting one. What I will tell you is, look, all defence forces internationally have faced challenges across the Western World. We have been operating within fixed baselines. We have a plan that has actually moved resources from the back of the office to the front line. We have been funding troops and we have been funding capabilities—just like Tony Ryall has been doing in health—and it has actually been incredibly successful.

What are we doing? We are bringing new capabilities to the front line: new helicopters, we are opening a new SAS training base—

💬 Hon Phil Goff: Oh, come on. Come on, I ordered and paid for those.

—we are funding the operation of those. Oh, it is all Phil Goff again. Here he goes. Phil Goff says he paid for them; it was not the taxpayer. These are the rantings of a sad has-been. He knows it has all gone. He knows he will never be a Minister again. It has all disappeared. But I think it is time that Phil Goff started to back our people, because there are two versions of the truth: there is Phil Goff’s version and there is what actually goes on at the front line with our defence people. If you talk to defence people, they will tell you that it has been a period of change but they are very focused on the future.

It is sad, really, because there was once a time when Labour took a bipartisan approach with National on defence and security matters, but now it seems that Labour members are so electorally desperate that they will grasp any opportunity to try to make political hay. I am especially disappointed in Phil Goff. When you see the Government Communications Security Bureau legislation, Phil Goff knows that that is legislation the Government actually needs to push through for the security of New Zealanders. He has been a Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade and he has been a defence Minister, yet he weakly sits back and chooses to play politics. He plays politics with everything.

If you look at the Corporal Hughes case that he quotes, which was a very sad case in Afghanistan and which is subject to a suppression order, Phil Goff tells Parliament that the Government has suppressed the court of inquiry. I would love to release in public the full text of that court of inquiry, but, as Phil Goff knows—

💬 Hon Phil Goff: Invite me to, and I will.

Well, I invite you to release it, but you will be breaking the suppression order, Phil. You will be breaking the law, and I very much hope that Phil Goff will be held answerable.

💬 Hon Phil Goff: I see, but you’d love to release it.

I would love to release it, because it would show what really went on. The problem with Phil Goff is that he continues to dance on the graves of our dead soldiers, and that is a disgrace.

💬 Hon Phil Goff: I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson. For the Minister of Defence to accuse me of dancing on the graves of dead soldiers, more particularly since I have lost a member of my family in Afghanistan, is disgraceful and despicable. I take offence. I ask you to ask him to withdraw that comment and apologise for making it.

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): Thank you, Phil Goff. I understand the situation, and I would ask the Minister to withdraw that comment.

I withdraw and apologise. But this is very much the point. Phil Goff can stand there calling me a liar and a person of low integrity. I am happy to accept that from him, because this is a robust parliamentary environment. But once you start telling the truth about Phil Goff, he gets very upset. He gets very, very upset; he cannot handle it. He talks about attrition in the Defence Force. I can tell you that attrition in the Defence Force is lower than it was at its peak under Labour, when Phil Goff was defence Minister. Morale in the Defence Force is higher than it was at its worst when Phil Goff was defence Minister.

I would be very happy to work with Phil Goff, because Phil Goff is actually not a bad guy. You saw him up in Honiara last week. We had a good discussion. To be honest, we have robust debates in here, but I just wish he would be a bit more bipartisan. I wish he would back our people in Afghanistan. I wish he would not be totally trying to undermine people all the time, and undermining the Defence Force. Frankly, in the end it does not reflect well on Phil Goff. We know—and Phil Goff secretly will agree—that both of our parties want what is best for the Defence Force. We know that our people do an excellent job. I wish our Labour colleagues would actually get behind our people in the Defence Force, because personnel tell me that they are sick of hearing of Phil Goff’s rubbish.

It has been a time of change in the Defence Force, but the Defence Force is going forward. It does not need politicians constantly trying to undermine the very good work our people have done in the Solomon Islands, in East Timor, in Afghanistan, in the Sinai, in Korea, in South Sudan. We need the Labour Party to actually back the National Government in defence policy and to take a constructive approach looking forward. So, Phil Goff, my message to you is do not distort the facts and do not quote selectively from that select committee report. Just tell us what your Government would do differently, because I know that, actually, your Government would not respond to these challenges any differently. The fact is that morale now is a lot higher in the Royal New Zealand Air Force than when you cut the Skyhawks and the Strike Wing back in 2000.

💬 Hon Phil Goff: Remember you promised to bring them back. Have you?

I have never made any such promise.

I can tell you that we have an excellent Defence Force. We have great people. The Labour Opposition needs to shut up and listen during these debates, and get up and make some positive contributions when we are talking about defence, because we have got very good people there. The future is good for defence. The Government totally backs the New Zealand Defence Force. The feedback I am getting is that our people in defence are looking to the future and looking to make a very strong, worthwhile contribution to New Zealand’s future.

Vote agreed to.

Vote State Services agreed to.

Vote Foreign Affairs and Trade agreed to.

Vote Official Development Assistance agreed to.

Vote Sport and Recreation agreed to.

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