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Well thank you very much Air Marshal Titheridge, to Air Marshal McCormack,
to Mrs Bronwyn Bishop the Minister for Defence Industry, Science and
Personnel, to Warren Entsch the Federal Member for Leichhardt, other
distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen.
I would particularly like to express my gratitude for the very kind
and warm remarks of Thelma Coconut. I was impressed by the depth of
the feeling expressed and the generosity and the spirit of the welcome
extended to me when I arrived on the tarmac and also here this morning.
She commands our respect and our gratitude and her recollection that
what led the owners of Peppan to agree that the base be built here
was the story of how scared of the planes overhead the elders who
were then growing up on the mission were reminds all of us of the
important sacrifices of Australians of all origins that have been
made in the years that have gone by. We are grateful for those sacrifices
of whoever made them and in whatever form for the defence and the
protection of our nation. And I certainly share firmly your hope that
the base will not need to be used in war.
Can I say how delighted I am to share this occasion with you. It is
always for me a particular pleasure to share a special occasion with
the men and women of the Australian Defence Force. I want on behalf
of the Government to express our unending gratitude for the tremendous
work that you do in maintaining the defence preparedness of Australia.
It is not always an easy life, it is not always a life that sits happily
and comfortably with the needs and demands of family responsibilities.
And in thanking the men and women of the defence forces I also thank
the wives and husbands and children of the joint sacrifice they make
as part of service life. All of us were, I am sure, moved and filled
with tremendous pride for the work that was done by the ADF contingent
in Papua New Guinea over the last couple of weeks following the terrible
tidal wave disaster. And those images of those men and women at work
relieving the suffering of humanity in a close neighbour and amongst
friends of Australia who have rendered great assistance to Australian
diggers in the past was a reminder to all of us of the diverse role
and the diverse skills and the great capability of the personnel of
the Australian Defence Force.
This base is very aptly named. Air Chief Marshal Sir Frederick Scherger
was, of course, one of Australia's finest airmen and military
officers. And he was one of the earliest advocates for a chain of
airfields to protect Australians more than air and sea approaches.
And no Australian can possibly be unmindful of the vastness of our
nation and the need, particularly in the north of Australia, to have
a chain of defence and of strategic installations which give some
degree of security and some degree of reassurance. And it's a
timely reminder for those Australians who have lived most of their
lives in the heavily populated areas of Melbourne and Sydney and the
south east corner of Australia. It's a very timely reminder to
come to a place like Weipa and to be reminded of the shared inheritance
we have with the indigenous people but also to be reminded of the
exposure of this country and the need for us always to remain and
retain a sense of vigilance.
When we came to Government in 1996 the Coalition said that we would
quarantine the Australian Defence Forces from any of the budget cuts
that we then believed necessary to put Australia back in the black
and I am very pleased to say that that commitment has been honoured
in full. I remain personally very committed to maintaining the provision
of all the resources that are feasible and practicable consistent
with our other obligations to the Australian Defence Forces. Our Defence
Efficiency Review is restructuring defence to eliminate waste and
duplication. We have achieved a one-off saving of $500 million and
annual savings of $1 billion which will go to the front-end helping
improve operational readiness.
Australian defence, of course, is not just about building barriers
and strong defences, it is also about a contribution to regional stability
and not just in the immediate deployment sense but also in the sense
of the contacts that exist between the Australian Defence Forces and
the defence personnel of our neighbouring countries. Nobody can overestimate
the importance, for example, of the links between the Australian Defence
Forces and the Defence Forces of Indonesia, our nearest neighbour.
And the network of those links that have been built up over the years
were very important to us a few months ago and they remain important.
And the confidence that is reposed by the Defence Forces of those
countries and the personnel that comprise the leadership of our Defence
Forces remains extremely important.
The Defence of Australia, of course, goes beyond our coastline. As
Ian McLachlan has said, our aim must be a secure country in a secure
region. Australia's geography means that we must focus on operations
to defend our maritime approaches before potential enemies reach our
shores. We therefore need to have an effective capability for control
and surveillance of the sea-air gap and for interdiction within it.
And Scherger will certainly help support that capacity. The Government's
strategic review in 1997 supported the development of an airfield
infrastructure in Northern Australia capable of operating modern aircraft.
And Scherger, as you all know, is one of six bases across the north
of Australia. Three of them are the active bases at Darwin, Tindal
and Townsville. Scherger is the third of the so-called bear bases
including Learmonth and Curtin which are capable of being activated
at short notice. And I had in the moments before coming here an opportunity
of seeing in action the capacity of the defence personnel to provide
that activation. This exercise, Northern Awakening, taking place around
us today, underlies that preparedness. This base's capabilities
will be further tested during a major exercise, Exercise Crocodile,
which replaces the Kangaroo series due to take place next year.
Today marks not only the start of operational activity but also an
end to construction and the construction route was begun in March
of 1993. The $137 million project is now complete, on time and under
budget. And I congratulate the 17 Construction Squadron. I congratulate
John Holland and Hansen Yuncken. And I would also like to congratulate
the Napranum Aboriginal Corporation who completed a major contract
for the base also on time and within budget. The contract involved
the manufacture of 120,000 specialised concrete blocks for the construction
of blast walls around the aircraft dispersal area. And this is one
of the largest contracts ever awarded to an Aboriginal community business
enterprise and it is a source of great satisfaction to all of us that
along with the other components of the construction of the base, it
also was completed under budget and on time. And it's a very
good illustration of the practical outcomes that can be achieved through
cooperation with different sections of our community. The contractors
can be justifiably proud of their achievements and the partnership
with the local people that is developed. And the Department of Defence
is a wonderful example to the rest of the community. The rights and
the interests of the local people have been respected in the street
names and in the cooperation. And, indeed, there has also been a very
deep respect for the natural heritage aspects of surrounds. I was
reminded as I drove around the base of the need for environmentally
friendly approaches even during military exercises. And every effort
has been made to ensure that the importance of the environment is
at all times respected and understood.
Ladies and gentlemen, this opening today is an opportunity to reaffirm
a number of things. It's an opportunity for the Government to
say thank you to the men and women of the Australian Defence Forces.
It's an opportunity for me on behalf of the Government and the
people of Australia to record our gratitude and our respect to those
men and women for the great service that they render to our country.
It's an opportunity to salute the sense of cooperation and partnership
that exists between the Royal Australian Air Force and the local indigenous
people. To thank the Peppan people. To thank particularly Thelma Coconut
as their representative who greeted us here today, for the spirit
of good will and commitment to our common land Australia which has
characterised their approach to the construction of this base.
The opening of this base completes a very, very important element
of an urban defence structure. And I know it is, to all those Australians
committed to and interested in the defence of Australia, a very important
day. It's a proud day for the Royal Australian Air Force. A group
of men and women that have served this country over long years and
have made a tremendous contribution to preserving and defending the
cause of liberty and the cause of democracy in many theatres of war
around the world. I thank them. I wish all who come to and operate
out of this base the very best of good fortune. It is the united prayer
of all of us that this base will never need to be used in wartime.
But as history has taught us, that united prayer can only be delivered
if we are willing to commit ourselves to a level of defence preparedness.
And if we are ready to, and have the capacity to, deploy military
capability and to deploy defence capacity in order to deter those
who might deny us the realisation of that joint prayer.
I therefore have tremendous pleasure in declaring open RAAF Base Scherger.
It honours a great Australian, a great airman, and a great person
who gave his life to his profession and gave his life to the defence
of his country.
Thank you.
[ENDS]