Interview with Paul Murray, Sky News

Subjects: Kevin Rudd; withdrawal of Australian troops from Afghanistan; Afghan Locally

Engaged Employees visa grants.

PAUL MURRAY:

Peter Dutton is the Defence Minister. There's a lot to talk about after troops have now left

Afghanistan; about what we're going to do to take care of the people who helped our troops

while there in Afghanistan, but also a little bit of fun at Kevin Rudd's expense. That's how we

begin our chat, which happened moments ago.

PETER DUTTON:

We should demand an investigation Paul. I mean who on earth would have released this

letter, who leaked this letter between the head of Pfizer and Kevin Rudd. It's self serving,

and I just think Laura Tingle – who would have been biting at the bit to write a story praising

Kevin Rudd and bagging the Coalition – needs to demand this investigation herself.

I think you're right. It's a joke. I think it's sad, actually. I think Kevin Rudd, as a former Prime

Minister, should conduct himself with the same dignity, frankly, that Julia Gillard or Tony

Abbott is. They don't weigh into these debates on a daily basis, that don't seek gratification

and public adulation. It's sad when people move from the public spotlight that they crave it

day and night, why he feels a need to contribute to public debate when, you know,

Australians have moved on from it.

I just think, as I say, it's a poor reflection on him and his desire for inserting himself into

public debate…I just think it talks more about his own character and probably reinforces

what we all knew, and most of us had largely forgotten, but now reminded of. So, there you

go.

PAUL MURRAY:

Also, I think, that if nothing else, that yet again, underlines the fact that plenty of people on

the Labor side of politics, well clearly don't think Albo's up to the job, so they want to do

their bid. You know Palaszczuk wants to be the federal Opposition Leader, McGowan wants

to be the federal Opposition Leader, Kevin Rudd wants to be the federal Opposition Leader

because none of this stuff's going back through his office.

PETER DUTTON:

I think you're spot on there mate. I think most of these people in conversations, you know

with Tanya Plibersek and Paul Keating and the rest would be saying, you know this guy is

hopeless. I mean why isn't he making these points? I'll have to go out and do it myself. You

can hear Kevin Rudd saying that.

There's a lot of disquiet in the Labor Party about Anthony Albanese, as you point out and

there are people who believe that they should be ahead in the polls, that Albanese's

problem is, you know, not just in Queensland and WA, but in NSW, particularly in the

Central Coast, in those seats that Labor has to retain or win to win the next election.

So I think at the moment because there's so much talk around COVID, that that is masking

some of that internal disquiet within Labor, but clearly it's there. It's there when you speak

to Labor people in private and no doubt it's a conversation they're having between

themselves and Kevin Rudd and Tanya Plibersek and others would feel a need to go out to

cover up for his obvious deficiencies.

PAUL MURRAY:

All right, more important stuff. So Australia is out of Afghanistan. Last troops have left. Two

points here. Let's deal with the one that we've talked about a lot on this show, lots of other

shows people have seen on Sky News, which is the people who are the Afghanis who helped

us, they either helped us as the interpreters, or they helped us providing security to the

Embassy. What is the status of those people returning and presumably, with no more troops

there and an Embassy disappearing, the chances of being able to save those people, it

dwindles by the day. Can you give us an update on where that effort is?

PETER DUTTON:

Sure Paul. So a couple of points. I mean one is that we've been working day and night to

make sure that we can bring those people to Australia that have provided support to us, in

some cases saved Australian lives, but we also need to be mindful of it and my first priority

is and always will be the safety and security of Australians.

So I'm not going to fast track an application and bring somebody here that we might have

question marks over. I'm going to make sure that we can look at the background detail and

also, you know, somebody who helped us out in 2012, if you've got a Digger on your show

saying, well, look, we had an interpreter who helped us during an operation in 2012, absolutely

and on the face of that we would help that person without hesitation – but if that person, as the

intelligence might indicate, he has been working for the Taliban or has questionable, you know,

work history since that time, there's a lot of time and a lot of circumstance that's elapsed in Afghanistan

between 2012 and 2021; we might decide that that person is not of good character anymore, and there

is a doubt about whether we should bring them to Australia.

So over the course of the last eight years, we've issued about 1,480 visas. Just over the

course of the last few months, since April of this year, the numbers more like 300. So not

just the principal or the primary applicant under the Locally Engaged Employee program,

but their family members as well. In some cases they want to bring extended family

members, so grandparents or cousins etc – well the program doesn't extend to include

those, so they might withdraw their application on that basis. Some have decided to take up

an opportunity to go to Europe or to the United States under their similar programs, but we

are absolutely mindful of the obligation that we've got to provide support to those who

have supported us, but we aren't going to compromise the security arrangements and

checks that we've got in place. That's first and foremost because if somebody came here

who committed an atrocity, committed a terrorist attack, then Australians rightly, would be

asking, who approved that? And why did that person come to our country?

So I've got to look at all of the circumstances around each individual applicant, and we do

that with all of those objectives in mind, but the principal one has to be, must be, and

always will be, to make sure that we're keeping our country safe.

PAUL MURRAY:

Now, I'm proud of the work that our men and women did in Afghanistan. I certainly know

that you are too, but how do we make sure that the people who went and serve there don't

end up being defined by what happens next? That we make sure that we honour them, that

we recognise the sacrifices of the 41 lives that were lost over there, the good work that was

done in trying to hold that country together for as long as they did? Because my fear is that

all the usual elements of academia, the media and the left of politics will try to make this

Vietnam 2.0, and they probably already started that process.

PETER DUTTON:

I think you're right Paul; and we made a terrible mistake as a country in the way in which we

received back our veterans from Vietnam and many people have paid a cost for decades

because of that neglect and because of the shameful way that many of them were treated

on their return.

Our country will never make that mistake again and for those people who have served in

Iraq, in Afghanistan, in campaigns otherwise in the Middle East, that there are many

Australians, 39,000 of them who have been involved in these campaigns over the course of

the last couple of decades plus, up to this very day; they deserve our honour. They went to

serve in our country's name. Forty one of them died in the service of their country, and all of

them contributed to keeping us safe and secure over that period.

PAUL MURRAY:

He's a good man. The Defence Minister Peter Dutton. I am so glad that he is there on the

front lines for the defence of this country.

[ends]