February 26, 2024
Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles has admitted there are "issues of culture" within the higher echelons of the Australian Defence Force and Defence Department that need to be challenged.
The Defence Minister has been under pressure over reports he has grown increasingly frustrated with his own department, to the point he hauled secretary Greg Moriarty and Chief of the Defence Force Angus Campbell in for a closed-door meeting late last year to demand change.
Speaking on Sunday, Mr Marles downplayed the conversation but said he "absolutely" expected excellence from his own department.
"I think what we need to see in terms of the leadership of the Australian Defence Force and the Department of Defence and I'm not just talking about the two leaders, but the broader leadership is that all that we do is done with excellence," he told Sky News.
"That advice is timely, that advice is accurate, that we are expecting of ourselves the same amount of excellence that we would expect of somebody who's in the infantry or somebody who is maintaining an aircraft, where there is excellence and complete competence." Opposition home affairs spokesman James Paterson said Mr Marles' comments appeared to be a "public vote of no-confidence in his own department and the military leadership of our defence forces".
"That's a deeply disturbing thing," Senator Paterson told Sky News. "If he does have confidence in them, he shouldn't publicly undermine them by saying that." Mr Marles said morale within the defence department had been hammered by the previous government, pointing to the rotating door of ministers in a short time period.
"When you have six, really seven, different defence ministers churning through the portfolio over the course of nine years, that has an impact on morale. And it has had an impact on morale," he said.
"Going forward, though, we need to address that culture."
