Peter Dutton confirms women would serve in the Australian Defence Force in a Coalition Government after a controversy over a Liberal candidate in the seat of Whitlam.
Benjamin Britton is now running as an independent after being disendorsed on Sunday following the resurfacing of comments he made in a podcast when he argued the ADF needed to “remove females from combat corps” in order to “fix our defence force”.
Mr Dutton says women would continue to serve in the ADF under his watch.
“You saw my record as defence minister in relation to women serving in any role, and they wanted to serve in an Australian Defense Force, and that would be the position under any government that I led,” he says.
“The Prime Minister says we live in the most precarious period since 1945 and then takes $80m out of defence.
I want to make sure that we can invest into defence, because we do live in an uncertain spot, and we do need the leader of our country who can make decisions to keep our country safe.”
Mr Dutton is asked about his shadow defence minister, who served in the elite Special Air Service (SAS) for five years, and who expressed a view in 2018 that female soldiers should not be allowed to fight on the frontline.
“Andrew Hastie’s view is the same as mine, and that’s the position … and I can assure you that government that I lead will have very strong defence force.”