Tuesday, 17 June 2014

War planes and drone strikes - senate estimates

Scott Ludlam of the Greens, has a summary of the senate estimates on the budget put out. There's links to the details of each case on the site, but these two issues caught my eye.

The F-35 war planes that don't work (or "do" work, depending if you're from the gov or not) have virtually an opened ended cheque that has no funds put aside and will be paid out of future revenue.

Last year US drones killed two Australian citizens in Yemen. The gov is obviously just a spokesperson for the Obama administration in this case. Pathetic. Simply because Abbott's in love with the US alliance, the gov thinks it's OK to ignore human rights violations as the US does.
Then there was the announcement we’re buying 58 F35 Joint Strike Fighters at a cost of $24 billion. I asked Australia's Chief Air Marshall how massive budget blow-outs, delays and performance fails issues had factored into the decision and was effectively told “Have you ever flown one? I have. You and the experts you quote are invalid”. We also confirmed that funding for these warplanes not been carefully set aside as we have been assured repeatedly by Abbott, and instead will have to be appropriated from future budgets. 

In November last year, the US killed two Australian citizens in drone attacks in Yemen. I asked does our Attorney General care about drone strikes on Australian citizens and what ASIO knew about US drone strikes on Australians. Here you’ll see our Attorney General George Brandis presents a great paradox: he’s a champion of classical freedoms for bigots and environmental destroyers, but not a fan of habeas corpus, international human rights laws, or the eternal dilemma of two citizens being executed without trial by the USA. more  

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