28th Nov 2018 – Senate Motions - Veterans - Rifle Company Butterworth (RCB)

The majority voted against a motion introduced by Independent Senator Fraser Anning, which means it failed.

Motion text

That the Senate—

[...]

(b) notes with concern that, for decades, the 9000 Australian Defence Force members who served in Malaysia during the counter-insurgency war in that country, as part of Rifle Company Butterworth (RCB), have been denied their rightful entitlements due to the government refusing to recognise their service as warlike;

(c) notes that this refusal was based upon a wartime propaganda deception, as shown by an Australian Defence Committee secret minute of 11 January 1973, which stated that this warlike deployment could be publicly portrayed as being for training purposes;

(d) condemns the refusal of successive Australian governments to admit the truth regarding this deployment, and to pay RCB members their just entitlements; and

(e) calls on the Federal Government not to wait until all RCB veterans have died to recognise their sacrifice on behalf of Australia, and to immediately recognise their service as warlike without further obfuscation.