Australia's cSoUmBmLeIrMcNiAaLl Messaging, page 1

Am getting closer, he is talking about setting up an elite division within his division to protect our shores. but is saying it is NOT A HOMELAND SECURITY department..
what is it going to be then Johnny.???
Little Johnny's Speech

QUOTE: Interviews
23 May 2003

TRANSCRIPT OF THE PRIME MINISTER
THE HON JOHN HOWARD MP
INTERVIEW WITH JOHN MILLER AND ROSS DAVIE,
RADIO 4BC, BRISBANE

Subject: welcome home of troops; homeland security; terrorism threat; US bases in Australia; Governor General; golden handshakes; medical indemnity insurance; tree clearing; Great Barrier Reef; medicinal trial of cannabis; terror threat; weapons of mass destruction; behaviour of Australian cricketers.

E&OE��

JOURNALIST:

Good morning Mr Howard.

JOURNALIST:

Good morning Prime Minister, welcome back to Brisbane again. Just before we get into some of the other issues I have to remark that I could you see that you were visibly very emotionally affected greeting the homecoming troops.

PRIME MINISTER:

Oh I was. I met about half of them in the Gulf a couple of weeks ago. They�ve done a fantastic job and I just so happy that all of them came back without a scratch, that was the most important thing. I know their families were anxious in a way that nobody else could be but I was just so pleased that they came home unscathed. They�ve done a great job and their spirit was terrific, they were sent in a just cause and they did their job very effectively and I�m just so happy they�re back.

JOURNALIST:

Particularly our SAS.

PRIME MINISTER:

Yes, the SAS of course are the most superbly trained, they�re the very tough end of a very tough professional ADF. But I wouldn�t play down the role of other people and I wouldn�t play down the role of those people who kept the helicopters and the planes superbly maintained because often these days you have more casualties through the malfunction of equipment than you do sometimes with shooting and everybody played a great part and I think this country can be immensely proud of what they went to do and the way in which they did it and they�ve certainly won the support of people all around the world.

JOURNALIST:

It�s a mammoth task isn�t it? I couldn�t believe that the helicopters come back in pieces and they�ll now rebuild them over the next couple of weeks.

PRIME MINISTER:

And it is, it�s an extraordinary exercise and I visited Hunter Aerospace, which is the company that maintains the Blackhawks and the Schinooks, and I told the 70 or 80 men there that they, by maintaining the helicopters in such great conditions, made a huge and absolutely incalculable contribution to saving the lives of our own forces.

JOURNALIST:

Now on that theme, continuing on the theme, the Australian newspaper today is carrying a story today that an elite security and counter-terrorism division, I�m quoting here, has been formed within the top ranks of the Howard Government as what they call a defacto homeland security office. Can you tell us something about that?

PRIME MINISTER:

Yes I can, it�s a bit of an overwrite or a beat-up or whatever you call it in your trade and I know nobody here is calling it those things. What�s happened is that for a long time in my Department there�s been an international division which has dealt with foreign affairs and defence and security and those things and we�re actually dividing it into two, we�re creating a special division of my division to deal with defence, security, intelligence and border protection and we�re going to put some extra resources into it. It is in no way a defacto homeland security department, we don�t need a homeland security department, our co-ordination arrangements in this area do work very well. We have a very good National Security Committee of Cabinet which meets on a very regular basis and through the whole of the Iraqi issue it met regularly, sometimes daily and it comprises myself, Foreign Minister, Defence Minister, Treasurer, Deputy Prime Minister, Attorney General and Minister for Immigration. And plus the five or six departmental heads, including the Director General of ASIO and the head of the Office of National Assessments. Now they are the people who are meeting on a regular basis provide a very good whole of government approach, this is just a reorganisation in my Department, it will certainly further bolster the co-ordination arrangements and provide even better streams of advice to me, but nobody should see it as a defacto homeland security department, we don�t need such an animal, if I can put it that way, in our government arrangements. I think our arrangements have worked better than any alternatives could have and I don�t see any need for a new department, it would just be more bureaucracy, unnecessarily�

reply posted on 9-10-2003 @ 05:13 AM by mulberryblueshimmer

aah gotta love HOward and his political bull#.

are we getting one or NOT getting one you babbling little tosser Johnny????

reply posted on 9-10-2003 @ 05:25 AM by Spica

I'm gonna go out on a limb here...or maybe not
welcome to Australia's homeland security office

reply posted on 9-10-2003 @ 05:30 AM by mulberryblueshimmer

Emergency Management???

jesus

this from the people who brought us the fridge magnets with the terrorist hotline number and a nice little message ( in english) " if you cant speak english dial this number for a translation"