Why Blunt Minister Questions Are Missing From Official Transcript

Australian journalist Latika Bourke has taken aim at the Albanese government after pointed questions she put to Defence Minister Richard Marles were omitted from an official transcript and instead marked as “inaudible”.

The exchange occurred at a London press conference earlier this month, where Marles was pressed over his assertion that Australia spends 2.8 per cent of GDP on defence — a figure he says places the country ahead of most NATO nations.

Bourke, an Australia-born journalist based in the UK, attended the briefing and said in a newsletter published on Friday that the transcript did not include the questions she asked from roughly a metre away from the minister.

“At Defence Minister Richard Marles’ last press conference in London, I asked him about his intentions — or not — to raise defence spending,” she wrote.

“But the official transcript issued by his office and posted on the department’s website rendered nearly all my questions ‘inaudible’.

“Given I was standing about a metre from the minister, it’s unfortunate that the official transcribers were unable to hear my questions.”

A review of the document by the Daily Mail on Saturday afternoon found that several questions understood to have come from Bourke had been recorded simply as “inaudible”.

Although she raised doubts about the missing questions, Bourke acknowledged that the diplomatic service had made what she described as a “mystifying” choice to stage the media event amid a “windstorm”.

Ms Bourke said she was giving Marles’ office the ‘benefit of the doubt’. However, Strategic Analysis Australia director Michael Shoebridge noted it was a ‘striking coincidence’.

‘Claiming inconvenient questions are ‘inaudible’ can be a way of censoring information while being able to claim it’s just a technical issue,’ he told the Daily Mail. 

‘If that’s what’s going on, it is covert censorship, and that’s damaging in a democracy. 

‘It’s a striking coincidence that the journalist’s questions drilling into Marles’ creative accounting on defence spending seem to be the ones listed as “inaudible” in the transcript. 

‘I’ve often found I have trouble hearing inconvenient questions, but it’s sad to see it happening to a minister and their staff.’

Mr Shoebridge also echoed Ms Bourke, saying the claim that Australia spends 2.8 per cent of GDP on defence is still short of the NATO benchmark of five per cent (which is made up of 3.5 per cent on core defence items and a further 1.5 per cent on related items, such as infrastructure capable of handling military systems). 

‘Marles’ media performances create the impression that he has been open and clear about defence spending and his claimed increases,’ Mr Shoebridge said.

He claimed, by his analysis, the figure is ‘just over two per cent of GDP and will slowly move to about 2.3 per cent in 10 years’. 

‘Australia’s spending is not matching Marles’ words about the increasingly dangerous world we are living in,’ Mr Shoebridge said.

‘The lack of openness and clarity from the government on defence spending is helpful to ministers because it means key partners – like the Trump Administration – don’t understand what Australia is actually committing to. 

‘Clarity might result in political pressure on the government to make actual increases towards the NATO five per cent benchmark.’

The Daily Mail has contacted Marles’ office for comment on the claims made by both Ms Bourke and Mr Shoebridge. 

Ms Bourke included her questions – and Mr Marles’ answers – in her newsletter.

She said she was sharing them ‘in the interests of posterity and the ongoing debate about whether governments are funding their militaries adequately, given the increasing security threats’.

According to Ms Bourke’s transcript, she repeatedly asked Mr Marles when Australia would raise defence spending to five per cent of GDP – the NATO standard – as well as the NATO target of 3.5 per cent by 2035.

Marles’ first comments, which were transcribed by the defence department, criticised Ms Bourke’s coverage in The Nightly.

Ms Bourke had written that Australia would only reach a NATO spending target of three per cent in 2033 and 2034, and the figure had not been raised ‘in any meaningful way’.

‘I saw what you’ve written in your commentary. I mean, it is wrong, actually wrong,’ Marles said.

‘We increased defence spending in terms of capability by $40billion over the forward estimates by $53billion over the decade in the National Defence Strategy this year alone over the decade.

‘That is a $53billion injection, and that’s in terms of capability, not the other stuff that you’re talking about, is the single biggest injection in terms of Australian defence spending in decades, more than anything that occurred during the Coalition period.’

Marles said Australia is ‘injecting $117 billion more over the planning ten-year period’, adding that it ‘represents the biggest increase in defence spending in peacetime Australian history’.

When Bourke asked if Marles would release what is calculated in all defence spending, he said the government had already done so. 

‘We do, we release all of that information,’ he said.

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