Sunday, July 08, 2007

Diggers won't be asked to die for petrol: Costello

Posted 2 hours 36 minutes ago
Updated 2 hours 1 minute ago

Oil controversy: Australian soldiers in Iraq (ADF )

Federal Treasurer Peter Costello says Australian soldiers "don't risk their lives for petrol prices."

Mr Costello was speaking on ABC TV's Insiders program this morning, and again denied that oil is a consideration for Australia's military involvement in Iraq.

The debate was reignited this week after Defence Minister Brendan Nelson said securing oil supplies was one of the reasons Australia needs to stay in Iraq.

Mr Costello and Prime Minister John Howard rejected the comments and Dr Nelson has also since moved to play them down.

This morning Mr Costello said Australian soldiers were in Iraq to protect democracy.

"I heard the suggestion earlier this morning by somebody from Labor that if we adjusted our Iraq policy it might affect the price at the petrol pump," he said.

"Well we're all interested in the price at the petrol pump. But Australian soldiers don't risk their lives for petrol prices."

Mr Costello also signalled an audit of all land that might be available for release to alleviate rising problems with housing affordability.

Labor has accused the Government of passing the buck on the issue by blaming the states and territories for not releasing enough land for residential development.

Mr Costello said the audit would include Commonwealth land that might be available for housing development.

"We will ask the states to look at any land that they have that could be released for housing," he said.

"Of course a lot of this will also be held by private sector developers and the like. We will try and identify if there's any reason why those developers are not releasing it."

Tags: business-economics-and-finance, industry, housing, oil-and-gas, defence-and-national-security, defence-forces, government-and-politics, federal-government, unrest-conflict-and-war, australia