Condolence Motion - Mr Thomas Page Pritchard

I wear the poppy pin in respect, remembrance and, indeed, awe. Today we gather again to pay tribute to Thomas Page Pritchard. We should respect him, we do remember him, and we are in awe of him. I look across the chamber and see the member for Spence, and I honour his service, too, as a private with the Army Reserve. I acknowledge all members in the federal parliament who have served our great nation and who have worn a uniform, because they are the best of the best and they are the bravest of the brave.

The one we pay special tribute to today, Thomas Page Pritchard, was a Rat of Tobruk. Indeed, he was the last of the Rats of Tobruk. During the North African campaign in World War II, Nazi propaganda radio broadcasts spoke—supposedly contemptuously—of the Tobruk defenders, labelling them as rats. In true Aussie Army fashion, they took that as a badge of honour. In defiance, the soldiers proudly adopted the nickname. In fact, during the siege they designed their own medals in the shape of a rat, made from the scrap metal of a downed German aeroplane. You've got to love Australians. You've got to love our soldiers. You've got to love those in the Australian defence forces.

I noted with interest last week that, when the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition began their tributes, the parliamentary speeches in relation to our fallen hero, neither of them mentioned in their very eloquent remarks Thomas Page Pritchard’s age. There’s probably a good reason for that—no-one’s quite sure whether he was 102 or 103. Let’s go with 103. It was said that he was born in Portland, Victoria, on 25 May 1921. But he was a man who lied about his age—he said it was 1919—so that he could serve. He lied about his age so that he could line up with his friends, his comrades, to serve our nation.

These days, some men lie about their gender so they can compete in women’s sport. This was the finest generation of men, of brave souls, who went to serve their nation in times of peril—enormous peril. None of them knew if they were ever going to return home and to the loving arms of family and friends, yet many of them went to war and laid down their lives for their friends and for their nation.

Just the other day I attended a war remembrance service in Wagga Wagga — Home of the Soldier, Kapooka's Blamey Barracks. A veteran, a digger, came up to me, and he said, ‘This was the greatest generation.’ He was referring to those from World War II who are still living and those who, sadly, have gone to their eternal rest, and he was right, because they were the greatest generation.

The Siege of Tobruk in 1941—what a campaign! Australians fought in land and air campaigns in Egypt and Libya in North Africa. They were up against forces led by German field marshal Erwin Rommel. They had great respect for Rommel and his Afrika Korps. It was a vital campaign in World War II. The defenders at Tobruk—our men, our heroes—had to adjust to life in stifling heat. Some of them were quite used to it, given the fact that they’d been in Australian summers, but this was a heat that was intense.

They were under constant artillery and air bombardment. Supplies of food and water were limited. The troops were plagued by flies, fleas and illness, and many of them—those who knew their history—would’ve been well aware of a campaign a little further south, the Second Boer War of 1899 to 1902, where more men died of disease than bullets. But spirits remained high, as they always do, because that’s Australian soldiers. That is the spirit of the khaki, which stretches from the Boer War and Gallipoli right through the world wars, Vietnam, Malaya, Korea, Afghanistan and all the other campaigns.

We train the best of the best in my hometown, and we're very proud of that. We’re very proud of being a garrison town, and Tom Pritchard’s loss has been felt keenly at Kapooka, because they know and understand that he was an iconic figure. Because of his death, a link in that heritage had been severed.

Mr Pritchard was also well aware of the responsibility that he had shouldered, probably unwantedly, as the lone known surviving Australian Rat. In 2020, his dying mate and fellow Tobruk veteran, Alf Jackson, who was 101, asked him to carry the torch for those who had passed on. Alf knew that he wasn't long for this world, and he said, ‘Can you do that for me, cobber?’ and Mr Prichard said that he would try.

Those who knew him described him as a quiet and thoughtful man. Like many World War II veterans, he didn’t like to talk of battles past, battles won and sufferings endured, but he and his mates helped win the war against the Germans and the Axis powers. He and his mates are responsible for the fact that we now can live free and that we now have a democracy that we should be proud of and should at all times uphold.

We live in very troubled times. We’ve got Ukraine, we've got the situation in the Middle East, and many Australians would perhaps not be so keen to don a uniform and defend our country. But it's the ideals that Mr Pritchard had in spades that we should try to live up to at all times. We should remember him and all others—the 103,000 names on the Australian War Memorial Roll of Honour, just down the road. We should remember them not just on 25 April, Anzac Day, and not just on 11 November, Remembrance Day and Armistice Day, but every day because we owe so much to them. We should always remember. Thank you, Mr Pritchard. Lest We Forget.