Military chiefs failed for almost 2½ years to provide formal updates to Defence Minister Richard Marles on the readiness of the army, air force and navy to be deployed on missions, an audit report revealed, sparking accusations of a bureaucratic culture intent on hiding bad news.
As Labor stonewalls the Trump administration’s demands to lift defence spending in response to China’s military build-up, fresh questions over the relationship between Marles and his department have emerged following a scathing auditor-general’s report into the Royal Australian Navy’s failure to properly maintain its biggest ships.
