Liberal candidate for the NSW seat of Whitlam, Benjamin Britton has been disendorsed by the party just days after his controversial remarks about women’s participation in the Australian Defence Force last year resurfaced.
On Sunday, a party spokesperson released a statement to SBS News, revealing that the party had removed Britton “over views expressed which were not previously disclosed and are inconsistent with the party’s position,” the statement read.
Last July, Britton made a series of controversial comments on a right-wing podcast before his preselection, including a view that women should not serve in combat positions with the Australian Defence Force (ADF).
“Basically, long story short, if we’re to fix our defence force, unfortunately, they’re going to need to remove females from combat corps,” Britton told conservative journalist and podcaster Joel Jammal.
“Their hips are being destroyed because they can’t cope with the carrying of the heavy loads and the heavy impacts that’s required from doing combat-related jobs.”
“I knew some of the toughest men I’ve ever met in my life, absolute nails. War left them a shaking mess. Drug addicted. Can’t go outside the house because they have panic attacks … If war can do that to them and destroy them, why would you want to send your beautiful women? Your females – the ones that are the backbone of your society. Your society only exists because of women … Why would you want to sacrifice them in war, on the altar?”
The former United Australia Party candidate claimed the ADF “need to remove females from combat corps” in order to “fix” our military, pointing to the 2013 federal government decision to lift gender restrictions on frontline combat positions as an issue.
Currently, approximately 20 per cent of military personnel are women. The ADF has made efforts to increase recruitment in recent years. There is no evidence that standards have been lowered to increase the number of women taking on frontline roles.
Speaking on the subject of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Britton said women soldiers were killed because they “didn’t stand a a chance and “should never have been there in the first place.”
“You’re seeing all the bodies in there – braided hair … Can barely hold up a rifle, and they put them on the frontline to just be killed,” he said. “You’re throwing away one of the most precious things that you have in your society.”
Earlier this year, Britton was praised by Peter Dutton as an “outstanding candidate”, who was “working hard in his community… [and] drawing on his dedication as a veteran and his leadership in the defence industry.”
The opposition leader has so far not publicly commented on whether he agrees with Britton’s views on women in ADF combat roles.
Other controversial views Britton has expressed include blaming “diversity and equity quotes, Marxist ideology and woke ideologies” for weakening Australia’s defence.
Britton ran unsuccessfully for the United Australia party at the 2022 federal election. In December last year, he was preselected to run for the safe Labor seat of Whitlam, with the Opposition pitching him as a champion for small business and housing ownership.
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