For more than a year now the Herald has repeatedly urged the federal Labor government to do more but, regrettably, action has been minimal. Compared to other major nations, our support is minuscule. The only wealthy non-NATO members contributing less than Australia are New Zealand and Taiwan. Japan, South Korea, Switzerland, Austria, Ireland, Cyprus and Malta have all contributed more as a percentage of GDP.

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It’s not as though we lacked opportunities to help. After rejecting repeated pleas to send a batch of Hawkei protected mobility vehicles last year, the Australian government recently declined a Ukrainian request to gain access to the army’s retired fleet of Taipan MRH-90 helicopters. Ukraine has also yet to receive a response to its request for a shipment of Australian coal to help with its energy needs.

Australia’s poor track record has the potential to shift this week when Defence Minister Richard Marles becomes the first government minister to visit Ukraine since Prime Minister Anthony Albanese travelled to Kyiv in July 2022.

He may well have a package of assistance to announce. If so, it had better meet the moment. As Rob Harris, the Herald’s Europe correspondent, recently summarised following a trip to Kyiv: “It is in everyone’s interest for Australia to put aside small and miserly spats over department budgets and look up over the horizon. This isn’t a quarrel in a land far away, it’s a battle at the heart of everything we value.”