Pat Conroy (Charlton, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to briefly speak to the report. First off, I commend the chair on the excellent process that produced this report. This is the latest in a series of major project reports conducted by the DMO and the ANAO at the request of the JCPAA. The key table in this report that people should look at is table 5, which demonstrates that significant improvements have been made in the performance of major defence procurement in this country; but there is a stark contrast between projects approved before the Kinnaird and Mortimer reforms and projects approved post that time. It is in this context that I raise deep concerns about any move to reduce the independence of the DMO or attempts to reintegrate it into the Department of Defence, because I fear that we could return to an era where the average slippage in schedule was 87 per cent, which is what occurred in projects pre the Kinnaird reforms. That is the real lesson that came out of the major projects report.

A key recommendation of the report was around sustainment reporting, and I again commend the committee on the constructive way it approached this issue, trying to balance the very serious national security issues around the disclosure of information that may be of use to potential adversaries areas versus the right of the parliament and the people of Australia to know how their defence dollars are being spent and how that platform is performing. It is fair to say that the committee is still not fully satisfied with how Defence is reporting on sustainment, which is quite opaque in the portfolio budget statements. Hopefully, hard work between the Audit Office, the DMO and the committee can resolve this issue over the coming year.

Finally, I would like to touch on the performance of some individual projects that are in this report, particularly the patrol boats and the air warfare destroyer, which was also subject to a separate ANAO report. In that case, as is highlighted in the major projects report, there is a clear link between a decline in the boom and bust of the shipbuilding industry and the performance of that project. The audit report clearly states that we are paying the price for a run-down of work post the ANZAC projects. It also notes the ongoing problems with the patrol boats. In my firm view, this adds more evidence to the case that we need to bridge the shipbuilding 'valley of death', where we have 4,000 naval shipbuilding jobs at risk. We can get greater performance for the Defence department, for the Navy, by bringing work forward and at the same time save 4,000 jobs. I was deeply disappointed that the budget of a fortnight ago had no information and no certainties for those 4,000 workers and their families.

I commend this report to the House. I congratulate all participants in the hearing process, particularly the ANAO and the DMO. I echo the chair's thanks to the committee for delivering an excellent report.

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