Richard Marles (Corio, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Immigration and Border Protection) Share this | Hansard source

We welcome the fact that the government has come to see the importance of a sovereign capability when it comes to the defence industry in this country. It would appear now to be something of a bipartisan view. It's taken time for the coalition to reach this point, but we will take them as they arrive. But it's important that this commitment on the part of the government to a defence industry in this country to support our nation's sovereign capability is something that is pursued in a way that is more than skin deep. Unfortunately, as we see in the way in which this is being handled at the moment, too much of the way in which the government is dealing with this, and has dealt with it since 2013, has actually had a negative impact in relation to jobs in the defence industry in this country.

At the time that Labor left power in 2013, our maritime shipbuilding industry, in respect of Navy, was employing 4,000 people in this country. But we faced the prospect of the valley of death, which is not something that couldn't be foreseen. In essence, the air warfare destroyers and the LHDs were coming to a conclusion before the offshore patrol vessels and the future frigates would start the commencement of their work. Needing to find a way through the valley of death was something that was very much in the minds of those making policy on the Labor side of the equation. I note the presence in this chamber of the member for Eden-Monaro, who was around at that time, who worked tirelessly to conceive of a way in which we could work through the valley of death.

Part of that was to have the building of the supply ship done in Australia, as well as bringing forward the construction of the offshore patrol vessels. What we saw was the supply ships being handed off to Spain, which is where they're now being constructed, and we still await a decision being made by this government on the preferred tenderer in respect of the offshore patrol vessels. That has seen the loss of somewhere between 1,500 and 2,000 jobs in the shipbuilding industry in this country. Measured in terms of those employed in the defence industry, there is absolutely no doubt that we have watched it go backwards since this government came to power. In my electorate of Corio I have companies such as Chemring, Marand and Winchester—all important contributors to the defence industry. A vibrant defence industry in this country is critical for those businesses to continue their work and for people in my electorate to continue to be employed.

Far too often what we've seen on the part of the government is a greater interest in closing free trade agreements, for example, than in the defence industry. We saw the supply ships being bartered around in an attempt to close the Korean free trade agreement. We saw the submarines being put on the table in an attempt to close the free trade agreement with Japan. That had a lot to do with free trade agreement policy but not a lot to do with the defence industry policy for this country. Again we see that the commitment to defence industry is skin deep and highly political. A well thought through policy is not what we've seen from this government. We had perhaps the worst and most egregious example of that at the beginning of 2015, when Senator Sean Edwards from the other place made his support for the then Prime Minister, Tony Abbott, in a Liberal Party leadership dispute contingent upon a particular outcome of the defence industry policy in relation to submarines in Adelaide. That treated our nation's defence industry, our nation's Defence Force and the Australian public with utter contempt. The former defence minister was out there arguing that ASC was unable to build a canoe. Nothing said more about this government's contempt for the prospects and skills of the Australian workforce in relation to defence industry than that.

We've seen it happen in the last few days as well. At a hearing on Friday, a Senate committee saw an Australian government tender document in respect of our future frigates that said the Commonwealth is not mandating that the successful tenderer use the workforce of ASC Shipbuilding in the building of the future frigates. Again this government is abandoning Australian workers when it comes to working in Australia's defence industry. Frankly, it needs to do better. (Time expired)

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