Richard Marles (Corio, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Defence) Share this | Hansard source

I congratulate you, Mr Speaker, on your appointment to high office. I thank the member for Solomon for his question and acknowledge his service to the Australian Defence Force.

Submarines matter for an economy of our size. The potency of our defence force is going to be defined by the quality of our capabilities, and no asset that we can have will give rise to a greater question mark in any adversary's mind than a long-range-capable submarine. As we look forward, to the end of this decade and into the 2030s, increasingly that will become synonymous with a nuclear propelled submarine, which is why the Albanese government is completely committed to acquiring that capability. I can report that, in my meetings with the United States, there is an incredible shared sense of mission with them—and with the United Kingdom—in helping Australia to gain this capability. This is important, because to do this will be one of the great national projects in our history.

But that project has been made so much more difficult by the negative legacy left to us by the nine years of inept government of those opposite. In 2013, when the coalition came to power, the successor to the Collins submarine, our current capability, was due in the middle of the 2020s—this decade, in the next few years. To start with, they went off to Japan to try and have the submarines built there, and then they backed out. They then signed an agreement with France, and five years later they ripped that up. In the process, precious years were wasted, billions of dollars were spent on absolutely nothing and great offence was caused to two countries which are so important to our future. At every moment, the decision-making of those opposite was guided by their own politics. Indeed, the day on which we saw Australia's submarine capability tossed around their party room in the empty-chair challenge against Tony Abbott was perhaps the moment when a party of government in this country showed the greatest contempt for the Australian people. They spent nine years yelling at the world while doing absolutely nothing to advance our capability and our national interest. Well, this country is now under a new management. There is a serious group of people who are in charge, and we understand the challenge that we face. We know the difficult calls that are going to be made but what we can say is this: whatever we face, there is only one interest which is going to guide effort we make, the decisions we take, and that interest is the national interest, a national interest which is defined by the national security of the Australian people.

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