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

Firstly, can I welcome the Right Honourable Grant Shapps, the UK Defence Secretary. It is a pleasure to have him here during question time. I can say that I've spoken with the opposition and collectively we've agreed that over the course of the next hour our behaviour will represent the high watermark of Australia's democracy!

This morning Secretary Shapps and I signed the defence and security cooperation agreement between Australia and the United Kingdom, which is a status of forces agreement between our two countries. It contains a commitment to consult with each other when there are contingencies which engage our national security and our sovereignty. It is a historic agreement.

Britain is our oldest relationship and our oldest friend. We have long had deep people-to-people ties. We have long had a deep cultural relationship. So it is somewhat of a surprise that it is only now that we are signing a status of forces agreement. Yet it reflects the fact that over the last couple of years we have seen emerge a strategic and security dimension to this relationship. Britain is increasing its presence in the Indo-Pacific, and today there are Australian service men and women in the UK training Ukrainian armed forces. Our two defence forces are working ever closely together, so this agreement is both practical and timely.

This afternoon the two of us will join foreign minister Senator Penny Wong and Foreign Secretary David Cameron to participate in the annual 2+2 AUKMIN dialogue between our two countries.

This will be happening in Adelaide, which will afford us all an opportunity to visit the Osborne naval shipyard, where under the banner of AUKUS, which is very much at the heart of our relationship, Australia will be establishing a production line to build our future nuclear-powered submarines with the assistance of the United Kingdom and the United States. The submarines that we produce there, that class of submarines, will be jointly operated by Australia and the UK. There is no greater statement than this of the significance of the security dimension of the Australia-UK relationship.

Can I say to Grant I am deeply grateful for our personal friendship. That, along with the friendship of so many Aussies and Brits, is emblematic of the bilateral relationship which exists between our two countries. We look forward, in a difficult world, to walking into the future side by side making our contribution to global peace and security.

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