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

It is well-known that Geelong has suffered greatly at the hands of this government in job losses through the failure of the Turnbull government to have a proper manufacturing policy. LAND 400 is the Army's $10 billion program to replace armoured vehicles. With it come a whole lot of job prospects, and those prospects have been cynically exploited by the Liberal Party in Geelong. On 12 February 2014 we had the former Liberal Geelong mayor promoting the prospect of jobs under LAND 400 under the heading 'Geelong's fight for $10 billion tank contract'. A year later we had the member for Corangamite, again on the front page, talking about Defence jobs as being 'in Sarah's sights'. Both these front pages represented fantastic exposure for those two individuals, but what do we actually see in terms of those jobs materialising?

What we have seen is this: LAND 400, under this government, has had first pass—which is the first step in the process—delayed by a year on what was originally proposed by the Labor Party. Tenders closed in August last year and tenderers were to be shortlisted earlier this month, but on 1 April, late on a Friday afternoon, the defence minister put out a media release saying that the request for tender process was being extended to a point that is likely to be after the election. Aside from the defence implications of that, what are the Liberals doing about LAND 400 jobs in Corio and Geelong?