James Stevens (Sturt, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It's my pleasure to report to the chamber on the naval shipbuilding events that surrounded the naval Pacific conference in Sydney, the Sea Power Conference that's held every two years. Last week it was held for 2019, which resulted in some important developments for South Australia.

A division having been called in the House of Representatives—

Sitting suspended from 16:29 to 16:40

I won't repeat my preamble from before the division; I know that everyone was paying fierce attention! There were two significant developments around the naval Pacific conference last week relevant to jobs in South Australia. The first was the decision by the Naval Group, which is building the 12 Attack class submarines, to sign an agreement with Schneider Electric, which is a French company—and which, helpfully, purchased a prominent South Australian company, Gerard Electric Manufacturers, probably about 10 years ago now, from memory. So the decision has been made that the contract for the circuitry for the submarines has been awarded to Schneider. Of course, they have existing expertise in France from working in the supply chains there. They're going to undertake a technology transfer over to their Australian subsidiary, Schneider Australia, which of course is a fantastic outcome for South Australia in particular. As I've outlined, that business is based in Adelaide.

The second significant development last week was the agreement between the Naval Group, the submarine manufacturer and the ASC to enter into a partnership to develop apprenticeships. Effectively, this is an agreement where Naval Group are sponsoring young South Australians—of course, for the benefit of Adelaide in particular—who will commence apprenticeships with the ASC, but who will ultimately find jobs as the Attack class program commences within the Naval Group. These were two very significant germination decisions through the supply chain, which go to show the sort of value that is coming online for the South Australian economy thanks to the very important naval shipbuilding decisions that this government has made.

There are more to come, but this just goes to show that in the space of a week we can have those kinds of significant decisions. It's a very exciting time in South Australia for our economy because of these naval shipbuilding decisions and the opportunities that are being opened up, and I look forward to keeping this chamber informed about all the great news that is going to keep flowing in South Australia because of the strong decisions of the Morrison government to invest in our national security and our defence industry capability in this country.