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

Only 10 days ago, on 16 October, it was my pleasure to attend the opening of Naval Group's new Port Adelaide offices at the old Port Adelaide TAFE. Naval Group is the French company that is building the 12 Attack class submarines for the Royal Australian Navy. This was a great celebration of a very significant milestone for it. One month before the coronavirus struck it was my pleasure to invite Minister Reynolds to attend their offices in Keswick, just adjacent to the Adelaide CBD. That was a happy celebration of the 200th employee joining Naval Group. They have now surpassed 250, as they move to a second premises out at Port Adelaide. Defence Minister Reynolds was again there to officiate. We had Minister Birmingham, the South Australian Premier and other federal and state colleagues there.

This is a really exciting step forward because it sees Naval Group expanding from their corporate facility to another facility—in addition to that at Keswick—which is adjacent to the shipyards. Clearly, it is a demonstration of how close the beginning of this project is becoming. Obviously the north Osborne shipyards are under construction as we speak. Some of those milestones are approaching. It won't be long before they're on site and cutting steel for the first Attack class submarine. I congratulate them on this milestone.