Andrew Wallace (Fisher, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for Defence. Will the minister update the House on how the recent Morrison government announcement to strengthen our relationship with the United States and the United Kingdom through AUKUS will keep Australians safe?

Peter Dutton (Dickson, Liberal Party, Minister for Defence) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I want to say thank you to the member for Fisher, not just for his leadership on the defence committee and the very valuable role he plays there but also for standing up for veterans on the Sunshine Coast. I've met with veterans with the member for Fisher and he has a deep and abiding passion to make sure that everything that we can do as a country for those veterans is an outcome that we can all be proud of. And he delivers on that, as this government does in terms of national security, providing that safety and security for our country, not just for today but into the coming decades. I want to pay tribute to my counterparts in the United States and the United Kingdom, Secretary Lloyd Austin and Secretary Ben Wallace, for their support in bringing AUKUS together and their leadership, even today, as we meet as three countries to look at ways in which we can deliver on the agreement we have entered into in the form of AUKUS.

Our Five Eyes compact has absolutely been a very significant underpinning to our national security for many decades. We know now that, as we move into this new phase of great uncertainty in the Indo-Pacific, Australians and people right across the world are worried about what the future holds for the Indo-Pacific. It's important that we not only rebolster the support that we have between the Five Eyes partners in that very important relationship but also that we take our security to the next level as a country and on behalf of our region in the form of AUKUS. AUKUS delivers us a technology which will replace the Collins Class in time, which will be—

Opposition Members:

Opposition members interjecting—

Peter Dutton (Dickson, Liberal Party, Minister for Defence) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I heard some of the interjections from those opposite. You must be referring to the whole period when you were in government, when you didn't order one vessel, one boat, one submarine or one ship and you cut money from Defence for soldiers and sailors. You were hopeless in government—let's be realistic, Mr Speaker.

Tony Smith (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Minister for Defence will come back to the question.

Peter Dutton (Dickson, Liberal Party, Minister for Defence) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

What are we doing in contrast to that? We are putting a record amount into defending this country and keeping Australians safe. We now have a nuclear submarine program which will be, in this region, an absolutely superior boat. It will give us the ability to work with the Americans and to work with the Brits to keep our country safe and secure. Out of AUKUS, there's obviously a lot more that we'll do in terms of cybersecurity, working on artificial intelligence and on quantum technologies, additional undersea capabilities—these are all areas of priority and there will be many, many more. We will work with our best allies in the world and with our dear friends in the region to make sure that we keep our country safe.