David Johnston (WA, Liberal Party, Minister for Defence) Share this | Hansard source

We certainly have not abandoned Australian shipbuilders. We have actually given them a credible path forward. If they can manufacture and recover the Air Warfare Destroyer Program, there is a promise, an option on the table for a further eight ships fully funded, fully designed, fully planned. That, in one fell swoop, is a thousand times more than what the incompetence of the last Labor government promised. We have had to confront a program that, as I have said, is $300 million and about two years late in terms of cost and schedule. If the senator wants me to make the sorts of promises that were the hallmark of his government, I will say: all will be rosy. We will not put up with low productivity in shipbuilding, but we want an industry and we will have one. (Time expired)