Marise Payne (NSW, Liberal Party, Minister for Defence) Share this | Hansard source

As Mr Lamarre said in estimates in February this year:

Well, I would say that many of those job losses are unavoidable, irrespective of the start date for the OPV or decision round of the OPV … there is no avoiding the down ramp that we are on from this 1,400 we are at today.

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Just to be clear, as I mentioned before, we are on a steady decline. So, there is nothing that is going to avoid us getting down to the several hundred …

But the difference is that this government will build offshore patrol vessels and future frigates and will acquire future submarines, in complete and distinct contrast to those opposite, who did absolutely nothing. The result of that will be thousands of jobs for Australian workers, and I stand by that absolutely.