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

As Senator Patrick well knows, staffing decisions are a matter for the ASC board and management. As I have said very clearly to this chamber on multiple occasions, job losses at ASC and elsewhere in the shipbuilding industry—which are regrettable, and I placed on record in the chamber earlier today that it is the case in any industry, in any organisation—are not a result of this government's policies; they are the direct result of an abrogation of responsibility by the previous government in not commissioning a single naval vessel in this country in their entire term of government. So, while continuous naval shipbuilding will create thousands of jobs—and I've outlined those numbers—for decades to come, there is a period of transition as our current shipbuilding workforce redeploys to new opportunities being created across our defence industrial base. That defence industrial base is at its strongest in Adelaide and Perth. (Time expired)