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

I thank Senator Patrick for his question. In acknowledging the number of points that the senator made I would note, firstly, that the government has clearly stated that the fact is Australia's strategic environment has deteriorated in ways that weren't anticipated even five years ago. We know that the Indo-Pacific is now the global epicentre of strategic competition, and that is why the AUKUS agreement between Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States is so important and so necessary.

In terms of capability itself, we as a government are delivering on our commitment to deliver to our service women and men the equipment they need to keep us safe. I can confirm in that context that defence spending under this government will rise above two per cent of GDP in the coming financial year. There are a number of additional capabilities in which we are investing, along with those already planned, that will address the potential security challenges in coming decades. We are extending the life of all six of our Collins class submarines. All six submarines will undergo life-of-type extension within the budget of $4.3 billion to $6.4 billion, extending the life of each submarine by 10 years.

We're also investing in advanced long-range strike capabilities including Tomahawk cruise missiles, long-range anti-ship missiles and joint air-to-surface standoff missiles. The Tomahawk cruise missiles that will be fielded on our Hobart class destroyers are going to enable our maritime assets to strike land targets at greater distance and with better precision. The long-range anti-ship missiles for our F/A-18 super hornets can strike land and maritime targets—the JASSMs for our F/A-18F super hornets and in our future F35s as well. We're enhancing our capabilities in offensive cyber, in hypersonic systems, in autonomous systems, in space capabilities. We are confident, as I said at the beginning of your question, that these will address the potential security challenges in the coming decades as we move to the new submarine acquisitions.