Anne McEwen (SA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Yesterday during Senate question time I was horrified to hear the Abbott government's Minister for Defence, Senator Johnston, say in response to a question about the replacement of Australia's naval supply ships:

Construction of these vessels is simply beyond Australian industry.

It was a damning and horrifying thing to hear from the Minister for Defence, and I beg to differ with him on that count. South Australia has a long history of shipbuilding. Many people would not realise that Kangaroo Island was an early hub for shipbuilding, with American whalers building the 30-ton Independence on that island in 1803. Subsequently, Encounter Bay, Goolwa, Port Augusta, Whyalla and even Renmark on the River Murray were all important sites throughout the 1800s as hubs to repair and build ships before the Port Adelaide area became the shipbuilding centre of my state of South Australia, and it still is. Since those early beginnings, Port Adelaide in particular has maintained a long history of shipbuilding and shipbuilders. It is an area that has seen many generations supported by the industry, and still today Port Adelaide remains proud of its shipbuilding roots.

Osborne, near Port Adelaide, has been the home of the Australian Submarine Corporation since 1987. ASC first gained its reputation designing and manufacturing the Collins class submarines for the Royal Australian Navy in what was the largest ever Defence contract signed in Australia. At the completion of the Collins class submarine program in 2005, the ASC became the home of the Aegis based Australian air warfare destroyers—the AWDs—employing more than 1,500 workers on that important project. Today, ASC should be the home to the Future Submarine project, building new and more powerful submarines to provide Australia with even greater Defence capability, but, unfortunately, I stand here this evening with no certainty that that will be the case.

Despite the historical ties that the Port Adelaide area shares with shipbuilding, the local area, the industry, the subsidiaries of the industry, and the Defence program could also be victims of the massive axe that the Abbott coalition government is swinging right across Australia. The Prime Minister has already destroyed car manufacturing in South Australia, and now the action and inaction of his government and the actions of his cabinet ministers is placing South Australia's shipbuilding industry at risk too. In the last nine months, the Abbott government has demonstrated time and time again that they cannot be trusted. They have reneged on their commitments and blatantly lied to all Australians. Defence Minister Johnston has recently played a role in the Abbott government's charades, when he went back on his word to the Australian people. Prior to last year's election, on 8 May 2013, he swore to deliver the Future Submarine project to ASC in Adelaide. In fact, the exact words that came out of his mouth at the joint press conference with the South Australian opposition leader, Steven Marshall, that day were:

The Coalition today is committed to building 12 new submarines here in Adelaide …

He made a promise to all Australians—and even more so to all South Australians—that the future of the shipbuilding industry would be preserved in South Australia. He promised that the ASC would build the vessels required by the ADF. In fact, he raved about the ASC's capability and capacity, claiming that it housed the expertise and facilities necessary to complete the tasks. It makes his answer to the questions yesterday in Senate question time all the more galling where he called into question the productivity and the capability of the workers at the ASC and in the shipbuilding industry in South Australia. In April this year, Senator Johnston, in a massive about-turn and a breach of trust to the Australian people, said he would no longer commit to the ASC project. In fact, he would barely commit to anything. While building in Adelaide was 'desirable' he said, there was 'no blank cheque', and he would not offer any assurance whatsoever to ASC or the industry that those subs would be built in South Australia.

Today, due to the minister's indecisiveness, the 1,500 workers out at ASC are now in limbo. Unfortunately, the rest of Australia's shipbuilding industry could be in the same situation. I call on the minister to make up his mind about what he is doing with his portfolio, and instead of claiming to be speechless with anger, he needs to open his mouth to give peace of mind to the 1,500 South Australian workers and also the rest of the industry nationwide about their future. As if his indecision on the future of projects was not bad enough, last week we learnt that two new supply ships for the Royal Australian Navy will not be built in South Australia or, indeed, Australia. Never mind our home-grown skills and capabilities and our long history of excellence in shipbuilding and the expertise that we have available in South Australia and in other places in Australia, the minister has decided to abandon Australian industry and have those ships built in either Spain or South Korea. To add insult to injury, the minister will not even give our own workers and our own companies a chance to tender for those projects. It does not exactly fill you with confidence about the future, does it? Currently, it seems this government is intent on sending our jobs and our industries—particularly our manufacturing industry—offshore. So much has already gone in nine short months, who knows what will be left.

The government's abandonment of the shipping industry echoes the abandonment of the automotive industry, again stripping Australia of the vital, high-skill manufacturing industry jobs that we need and severely impacting and hurting South Australian jobs and futures in particular. After all this time as a shipbuilding country where we have proven over the last 150 years that we have the capacity, the skills, the innovation and the integrity to build these ships here at home, the Abbott government has overlooked Australian workers in favour of international labour.

The Australian Labor Party has always supported Australian jobs and particularly the shipbuilding industry. We had a plan to bring forward a hybrid build for the construction of those same naval supply ships so that they would have included an Australian component. We also proposed bringing forward the construction of new patrol boats and investigating the possibility of bringing forward the Future Frigates program in order to address the so-called valley of death—the lack of projects in the shipbuilding industry in Australia.

Instead, the Liberal government has made the dreadful decision to send the construction of ships and, with it, hundreds of Australian jobs overseas. By so doing, it is putting the whole of the future of the Australian shipbuilding industry at risk. Not only will local shipbuilders lose their jobs; the skills, the training and the innovation that are ever so vital to the industry will also be lost forever. The industry will be handicapped in its ability to bid for any future projects that might come its way. Without the workers, we will lack the skills; without the skills, we will not get the projects. It could not be clearer that sending shipbuilding jobs offshore at this critical time for the future of the Australian manufacturing industry could ultimately lead to the complete demise of an industry of which we in South Australia—and the rest of Australia, I am sure—are so proud. It is predicted that some 4,000 highly skilled jobs could be lost if this government is successful in stripping Australia of the shipbuilding industry entirely.

In the few minutes left to me, I ask: where are the South Australian Liberal senators in this place? Where are they? They are not standing up for shipbuilding in South Australia. Before the election, they all stood behind now Minister Johnston saying that, yes, they would support shipbuilding and defence industries in South Australia. After the election, they are running a million miles away from shipbuilding and the manufacturing industry in my state, and I think their actions are shameful. I call upon them to stand with the rest of the South Australian senators, with the Labor senators on this side of the chamber, to support an industry which South Australia is proud of, which has a long history in South Australia and which, most importantly, is integral to the future economy of South Australia and the retention of highly skilled, good jobs in South Australia.