Alex Gallacher (SA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

Firstly, I want to put on the record that Labor's first thoughts are with the affected workers and their families who are dealing with this news at an extremely difficult time. That is the difference between this side of the chamber and that side of the chamber. They have been in government since 2013 and the ordinary performances from Senator Brandis, Senator Back and Senator O'Sullivan is simply to reiterate the six years prior to that.

You have had two years to make decisions. I am sure it is of no comfort to a worker sitting down with his family and his kids to have you throwing across the chamber that two years ago someone else should have done something. The reality is that you have had two years of government. You won government. You had a defence minister and you had him white-anted. You have had your defence department white-anted. You have had the economic rationalists take over, saying, 'We will just not build anything here. Let's go and get a Japanese submarine and put all of those workers in South Australia, all of those workers at Williamstown, Forgacs, under the pump. Push them down.'

We actually care about workers, their families, their jobs and their futures—unlike anybody on that side, from what I have seen in their contributions today. I do not think any of those families are going to get any comfort out of this debate when you simply say, 'Someone should have done something six years ago.' You won government and, in the two years since then, all you have done is dismantle. You have dismantled a whole viable well-trained blue-collar workforce. Go back to Senate estimates where Defence Secretary Richardson said there wasn't a problem in the blue-collar workforce. He said there are no issues there—the issues are in that tier of management. He did not say it was political. He said, 'I don't detect any less inclination to pay a premium for building in Australia'—very careful, diplomatic words—but there is. This is clearly what has happened here. You have got in, you have had a look at it, and you have said, 'We'll let this go the same way as Holden; we'll let this go the same way as manufacturing in this country.' You do not care about workers or their families. You will take no proactive steps in respect of maintaining good, skilled jobs and conditions. And there have been opportunities for you to do something different.