Christopher Pyne (Sturt, Liberal Party, Leader of the House) Share this | Hansard source

I visited HeliMods on the Sunshine Coast, in the electorate of the member for Fisher. It has just won the contract to build aircraft cabin wet decks for Navy helicopters. It is just one of the businesses on the Sunshine Coast that are benefiting because of the government's commitment to military capability.

I was also in the electorate of the member for Ryan, at the Gallipoli Barracks, where I welcomed the first delivery of the Rheinmetall trucks and trailers from Haulmark Trailers in Queensland, a $3½ billion project generating 110 jobs for Queenslanders. And of course Rockhampton and Townsville, in Central Queensland, are the big winners from a $2.25 billion investment in the massive expansion of training up there on the Central Coast and North Queensland. And the Amberley air base is receiving a $720 million redevelopment. These are decisions that were never made in six years by the previous government—$720 million, creating 500 jobs in the construction and development of the Amberley air base in Queensland.

And the member for Leichhardt: his city is the big winner from this massive build-up in military capability. In Leichhardt, Cairns is our major North Queensland base for the sustainment and maintenance of the Pacific patrol vessels as well as the Armidale-class patrol boats that they are doing right now. He won for his electorate a $24 million investment in marine infrastructure in Cairns that will transform the Cairns port into one of the most modern sustainment and maintenance ports in the Southern Hemisphere. There is also the Joint Strike Fighter. Ferra Engineering is just one of the companies that has won an $80 million contract for the Joint Strike Fighter program, employing 55 Queenslanders. None of it would have happened without our government being in power. It never happened under the Labor Party.

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