Leon Rebello (McPherson, Liberal National Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to support the motion moved by the member for Durack and to restate a simple truth: space is no longer a curiosity at the edge of government—it's a vital sovereign capability which the coalition recognises. National defence, emergency management and agriculture are already dependent on space based services. Think of the Black Summer bushfires. Our emergency services and the Bureau of Meteorology depended on rapid satellite feeds to track fire fronts and smoke plumes in near-real time. Yet Australia owns no Earth-observation satellites.

For the sixth-largest nation by landmass with responsibility for airspace over a vast portion of the globe, that dependence on others is a vulnerability we can no longer accept. Space touches everything: GPS for farmers and freight, climate and water management for our regions, telecommunications for remote communities, precision timing for our financial system and domain awareness for defence. The global space economy is marching towards the trillion-dollar mark. The jobs it generates are high skill, high wage and exactly the kind we want Australian students training for today.

Against that backdrop, Labor's handling of the space industry has lacked both foresight and responsibility, weakening our capacity at the very moment we should be building it. In 2023, within one year of taking office, this Labor government cancelled the coalition's National Space Mission for Earth Observation program—worth over $1.2 billion—abandoning four Australian-built satellites which would have made a significant contribution towards our space capabilities. Further to this, they cut $59.7 million from the technology into orbit program, $18 million from the Moon to Mars global supply chain program and $32.3 million set aside for space ports and launch sites. And, on top of the cuts, the government removed space as an explicit priority from the National Reconstruction Fund. This represents a profound neglect of national priorities—short-termism over strategy. They weaken us by increasing our reliance on foreign satellites and denying the enormous opportunities that a sovereign space capability would bring—opportunities for high-skill jobs, national resilience in times of crisis and the ability for Australia to shape its own future in space rather than rent it from others.

Industry has been blunt. The Space Industry Association warned of defunding without explanation. Across the sector, from satellite manufacturers to launch providers, the message is ultimately the same: uncertainty kills investment. The government says it wants to, 'build things here'. Instead, its actions have taken the sector off the launch pad. By contrast, the coalition has a record of building and of enabling, not smothering, industry. We established the Australian Space Agency in 2018, and we released the Australian Civil Space Strategy to grow the sector to a $12 billion sector and create 20,000 jobs by 2030. We backed industry with substantial investment, including the Moon to Mars initiative and the Trailblazer rover, giving Australian firms pathways into NASA missions and global supply chains. We celebrated achievements that inspire the next generation, like Katherine Bennell-Pegg becoming the first person to complete astronaut training under the Australian flag. Katherine completed her training with the support and the funding of the Australian Space Agency.

Australia needs a sovereign space capability that is designed, built, launched and operated here at home and backed by sustained investment. This is a choice between retreat and resolve. The government, as they do very often, have chosen retreat—cuts, confusion and lost time. The coalition will always choose resolve, and we will work towards a confident and coherent plan to build an emerging and vital industry that serves our economy, our security and, very importantly, our regional communities.

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