Ann Sudmalis (Gilmore, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for Defence Industry. Will the minister update the House on how the recent budget continues to invest in keeping Australians safe, particularly through the government's Naval Shipbuilding Plan? Have previous policy approaches invested in defence and the defence industry ever changed to this extent before?

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

I thank the member for Gilmore for her question.

The 2018 budget continues to invest in keeping Australians safe. It's one of the most important jobs of any government. This government is doing so, and the 2018 budget is committed to that into the future. This government has a $200 billion commitment to building up our military capability over the next 10 years—the largest in our peacetime history. It's going to get us to two per cent of GDP in 2020 being spent on defence, a year ahead of the promise that we made back a few years ago when we were elected.

We're doing it because it's critically important to protect Australia's national interests. But we're using the opportunity of that $200 billion heft to drive innovation, jobs, investment and advanced manufacturing in Australia. That's the big difference between this side of politics and the Labor side of politics: we actually put our money where our mouth is. What companies like H.I.Fraser, in the member for Mackellar's electorate; the Tasmanian company, Taylor Brothers (Slipway & Engineering); BlueScope Steel in Port Kembla, Thales in Bendigo; Forgacs Marine and Defence in Newcastle; Avalon Systems in Mawson Lakes; and Jenkins Engineering Defence Systems all have in common is that they all work on the Air Warfare Destroyer program, a program initiated in the Howard government. A couple of weeks ago we launched the latest of the air warfare destroyers, the HMAS Sydney. Productivity improved by 60 per cent between ship 1 and ship 3. But do you know what was sad about that day? What was sad about that day was, if Labor had been re-elected in 2013, that would have been the last naval vessel ever built in Australia in an Australian shipyard. Labor would have closed down every shipyard in Australia.

Opposition Members:

Opposition members interjecting—

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

I hear them all interjecting. In six years of Labor, they did not make one decision to build a ship in Australia—not one in six years. I suppose, in the seventh year, they were limbering up for a big decision—were they?—to build a ship in Australia.

Under this government, we've commissioned 54 naval vessels, driving jobs, innovation and advanced manufacturing. This is a government that's getting on with it. And we can afford to do it because the management of the budget by the Treasurer and the Prime Minister ensures we've got the money to invest in our military capability to protect our nation and its people and to invest in Australian business, Australian jobs and Australian manufacturing. That's something Labor could only ever dream about.