Gavin Pearce (Braddon, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for Defence Industry. Will the minister outline to the House how the Morrison government is delivering on its plan to achieve a target of investing a record $200 billion in our defence capability to achieve two per cent GDP spending? And how is this record investment creating jobs for Australians?

Melissa Price (Durack, Liberal Party, Minister for Defence Industry) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Can I thank the member for Braddon and also acknowledge his deep passion for the Australian defence industry. Because of the Morrison government's strong budget management, we are able to invest a record $200 billion in our defence capability and achieve two per cent of GDP in defence spending in the next financial year. This record investment is creating many jobs in Australia.

Yesterday Senator Molan and I had the great pleasure of visiting Lintek, an Australian small business employing 50 Australians just down the road in Queanbeyan. It was a great pleasure to meet the Lintek team and to announce their new manufacturing capability in the global F-35 program. This new manufacturing capability will double Lintek's F-35 circuit board production capacity, and what this means for Lintek is that it's now in a much stronger position to increase its work on the F-35 program. Lintek is just one of those many small companies that, because of our investment, is able to export its products overseas.

Last year I visited the US to fight for more Australian work in the US program. I was proud to announce upon my return that the Western Sydney base Quickstep was awarded additional work to provide some 10 new parts to the global F-35 program. Proudly, there is currently US$250,000 worth of Australian Quickstep equipment on every F-35 globally. Their world-leading capability is yet another example of an outstanding Australian success story in our defence industry. Quickstep and Lintek are just some of the 50 companies who are sharing in some $1.7 billion worth of work on the Joint Strike Fighter Project. Talking about jobs: yes, this program is currently supporting some 2,400 Australian jobs, with thousands more expected by 2023.

We on this side of the House are backing our defence industry, and small, medium and large defence industry businesses. At the same time we're creating thousands of Australian jobs. That's what record investment of $200 billion will get you. It will get you support for our defence industry, ensuring that our men and women in uniform get the capability that they deserve. And it's only with sound financial management that we on this side are able to deliver what our men and women in uniform deserve, at the same time as creating Australian jobs.