Malcolm Turnbull: Our island nation needs a strong navy with a powerful fleet of submarines
AUSTRALIA’s submarine fleet will be built in SA by Australian workers with Australian steel. Our decision to build 12 regionally superior submarines in Australia is central to our plan to ensure economic and national security for generations to come.
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AUSTRALIA’s submarine fleet will be built in South Australia by Australian workers with Australian steel. Our decision to build 12 regionally superior submarines in Australia is central to our plan to ensure economic and national security for generations to come.
The potency of the Australian Navy, both on the seas and beneath them, is built upon an understanding that we need a strong, competitive and sustainable Australian shipbuilding industry.
Our national shipbuilding plan — involving frigates, offshore patrol vessels and regionally superior submarines — sets the course to fundamentally transform our defence industry and sustain it for decades.
A local build will maximise the benefits of this $50 billion investment — the largest in our military history, using the most sophisticated technology in the world — with the creation of nearly 3000 new jobs.
We have chosen to partner with DCNS of France to design our Australian-built fleet of submarines because they offered the best capabilities to match our unique requirements.
The tremendous economic growth of our region presents great opportunities but also challenges, as nations invest more in their military capabilities.
Half of the world’s submarines will be operating in the Indo-Pacific within two decades so, to be secure, our island nation needs a strong navy with a powerful fleet of submarines.
That is why we are investing in a historic modernisation of our Navy to ensure we fulfil the most fundamental responsibility of Government — the security of our nation and its people.
The choice for an Australian submarine build was clear following the competitive evaluation process the Government commenced in February 2015. An Australian build best ensures that we have sovereign control over the future submarine, so we can operate and sustain it without undue reliance on another country.
An Australian build establishes and maintains a capable industry base and skills in Australia from day one. It means that the engineers and welders who build the submarines will be the same ones who end up maintaining our future submarines.
The build of future submarines in Australia will directly create around 1,100 jobs and a further 1,700 jobs in the Australian supply chain. My Government is committed to maximising Australian industry involvement right across Defence capability acquisition and sustainment.
Our commitment to a continuous build philosophy and our national Naval Shipbuilding Plan will put an end to the insidious ‘‘boom-bust’’ cycle that has afflicted Australian industry for so long.
Now, instead of wondering where the next job will come from, industry will have the certainty of knowing that the Government and the Navy have committed to a long-term continuous build of naval surface ships and a rolling acquisition of submarines — sustaining work and driving innovation and technology for decades.
The $50 billion future submarine program and $35 billion future frigate program will provide the Royal Australian Navy with the capabilities that it needs to defend our nation for decades.
But in order to maintain the capability and technology edge in our region we need innovation, ingenuity and inventiveness from Australian industry.
Our Defence Industry Policy Statement sets out two key investments that will help us to do that — the Next Generation Technologies Fund and the Defence Innovation Hub.
Each of these programs will enable industry right across Australia to innovate and develop the technologies of the future that will end up in our future submarines, our future frigates, and right across the gamut of Defence capabilities.
It is this type of work that will help drive the transition to a hi-tech future economy, which will also provide us with world-class Defence capabilities.
Our decisions about building our future Navy right here in Australia will provide opportunities for business across the nation.
The renewal of our fleet, the regeneration of our navy, is a great national endeavour.
We stand in contrast to the neglect of the Labor Party which cut $18 billion from Defence and failed to commission one ship from an Australian shipyard.
My Government will bring together Australian industry, educators and researchers from across the nation to work with us to deliver jobs, innovation, technology and naval capability.
Our naval submarine and shipbuilding plans provide the certainty that industry can grab hold of to invest in and employ Australians.
This is a great day for the Australian defence industry, and an exciting day for jobs, innovation and investment for all Australians.
A stronger Australia supports a safer Australia, a safer region and a safer world.
Malcolm Turnbull is the Prime Minister of Australia.
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