Adelaide shipbuilder ASC looks to cut 63 jobs as air warfare destroyer work winds down

SOUTH Australia’s shipbuilder ASC is looking to cut a further 63 jobs as work on the Navy’s air warfare destroyers winds down.

ADELAIDE-based defence shipbuilder ASC is looking to cut a further 63 jobs as work on the navy’s new air warfare destroyers winds down.

ASC is close to completing the third and final ship and says that means it may need to cut 56 production jobs and seven salaried positions.

It will consult with its workforce over the next six weeks and is offering voluntary redundancy packages.

“ASC Shipbuilding takes this action reluctantly and only following a rigorous process of identifying and filling redeployment opportunities to other areas in the ASC Group,” the company said in a statement on Tuesday.

It said no workers would leave the business immediately and the number leaving could be reduced if further redeployment opportunities were identified in the coming weeks.

The company said it might also be possible for some workers to return once work on the Hunter Class frigates begins in 2020.

Those ships will be built in Adelaide by ASC which is expected to operate by then as a subsidiary of BAE Systems.

The Australian Manufacturing Workers’ Union said the further loss of jobs from ASC was evidence the federal government had failed to secure the workforce for Australia’s future defence shipbuilding programs.

“Unless there is a trained and skilled workforce in place, the future building programs for frigates and submarines will be badly impacted,” AMWU assistant national secretary Glenn Thompson said.

“We are losing those skilled workers who have recently completed the air warfare destroyer program and unless this latest round of redundancies are overturned, they will be lost to the industry, and possibly even leave SA to find new jobs elsewhere.”