Shipyard jobs: Concerns over potential delay for Future Frigates
Naval experts have warned of risks in trying to begin building the future frigates in 2022 if the design is not fully ready by then.
SA News
Don't miss out on the headlines from SA News. Followed categories will be added to My News.
Australia’s $45bn Future Frigates could be delayed, prompting concerns for South Australian shipyard jobs.
Construction of the first warship is still on track to start in Adelaide in 2022 “at the moment”, Defence Minister Linda Reynolds says.
But naval shipbuilding experts have flagged risks in starting construction in 2022 if the design is not sufficiently finalised.
Defence Department secretary Greg Moriarty told a Senate Estimates hearing on Monday there had been some challenges.
He said Defence was “working on those challenges” but was expecting prototype construction to start this year, while Government was committed to begin construction for the first frigate in 2022.
Naval Shipbuilding Advisory Board chairman Don Winter said the program was in a position to start construction in 2022 “if it chooses to” but there were questions about risks in starting at that point.
The risk related to how advanced the design was and whether parts would have to be reworked if it changed.
A Defence official said the design was due to be finalised in mid-2024 but building could begin in 2022 for some parts.
Minister Reynolds said: “We are still on track for construction by the end of 2022 but we are continuing to look at the COVID impacts, cost and scheduling implications.”
The frigates will need 1385 shipyard jobs in SA by 2022, rising to 2020 jobs by 2030.
Meanwhile, the inquiry was told a decision on whether a lucrative submarine contract stayed in South Australia or moved to Western Australia did not have to be made until 2023 – three years before it would potentially move.
Minister Reynolds would not be drawn on whether the Government would announce a decision before the next federal election.
South Australian federal Labor frontbencher Mark Butler said the minister refusing to guarantee a decision before the next election was “a slap in the face for the 700 workers whose future has been hanging by a thread”.
Labor’s defence spokesman Richard Marles said the frigates were “yet another Defence project with serious question marks hovering over it”.
Defence analyst Marcus Hellyer, from the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, said the frigates’ schedule was clearly under pressure but the government may opt not to delay construction.
“Construction could still start in late 2022, but at a slower rate, or on certain components but not on others,” he said.
He also said the workforce may not be ramped up to full speed for some time, given yesterday’s revelation that the ship blocks which would be built as part of the prototyping phase were actually blocks of the original UK Type 26 design, not Australia’s Hunter class frigate design.
“Even if the prototyping goes well, the blocks are likely to be unusable in Hunter class frigates,” he said.
“It doesn’t make sense to run the shipyard at full capacity building blocks you are just going to throw away, so it will be a while before the shipyard gets close to full workforce.”
More Coverage
