Paul Keating has lashed this week’s AUKUS decision as the worst by a Labor government since Billy Hughes tried to introduce conscription during World War I, but his view has been repudiated, including by former colleague Kim Beazley, who oversaw the construction of the Collins Class submarines.

In a firebrand appearance at the National Press Club on Wednesday, the former Labor prime minister accused Anthony Albanese and his “seriously unwise” Foreign Minister Penny Wong and Defence Minister Richard Marles of “screwing into place the last shackle the United States has laid out to contain China”.