AUKUS alliance: Nuclear subs deal divides ALP

Former prime ministers Kevin Rudd and Paul Keating have broken with Labor’s leadership to savage the Morrison government’s handling of the deal.

Former prime minister Kevin Rudd has used the opinion pages of French newspaper Le Monde to offer a scathing critique of the way Scott Morrison handled the cancellation of the Naval Group submarine contract. Picture: Gary Ramage

The cancellation of the $90bn French submarine program has cleaved a generational fracture within the ALP and opened up new party rifts, as senior Labor frontbenchers reject claims by former prime minister Paul Keating that Australia is surrendering control of its military.

The wrangling came as ­another former Labor leader, Kevin Rudd, used an article in France’s Le Monde newspaper to attack Scott Morrison’s “gross mishandling” of the delicate ­diplomatic ­decision, saying French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian was correct in his characterisation of the Prime Minister’s conduct as “a stab in the back”.

Mr Keating accused the Morrison government of turning away from the Asian century and back towards a “jaded and faded Anglosphere”.

He then turned his fury on his own party for their complicity in the AUKUS alliance, which he labelled a “historic backslide”.

A revered Labor statesman, Mr Keating attacked opposition foreign affairs spokeswoman Penny Wong for her “muted complicity” in the government’s “foreign policy and posture”, which he claimed had “neutered” Labor’s historical position on Australia’s “right to strategic autonomy”.

But Labor’s leadership rushed to defend Senator Wong and the party’s position, with Anthony ­Albanese saying that Labor continued to “forge our own path”.

“I don’t, with respect, agree with the former prime minister,” the Opposition Leader said on ABC radio. “I seek Paul Keating’s counsel regularly. And he’s always worth listening to. But the fact is that we’ve had an alliance with the United States since 1951.

“I think that the submarine ­arrangement is based upon the best advice,” he added.

“Labor has always, including when Paul was prime minister, put our national security interests front and centre.”

Opposition Treasury spokesman Jim Chalmers also said he did not agree with Mr Keating’s view. “When it comes to Penny Wong, this is a decision that our team has taken collectively. And of course we don’t agree with criticism that’s made of Penny, one of our most effective shadow ministers,” he said.

But in a speech to be delivered at the United States Studies ­Centre on Thursday, Senator Wong will back in some of Mr Keating’s concerns and warn that Australia is obtaining new technologies that are “not ours” and question whether this could limit Australia’s ability to act independently to defend itself.

In his piece for Le Monde, Mr Rudd warned the fallout from the decision would likely have electoral implications for the Morrison government.