Just who is going to build our submarines?
The Coalition entered the 2013 election committed to the Defence White Paper’s recommendation that 12 new submarines be built in South Australia:
The Defence White Paper, released by the former Labor government on May 3, 2013, said Australia’s existing Collins Class submarine fleet would be replaced with an expanded fleet of 12 conventional submarines. “The future submarines will be assembled in South Australia,” it said.
On May 8, opposition defence spokesman David Johnston said the Coalition accepted and “will deliver” the white paper’s commitment.
“The Coalition today is committed to building 12 new submarines here in Adelaide,” he said. “We will get that task done, and it is a really important task, not just for the Navy but for the nation.
“And we are going to see the project through, and put it very close after force protection, as our number priority if we win the next federal election.”
It looked like it was one of the rare promises the government would keep when in August 2014 the Prime Minister promised that the construction of the navy’s next generation of submarines will create a “massive amount of work’’ in Adelaide. All the talk in July of that year that Tony Abbott was about to sign a deal with Japan was no doubt just some news.com speculation.
The promise went pear shaped, of course, when it was realised that South Australians couldn’t even build canoes, let alone modern, war-ready submarines. But the rhetoric had changed quickly since the August promise. The ‘canoe’ comment merely cemented the Prime Minister’s new opinion that submarines built in South Australia may not be able to build a “world class” submarine.
One can only speculate why this was not determined before the election, but that’s another story.
Our eyes again turned to Japan when it was reported in November that the government was considering buying Japanese Soryu submarines and again a month later when The Australian informed us that:
Tony Abbott is expected to announce within days the start of the process for selecting the navy’s new submarines from a range of international options and for building and maintaining them.
The Australian has been told the Prime Minister’s announcement is likely to include the creation of a new defence industry entity to work with an experienced international submarine designer and builder.
The expected re-election of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s government with a substantial majority will remove a significant hurdle to Japan providing new submarines for Australia.
Japan, Germany, France and Sweden are all keen to provide the submarines. The Japanese are ahead of the others because they have the most experience building conventional submarines large enough to meet Australia’s needs.
Yet in January we hear that Tony Abbott all but awarded the contract to Germany. German paper Spiegal reported that (translated thanks to Google Translate):
German Chancellor Angela Merkel fights for one of the largest arms export business of German history. It involves the sale of up to twelve submarines of the class 216 from Australia.
The deal could bring an order value of 14 billion euros of German industry and is in government circles as “outstanding”, as the submarine industry would benefit for decades.
Back in November Merkel has worked on the edge of the G–20 summit, the Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott in Brisbane for the German offer. Merkel argued here that Germany could act politically neutral, while Japan was suffering from tensions with China. “So you‘re right,” Abbott said.
(By the way, did Tony Abbott also mention to Ms Merkel that he had on numerous occasions hinted that the Japanese were the front-runners?)
And that’s the last I thought we’d hear about it. Until today. Under this headline in The Australian: Abbott leadership crisis: PM woos MPs with $20bn submarine contract we read that:
Tony Abbott has sought to tie up his political support by opening the way for Adelaide-based shipbuilder ASC to bid for a lucrative tender worth at least $20 billion for the navy’s future submarines.
The assurance was part of a deal cut between the Prime Minister and key South Australian Senator Sean Edwards who said his support for Mr Abbott in a leadership contest would depend on the shipbuilder being given the greenlight to make a bid.
Mr Abbott rang Senator Edwards earlier this afternoon to make the commitment, with Senator Edwards telling The Australian a short time ago: “I won’t be supporting a spill motion tomorrow.”
So we’re back were we started. But it looks like it won’t be going to the highest bidder. Tony Abbott will – we can speculate – be spending $20 billion of the taxpayer’s money to buy one lousy vote to help him keep his job.
Now what about those canoes?
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