Good morning everyone, it’s Matilda Boseley here, ready to take you through the day’s news.
But actually, first up I have some news brought to you by my esteemed colleague Daniel Hurst:
The defence minister, Peter Dutton, will today name two large US weapons makers as “strategic partners” in Australia’s own push to manufacture and maintain guided weapons.
Dutton is also expected to open a new $96m maintenance facility for navy guided weapons at Orchard Hills in western Sydney this morning, as part of the government’s continuing efforts to focus on national security ahead of the election.
The government’s force structure plan, released in 2020, said one of the most important lessons from previous conflicts around the world had been “how quickly supplies of precision munitions can come under stress, especially for those nations that possess little domestic capacity to manufacture them”.
Defence began exploring the potential for a new sovereign guided weapons and explosive ordnance production capability. The prime minister, Scott Morrison, subsequently said: “Through the $1bn Guided Weapons and Explosive Ordinance Enterprise, we will be able to make our own weapons on our own soil.”
Today’s announcement is that Raytheon Australia and Lockheed Martin Australia will be the strategic partners in that effort. (Lockheed Martin Australia, incidentally, was previously contracted to deliver the combat system for the French submarine project, which has now been abandoned.)
Dutton said in a statement:
These two companies, along with their US-based parent companies, are the largest suppliers of guided weapons to Defence. We will be working with them to rapidly increase our ability to maintain and manufacture guided weapons and their components in Australia.
We know we need to work closely with our partners to bolster our self-reliance and this is another major step in delivering that sovereign capability here in Australia.
Dutton said Australia’s strategic environment was becoming “more complex and challenging” and the Indo-Pacific region “now sits at the epicentre of global strategic competition”.
He said it was “imperative that we work closely with like-minded countries and industry partners to develop a more capable military force to defend Australia”. He said the industry partners would work with a panel of local Australian-based providers “to deliver an array of necessary infrastructure to support this program into the future”.
OK, with that in mind, why don’t we jump right into the day!