Doorstop Interview, HMAS Coonawarra, Darwin

SUBJECTS: Kuru Wharf at HMAS Coonawarra; Defence Investment in Northern Australia; Training Exercises in the NT; NATO; Healthcare Capacity in Darwin.

LUKE GOSLING, FEDERAL MEMBER FOR SOLOMON: Good morning everyone, and welcome down to HMAS Coonawarra. It's awesome to be here with my mate the Assistant Minister for Defence and Veterans Matt Thistlethwaite who opened officially this morning facilities down here at HMAS Coonawarra including the Kuru Wharf but also some buildings and what they are part of is a $210 million dollar package part of the suite of projects we're doing across, not only the Northern Territory, but northern Australia, some $14 to $18 billion across the next 10 years in facilities across northern Australia. And here in the Northern Territory, over the forward estimates, we've got the majority of that, which is great for local businesses. 

It's also obviously critically important for the preparedness of our Australian Defence Force for the range of operations that we ask them to do. This wharf facility is really significant, just in recent months, we've had not only HMAS Adelaide, which is our helicopter landing dock ship from the Royal Australian Navy but also the big Italian aircraft carrier that lots of people in Darwin have seen over the last couple of days. It's been great to have all our international visitors here for Exercise Predator’s Run but also Exercise Pitch Black that continues. Kuru itself, the wharf is named after a World War Two ship with an incredible history, and it was great to hear a bit more about that this morning.

So, it's always good to have Matt up here in the north, he is a frequent visitor and a big supporter of the Territory and the Defence Force. So, thanks for coming up again, Matt.

MATT THISTLETHWAITE, ASSISTANT MINISTER FOR DEFENCE: Thanks Luke. This is a great day for the Australian Defence Force, here in Darwin and our maritime capability across the north of Australia. It's also a great day for the Darwin community and their support of our Australian Defence Force. The Albanese Government has a plan to bolster the capabilities of our Australian Defence Force here across the north and throughout Darwin. That plan is called our National Defence Strategy. It represents our investment in the people, the power, and the posture of the Australian Defence Force, particularly across the north of Australia, and this Kuru Wharf development that we're officially opening today is a vitally important part of improving our maritime capabilities across the north. This will be able to take six patrol class vessels. It’ll also be able to take submarines and the surface combatant fleet into the future. We're also opening the operational command facilities and the fuel storage facilities. 

I want to thank the local community, particularly Laing O'Rourke, the principal contractors, all the workers that were involved in this project. 200 odd jobs created, 80 percent of those contractors were from the Northern Territory, nine percent of them were Indigenous businesses, a great example of the partnership between the Australian Defence Force and the local business community delivering infrastructure upgrades that will help protect Australia into the future.

I also want to thank the Darwin community for your patience and your support of Exercise Pitch Black that's going on at the moment. Luke and I were fortunate yesterday to spend some time with some of the troops that are involved in this important exercise, to see awesome capability take off from the RAAF Base yesterday in our fighter jets and be involved in an exercise scenario from Tindal up to RAAF Base Darwin in a combat scenario blue team, red team scenario and see the command and the planning that went into that operation, it gives you a renewed respect and love of our Australian Defence Force and our allies. So, thank you to the Darwin community. Thank you for being so supportive of Defence here in the north. 

We're happy to take some questions if you have any.

JOURNALIST: This new facility, you mentioned it in your speech before, it's future-proofed to obviously account for technological advances into the future. Just how long will this be functional for?

ASSISTANT MINISTER: Well, we're building for the future, we're building for growth and we're building for increased capacity. This will be able to take submarines into the future, including our nuclear-propelled submarines. It will be able to take some of the elements of our new surface combatant fleet. And that’s why we're investing in facilities now that will deliver growth and safety to the Australian community into the future. And this wharf development is an important part of that. And the broader Larrakeyah Defence Precinct upgrades that are undertaking, are being undertaken here, and that represents the growth that's occurring in the Australian Defence Force across the north. Luke mentioned that we’re investing about $14 billion dollars over the course of the next 10 years, basically every single Defence base across the north of Australia is getting an upgrade because the north is so crucial to the defence of our nation into the future.

JOURNALIST: This would be a potential launching place for a combat situation, wouldn’t it? 

ASSISTANT MINISTER: Yeah, obviously we train for those scenarios, we hope that we never have to engage in them in the domestic waters of Australia, but we prepare for them and that's what the Defence Strategic Review was all about ensuring that our Defence Force was fit and capable to meet the challenges of the future and they said that we need some work to do. And as a result of that we put together the National Defence Strategy. Our 10-year plan for the investments that we need to make to keep Australians safe into the future and this is part of that. So, it could take a combat capability into the future. We hope we never have to use that but we're planning for those scenarios should we need them.

JOURNALIST: The Defence strategy calls for bilateral and multilateral exercises to continue. How many more elements, exercises like Pitch Black, will we see running out of a place like this?

ASSISTANT MINISTER: Yeah, the beauty of Darwin and the north is that it's so special and so suited to international exercises. Speaking to some of the international contingents that are here as part of Exercise Pitch Black, the air space that they are operating in is twice the size of some of their countries. It's about 400 times the size of Singapore and that gives you an appreciation of how respected the Australian Defence Force is and how important these operations are for our allies, for their training and their capability improvements, but also the interoperability that goes with it. So, Exercise Pitch Black, Predator’s Run, Talisman Sabre, all of these important international operations, that take place here in the north are a vitally important part of training our defence forces and improving our interoperabilities.

JOURNALIST: What about rotations with the UK and the US as part of AUKUS?

ASSISTANT MINISTER: Yeah well, at the moment you've got the three chiefs of the Australian, United States, and UK navies that are in Perth to kick off some upgrades that are occurring to facilities in Fleet Base West and that represents our investment in delivering nuclear-propelled submarines into the future. So those partnerships, those allies, alliances are really important for the future of our capability. We know that AUKUS is going to be the figurehead for Australia's international alliances and capability into the future and we're planning for that. And these wharf upgrades are an important part of that planning in the North.

JOURNALIST: Just about NATO and just on the submarines, how many of those would be [inaudible]?

ASSISTANT MINISTER: So in terms of NATO, a couple of weeks ago, myself and the Defence Minister and Deputy Prime Minister were in the United States for the NATO conference, and I was able to participate in some meetings with NATO defence ministers and I can tell you that they are very keen to continue engaging with Australia, and our partners in the Indo-Pacific because they see the importance of the Indo-Pacific to the peace and prosperity of the world moving forward. And for Australia to be invited as part of those talks is a great symbol of their commitment to engaging with us and how important they see us to peace and stability and upholding international rules in the Indo-Pacific. So that was a really important part of that that project. This will be able to take a number of submarines, six patrol class vessels and that's the important part of this development. We're built for growth and we're building to meet the challenges of the future.

JOURNALIST: What's, what's the likelihood that Australia signs individual defence agreements with individual EU nations such as France, Germany and Italy. Is that a potential?

ASSISTANT MINISTER: At the moment, we've got an agreement that we work through with the NATO nations and that's an important part of our alliance building, particularly to the north of Australia. ANZUS will always be the foundation of Australia's defence. It's served our nation well since World War Two, we're building on that with AUKUS. I had some meetings in Congress with representatives from Republicans and Democrats. They're all committed to AUKUS and they all want to see it delivered and the regulation making powers to deliver that technology transfer and innovation are now going through the Congress. So, we're bolstering our defence and alliance capability through AUKUS but we're also looking north to other important alliances through ASEAN, through APEC and more broadly through NATO.

JOURNALIST: Last year we saw a terrible fatal crash here with the Ospreys and it caused absolute havoc to our health departments. The Defence is investing huge in capability but what about in local capability around our hospitals?

ASSISTANT MINISTER: Firstly, I want to, I want to pay tribute to all of the first responders and health care workers here in the Darwin community, who responded to that terrible tragedy last year with the Osprey. I met with representatives of the United States Marines in the wake of that tragedy and they had nothing but praise for the work of the first responders and the local health care community. Obviously, we're also investing in the healthcare facilities and the capacity of the Australian Defence Force at bases such as this. We know that with increasing exercises, with an increasing presence of the Australian Defence Force and international allies here in the north that we are going to have to invest in that capacity in the local health care system. And that's why we're investing in Medicare, that's why we're building urgent care clinics to take some of that pressure off our hospital emergency departments. So that when there is a crisis situation and a severe trauma, they can deal with those problems into the future.

JOURNALIST: If we’re to see up to 5000 more troops based here in Darwin then do we not need a bigger hospital?

ASSISTANT MINISTER: You’re not going to see 5000 more troops. You're going to see more troops coming to the north, you'll see more rotations of troops, but we are investing in the healthcare facilities, in the infrastructure that is needed to support those additional troops in the Australian Defence Force and the additional rotations that are coming into the future and we're making those investments, we’re making the investments in this important infrastructure to ensure that we can cater for those contingencies into the future.

JOURNALIST: Just on the command centre. Can you just explain, you know what the command centre’s function will be, how many people will work there? But just as a, just a general sort of a question about design and architecture in Darwin, this is a fantastic building that we don't see here in the CBD at all. Is there any merit in considering actually building some of those assets in the city outside, off-base to value add the city rather than just your asset as well.

ASSISTANT MINISTER: Yeah, it is a fantastic facility. And it represents the great partnership that exists between the Defence Force and local industry. That's a building that was delivered by local industry and that's something that the Darwin construction community should be very, very proud of. I can certainly put the local government in touch with the Defence Force and the Security and Estate Group so that they can make these contractors available to the local community for specific jobs. But the command and control centre is an important part of the management of missions that take place from this wharf here and you've got some of the most skilled and technologically capable operators that operate out of that centre and provide the comms and the navigation and the support to our troops, who are undertaking those patrols across the north. Thanks everyone. 

ENDS