AUKUS anxiety: Local fears grow around submarine build
South Australians lead the nation in believing that the AUKUS security pact between Australia, the United States and the UK will make the nation less safe, while two thirds of people polled by The Australia Institute support a parliamentary inquiry into the agreement.
Results of a YouGov poll, commissioned by the Institute and released on Monday, indicate that support for a parliamentary inquiry has increased from 57 per cent of those surveyed nationally to 66 per cent, while just fewer than half, at 14 per cent, believe the agreement would make Australia safer.
A quarter of South Australians who were polled believe AUKUS would make us less safe, ahead of Western Australian respondents on 24 per cent and 23 per cent for people from the territories.
And 71 per cent of South Australians polled support a parliamentary inquiry into AUKUS – 5 percentage points higher than the national average.
SA’s defence industry stands to benefit greatly particularly once the construction of the SSN-AUKUS submarines moves to Australia, with the Australian Submarine Agency saying in the past the home-grown submarine build will start by the end of the decade.
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Enabling works have already started at the Osborne shipyard, with a view to delivering the first local submarines to the Royal Australian Navy in the early 2040s.
The fate of the AUKUS agreement remains up in the air however, with the US recently extending the deadline for its own review of AUKUS, which was scheduled to be completed this past weekend.
Acting Defence Minister Patrick Conroy told the ABC on the weekend the government was optimistic about the outcome of the review.
“I’m confident it will support AUKUS just as our review of AUKUS (and) the UK review found,” Conroy told the ABC’s Insiders program on Sunday.
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“There’s been lots of speculation about what the timeframe is of the review … my last information is that the review has not been completed yet.”
The Australia’ Institute’s director of its International & Security Affairs program Emma Shortis said, “In a healthy democracy, scrutiny of a deal the size and scope of AUKUS should be welcomed’’.
“It is truly extraordinary that of the three countries that are party to the deal, Australia – which bears the brunt of both the cost and the risk – is the only one not to have put AUKUS to a genuine review,’’ Shortis said.
“The AUKUS submarine deal would undermine Australia’s ability to make independent decisions about the future of our own security.
“It is only right that such a huge change should be put to genuine democratic scrutiny.’’
Shortis said the pact would tie Australia to an “an increasingly volatile and unpredictable United States’’.
“As Trump upends the world order as we know it, the vast majority of Australians want the Parliament to be able to do its job, and have a genuine conversation about the future of our security.”
Premier Peter Malinauskas said recently that the US review of AUKUS could make the program more secure by ending any doubt as to its future.
The YouGov poll was an online survey of 1522 voters conducted between June 27 and July 3.
The State Government has been contacted for comment.
