Keep calm and carry on: Top-ranking UK MP drops into SA for subs talks
Amid turbulent defence commentary from the American president, the chief secretary to the UK Prime Minister quietly jetted into Adelaide to meet key leaders over the nation’s vital subs deal last week.
South Australian Premier Peter Malinauskas met with the UK’s Chief Secretary to the Prime Minister on Friday to discuss defence collaboration opportunities arising from the Australia-United Kingdom-United States (AUKUS) military agreement.
Darren Jones, UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s number two, also toured a number of key defence sites around Adelaide as part of his trip to Australia, which also included visits to Sydney and Canberra.
He was accompanied by the newly minted State Development Minister Chris Picton who told InDaily that Jones was in town to be briefed on preparations for AUKUS and it was reassuring to see the United Kingdom’s continued “interest and support”.
Billions of dollars will be spent by the federal and state governments on the AUKUS pact between Australia, the UK and the United States, that forms the backbone to having five nuclear submarines to be built in South Australia under an agreement with the UK.
In February, the federal government announced that at least $30 billion would be spent on the construction yard for the submarines in Osborne and pledged a $3.9 billion down payment to secure the Submarine Construction Yard’s future.
But concerns remain around whether the United States’ would deliver five Virginia-class nuclear-powered submarines to Australia as ordered under the AUKUS pact.
Jones and his delegation toured BAE Systems and ASC’s Osborne shipbuilding facility where much of the nation’s future defence building is set to take place, including the construction of nuclear-powered submarines under the AUKUS agreement.
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He also visited TAFE SA and the Tonsley Innovation Precinct with Picton, as well as Flinders University, “where they have the factory of the future”.
“The delegation was impressed in terms of the cooperation and the work that’s happened so far on AUKUS,” Picton told InDaily.
“We know there’s a lot more that needs to happen. There’s a long way to get to the point of manufacturing nuclear-powered submarines.
“The fact that we had this high-level delegation visit Adelaide is certainly a positive sign in terms of the interest and support from the United Kingdom.”
And Jones attended the Collingwood v Fremantle match as part of Gather Round over the weekend, taking to Instagram to say “we see eye to eye with Aussies on many things – coffee, Kylie, BBQs – but not the rules of football!”.
The visit comes as military relationships between Australia and the United States teeter, with US President Donald Trump repeatedly calling out Prime Minister Anthony Albanese for not supporting his nation’s war efforts in the Middle East.
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“We’ve received no requests… they’ve made this announcement overnight and they’ve done that in a unilateral way,” Albanese said.
“We haven’t been asked, and I don’t expect that we will be.”
Asked today by InDaily if the AUKUS agreement was still secure considering the global uncertainty and militarisation, Picton said: “We believe it absolutely is”.
“The difficulties that we see across the world in terms of global security only heighten the need for the development of AUKUS and the partnership,” he said.
“As well as doing our best to explain Australian Rules Football, we hosted a number of our defence companies at the football with the delegation. That’s another good opportunity for us to strengthen our links there.
“From both countries’ perspective, there’s a really strong partnership and agreed need for AUKUS.”
While Australia was unlikely to bring forward production of its own nuclear-powered submarines, Picton said: “We don’t have a second to waste in terms of preparation”.
“While I haven’t visited Barrow-in-Furness in the United Kingdom, from all accounts the scale of what is undertaken there is enormous and the development of what’s going to happen at Osborne is equally huge,” he said.
The Minister, formerly the Health Minister, said he was considering a trip to the United Kingdom.
“We’re certainly talking about various needs to connect with parts of the world, both with the trade and investment side of things, but also in terms of defence,” he said.
“We’ll consider that through the course of the next couple of months.”
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