THE HON ANDREW HASTIE MP
SHADOW MINISTER FOR DEFENCE
SHADOW MINISTER FOR DEFENCE INDUSTRY
SHADOW MINISTER FOR DEFENCE PERSONNEL
FEDERAL MEMBER FOR CANNING

TRANSCRIPT
INTERVIEW WITH MICHAEL McLAREN, 2GB AFTERNOONS

THURSDAY 20 MARCH 2025

Topics: Labor’s mismanagement of Collins-class submarine LOTE program, Australia’s Defence capability, the Coalition’s plan for a strong Australian Defence Force, Defence spending, re-industrialisation.

MICHAEL McLAREN: Well, we have some hope. We have some hope and his name is Andrew Hastie. He's the Shadow Defence Minister, and he's on the line. Andrew, thank you for your time.

ANDREW HASTIE: My pleasure, Michael.

MICHAEL McLAREN: We have hope in you, although the Australian public will be looking at the Adelaide dockyards and seeing what's happened with the Collins class submarines and thinking, unless Andrew Hastie can perform a miracle, it may be a little hopeless. What's the state of play there with those particular subs?

ANDREW HASTIE: Well, the big picture, of course, Michael, is that we're living in a more dangerous neighbourhood and under Labor, we are less prepared to defend ourselves than we have been in decades. They've cut $80 billion from the Defence budget, and we've recently discovered—just this week, in fact—that the cuts have included the scaling back of the Collins-class submarine life-of-type extension program. Now, until we receive our Virginia-class submarines in the early 2030s, we're going to have a capability gap unless we refresh our Collins-class submarines with new diesel engines, new generators and other componentry, which are critical for the capability. What we've seen is that Labor's gutted the sustainment budget as well, and so now they're scaling back the life-of-type extension for our submarines, which means our submarine capability is also going to be degraded as well. Labor is not taking the defence of the nation seriously. A lot of your listeners wouldn't walk out of their homes and leave them unlocked. Under Labor, we're increasingly defenceless, I think, as we found out with the flotilla from the Chinese circumnavigating our continent. The Virgin Airlines pilot was the forward edge of our surveillance capability, and it's a big problem.

MICHAEL McLAREN: True. Mind you, with all of that said, it's not as if the defence capability of this country just fell off a cliff in the last two and a half years. I mean, Labor have only been in for two and a half. The Coalition were in for ten before that. I mean, let's be honest, there are some questions to be answered by both sides about how we're in this position.

ANDREW HASTIE: Yeah, sure, Michael. And of course, you know, we all have an obligation to improve Defence. When we got the Defence budget back in 2013, Labor had taken it to the lowest Defence spend since 1938 –

MICHAEL McLAREN: True.

ANDREW HASTIE: – and we increased it back up to two per cent. It wasn't flawless, of course – no government is perfect – but we certainly got Defence spending back on the right trajectory. But under Labor, they've pulled out $80 billion and that's a big problem. We are taking action, though, to improve Defence, which is why we announced recently the fourth squadron of F-35s.

MICHAEL McLAREN: Okay. Many people say what we need is long-range defence capability. So we don't just think about defending Australia within like, you know, three kilometres off the coast, or something like that. We need long projection. We need long range bombers, particularly domestic fixed, long-range missile capability, so that anyone approaching from our northern extremities will think twice about just how close they can get before we can hit back. Is there any hope on the horizon here that under a Coalition government, we're going to get a very strong, long-range, lethal missile deterrent?

ANDREW HASTIE: We're going to do a number of things, Michael. We've got to fix the recruiting crisis. We've got to fix the retention crisis. We've got to fix the readiness crisis. Part of the readiness crisis is our combat power—and you're absolutely right—we need to be able to hold our adversaries at risk, at distance, and the best way to do that is with strike platforms. Submarines are important, but so too are missiles. But we also need to think about drones as well, and we've had a number of defence companies in this country supply leading edge technology to Ukraine in their fight against Russia's invasion. So we have the capabilities, we have the intellectual property and the knowledge and the people, we've just got to invest in Australian businesses. And I think we can develop some world leading capabilities that will secure our supply lines and our lines of communication as well. You made the point about our fuel security, our pharmaceuticals. I've got to tell you, Michael, if our supply lines are cut or held at risk by a navy, for example, all those Coles and Woolies trucks that drive from all our capital city airports and deliver food to the outer metro and regional areas – they'll stop driving because we run on a diesel economy. So fuel security is important, and we need to protect our lines of trade with long-range strike.

MICHAEL McLAREN: I mean, you'd know this because you worked with him, the late great Jim Molan as a gift of the nation, wrote that book in his dying months. And it says basically what you were saying there, that we need to be prepared, not just militarily, but across the economy. We need to be prepared for what might come our way. We're not. And again, that's not just the fault of the last two and a half years, and Jim made this point to me, we've been slow off the mark no matter who's been in power when it comes to fuel security, food security, energy security, water security – you name it. I guess what I'm saying is, should you become Defence Minister, we need to encompass under that portfolio, do we not, more than just talk about submarines and soldiers and missiles, we need a whole of economy approach.

ANDREW HASTIE: That's right. Jim Molan was a great man, and his final months were spent writing about the defence of his country, and for that, we're very grateful to him and his family. I think the message from Jim is national resilience matters. It's not just about having platforms, we've actually got to have the hardware, but we've got to have the heart-ware as well. We've got to have Australians with big hearts who want to defend their country, from those in uniform to those in defence industry to those in our Parliament, who've got to lead on these issues and encourage young Australians to do their bit. So I'd love to see more young Australians getting into uniform, I want to keep more Australians in uniform, and I think we have this amazing tradition of citizen soldiering that goes all the way back to Anzac, and our reserve units need to be built up as well. So there's a whole range of things that we need to look at. And that's the gift that Jim gave us – national resilience. We're not doing it under Labor, we need to be doing it, and we'll do it under a Dutton government.

MICHAEL McLAREN: It doesn't come for free, though. Patriotism, yeah, okay, you don't have to pay for that, necessarily, but the equipment you do. We're going to have to find some money and you know this, you've been working on this, no doubt. But let's say we get to two and a half percent of GDP on Defence, the Americans want us to get to three, I think we're going to have to get there. How do we do it? We can't just borrow the money. We're going to have to have some pretty, I think, blunt conversations with the Australian public about where we don't spend money anymore so that we can liberate it for this.

ANDREW HASTIE: That's right. We'll have more to say about this, we'll have the budget next week. But the bottom line is that Labor in April last year committed to spending 2.4 per cent of GDP by the end of the decade. They've since revised that down to 2.3 per cent, so they're already falling behind their own targets. And you're absolutely right, none of this is for free. Hard decisions have to be made, trade-offs have to be considered, but what price can you put on the defence of the nation? And so Labor has to lead here. We've got the message every time they've stood up over the last two and a half years and said: ‘Australia is living in the most dangerous strategic circumstances since the end of the Second World War.’ And I say to them, well, do something about it! Stop talking about it. You've had a signal now from President Trump, and I think Europe is waking up to the new strategic reality. Let's see some investment from Labor. What we're going to announce—we'll do that in due course—but people have already got a sense of where we're going. We committed to the fourth squadron of F-35 fighters with an additional $3 billion already committed. So our posture is moving in the right direction, and Peter Dutton will have more to say about that next week.

MICHAEL McLAREN: Okay, I know how this works, but just give me one example of where there will be some savings to spend in Defence. You say $3 billion for the jets. Okay, fine. You're either going to borrow the money or you're going to cut somewhere or save somewhere to get that $3 billion. Do we get a sense of where that is?

ANDREW HASTIE: Well, Michael, Peter Dutton will give his Budget in Reply speech on Thursday night, and it would be unwise of me to speculate about what might be in that. But he's made it very clear that Defence is a priority for us. And people have got to remember that we actually have the opportunity to invest in Australia. If we start investing in our own defence industry, if we re-industrialise parts of our economy that strengthens us—our own sovereignty, our own resilience—it also creates jobs and opportunities for Australians as well.

MICHAEL McLAREN: That's true, but it also delays – as we've seen with Adelaide over many, many years – it also delays the acquisition of hardware, right? Because we're not buying it off the shelf, as it were. Look, I'm with you, I think we should be investing in defence material domestically. But do we have time on our side to do that now, or do we really now just have to start going shopping overseas and seeing what we can get?

ANDREW HASTIE: Well, the reality with AUKUS is we won't receive our new submarines until the early 2030s. Our general purpose frigate, we won't receive until the late part of this decade, if it's on time. Our submarines are being degraded under Labor. So we need to work out how do we deliver lethal, cheap capability to defend Australia in the next three to five years, and I think Australian defence industry has the answer. It's just a question of backing them. Ever since we lost the car industry in Adelaide and Victoria, it's like we've lost our confidence to build things, and I think we can absolutely build things. I was in Melbourne at a defence business which is using lasers to shoot down drones, world leading technology – AIM Defence. I was amazed at what these two entrepreneurs have done. It's world leading technology. Let's find these people and let's back them, let's invest in them. Instead, they're going offshore, because the Australian Government—under Anthony Albanese—is not backing Australian defence industry.

MICHAEL McLAREN: Yeah, okay, but the car industry – I agree with you – but the car industry was dealt the final death blow, not by the Labor Party, it was by the Coalition. And so, the Coalition would say, look, they were uncompetitive, and the reason they were uncompetitive is that the unions got in there and demanded ridiculous levels of protection and wages. Which brings me to this – it's a story in The Australian just the other day, but our biggest Defence projects are facing a massive wages and cost blowout with BAE's Hunter Class Frigate Program the latest target in a union led campaign. They want 30 per cent wage rises over three years. So this is my point. I agree we should have domestic capability, but if the guys and the girls working there want 30 per cent over three years, and we have a, let's be blunt, rather poor track record of churning out kit compared to overseas, where there's quantity and scale, are we shooting ourselves in the foot when times not on our side?

ANDREW HASTIE: Well, I think we've got to do both. We're obviously getting F-35s from the United States, we're getting Virginia-class submarines from the United States, but we also have to build up our own capacity, and that's a message from President Trump. You know, allies have to step up and be self-sufficient. As to re-industrialisation of the different parts of the economy that are critical here, that comes down to political leadership, and that's why Peter Dutton is going to be a far better choice than Anthony Albanese. He's pro small business, he understands how to get business going. We want to get energy prices down. We want to make this country a place for investment. We want to get projects moving and of course, government often gets in the way of these things. We want to support industry, not slow them down. Under Anthony Albanese, they're applying a massive brake, and that's why we've seen 27,000 small businesses go under this government.

MICHAEL McLAREN: Yeah, well, energy has been the problem there. Just finally, I know you've had things to say in the past about the Defence Department. I mean, this is the final question. I guess a lot of people would say, okay, we've got to spend more on Defence, but if we're wasting the, what's the budget at the moment, $53 billion per annum? If we're wasting a lot of that, no point just pouring more money into the bucket with the hole. Simultaneously, I guess, we want to clean up the Defence Department and make it match fit, or should I say battle fit, before we start boosting the cheque book, right?

ANDREW HASTIE: That's right. We've got to lean it out. We've got to sharpen it up at the top as well. It's bloated, it's top heavy, it needs reform of its command and control. And we've got to get decision making moving much more quickly, and that means empowering the leadership, making them accountable for decisions, and giving them the permission structure and the culture to make decisions. People are so afraid now of making mistakes, of being accused of corrupt conduct, that they're delaying decisions, and that's why a lot of this money is being wasted and not getting out the door quickly enough. I want to make sure that we empower the people at the top to make the calls to defend our country and give them the resources they need, and say: ‘right—you're accountable, you're responsible, go get after the problem and make it happen.’ And that's what political leadership is in Defence, and that's what I'm going to deliver under Peter Dutton.

MICHAEL McLAREN: I think a lot of people look to you as a future leader, and we'd be in pretty capable hands I think, Andrew, if that were to happen. Thank you for being so generous with your time, and hopefully we can speak again before the vote in May.

ANDREW HASTIE: Thank you, Michael. It's a pleasure always from Perth.

[ENDS]