891 ABC Adelaide

SUBJECTS: Future Submarine Program, same-sex marriage plebiscite

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: Lets to right now though, to Christopher Pyne, Minister for Defence Industry. Good Morning Christopher Pyne.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Good morning Matthew.

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: And sorry to keep you waiting but we are keeping an eye on the rain.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: No not at all.

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: Chris Pyne, the Premier, in a tweet, hash-tagged sad old men. Which is a way of describing the five businessmen who’d place this add expressing their concerns about the submarine contract. Do you agree with him?

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Well those five businessmen are entitled to their opinion, and an opinion can be misinformed, misguided and plain wrong. And in this occasion those five gentlemen are entirely wrong. And they’ve spent a lot of money, telling the world how wrong they are.

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: Let’s go through some of the things that they said. One was that putting a diesel piston submarine against a nuclear one, is like putting a piston propeller fighter up against a modern jet. We will be condemning our sailors to their graves.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Well obviously that’s just entirely hyperbolic and quite wrong. We don’t have nuclear energy in Australia, and therefore we can’t have nuclear submarine. And many countries of course, don’t have nuclear submarines and have perfectly adequate navies. And our Collins-class submarines are amongst the best in the world. They are the most lethal platforms we have in our Defence Force, and they’re not nuclear.

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: No but they were never designed to be nuclear, is that correct? They were designed to be diesel electric.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: But neither will the future submarines.

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: Their argument is that we don’t have a design for the French subs yet, what we do have though. There’s not one operational French Barracuda Submarine. This is what they’re saying Chris Pyne.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: I know that’s what they’re saying, but they’re not right.

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: Well they’re saying the first version is still in the shipyard, but that is a nuclear powered version. They said it’s never been tried before that you would take a nuclear powered design, and then effectively retrofit it, I suppose, to make it diesel electric.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Well quite clearly we are not getting a short fin Barracuda Submarine. We are getting a unique design for Australia conditions. Because we operate in the Indian Ocean. We operate in the pacific. These are quite different oceans, quite different temperatures. So designs for our submarine will be unique. We’ve chosen DCNS because we believe that they have the best record, and the best designs in terms of large submarines that are both nuclear and non-nuclear, to build design our submarines into the future. And these gentlemen are perfectly entitled to their views. There are a lot of people with opinions about what’s best for defence. But the choice of these submarines went through a very thorough competitive evaluation process. The advice on defence was entirely clear. And that was that the French DCNS design was the best for what we needed for our capability.

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: You’re saying we’re not getting the short fin Barracuda, which one are we getting?

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: We’re getting a unique design for Australia that DCNS will start on very soon.

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: But what’s that called?

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Well when we’ve decided the name, you’ll be the first to know.

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: I thought we were getting the short fin Barracuda, that was on your posters I think.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: It’s based on that particular submarine, because it’s the same size and generally the same size. It’s not going to be a short fin Barracuda, because it’s a unique Australian design.

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: Alright, so it won’t be a nuclear sub that’s going to have the reactor taken out, and you’ve bolted in a diesel Massey Ferguson thing they charge in a few batteries.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Of course not, no.

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: We know that. But we don’t know the design yet. And do we have a contract yet, or do we just have a press release?

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: We signed an agreement with DCNS on July 20. So the idea that we don’t have an ongoing relationship with DCNS is another total misnomer. And we will be soon signing a contract. But those things take time to negotiate and get right. I mean this is a many decades arrangement to built 12 submarines. It’s not something you announce on Friday and sign on Monday.

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: No. So what have we signed? It’s not a contract. What have we signed?

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: We’ve signed an agreement to enter into negotiations to sign a contract on 20 July, and that’s what we’ve been doing.

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: Right.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: And we’ll soon be able to announce the next stage, and we are well on- we are entirely on schedule. Exactly as we’ve expected is exactly what’s happening.

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: So how long-

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: And those people who are saying things like those five businessmen and others, like other politicians, simply don’t know what is going on.

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: Okay. How locked in are we to DCNS? If we haven’t actually signed the contract yet, we’ve simply signed an agreement to enter into negotiations which will result in a contract. Could we walk away from it without penalty right now if we wanted to? I’m not saying we will, but is that the kind of agreement we’ve signed up to?

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: We are- we have chosen DCNS to be our designers of this submarine.

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: Yeah.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: And we are going through the negotiations to sign a contract, so-

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: So we could walk away now if we wanted to. I’m not saying we will.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: We have absolutely no intention of doing that.

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: Not, but that is the nature of what we’ve signed. That is, we’re in a sort of a twilight zone at the moment. We could walk away if we wanted to but in fact you’re saying we are moving through the twilight to wonderful daylight.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Well, of course we have chosen DCNS to be our designers, and in a negotiation process you can of course walk away but we have absolutely no intention of doing that and neither does DCNS, so it’s entirely hypothetical and really completely irrelevant.

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: Well now Xenophon said yesterday look, the development times for the new DCNS sub, yet to be named, it may be that those development times are so far off it will result in a capability gap, and to fill that gap we might need to, in the short term, buy an off the shelf submarine from overseas and have it sent here and we can bolt it together.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: And that won’t be necessary, and Senator Xenophon is another person who doesn’t have all the information that’s at the hands of the Government because of course he’s not in government, he’s simply a commentator on these matters. We will be building 12 submarines, they’ll be starting in the early 2020s. They will be available to go into the water in the early 2030s. We have six very capable Collins class submarines that are in operation now, and we intend to continue those submarines until the new submarines are ready.

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: So you’re saying that the current Collins class submarines are good enough to continue right into the 2030s without a capability gap?

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: There is no capability gap, and there’ll be no necessity for us to do anything of the sort that Senator Xenophon suggests.

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: There is- I think the focus of his concern – and I mean I think when he was saying that we may have heard a dull thudding as Tony Abbott was banging his head against a desk, because that was, I think, the original plan, wasn’t it?

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: No.

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: It was comprehensively bagged – not by you – but I’m just saying comprehensively bagged by Nick Xenophon.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: No, that wasn’t the original plan, no.

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: Really?

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: That’s right, there wasn’t a plan.

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: We must have…

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: There’s no- it’s completely ridiculous to suggest that things that people have claimed are somehow facts in the past – no matter how long ago they were said – but there was never a plan to do what Senator Xenophon has suggested, just to buy an off the shelf and bolt it together anywhere. I mean, this is a serious business.

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: Well there seems to be- no, no, no, but there seem to be quite…

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: We’re actually building 12 submarines and spending $50 billion of Australian taxpayers’ money to do so. It’s not something that you know, can be dealt with in such a light-hearted manner as Senator Xenophon might be dealing with it.

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: Was there not quite a lot of discussion by the Government about, you know, with the same job impact here but the critical components and the design being done overseas, effectively an established design?

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: No. The Government established the competitive evaluation process.

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: I meant the…

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Three bidders bid for that design of the 12 submarines, and DCNS was chosen, so-

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: I know that.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: I’m not going to go back in history and comment on other peoples’ comments.

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: Well you’re just telling- it was only three years ago, Tony Abbot was Prime Minister.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Well you’re wrong, and you can keep putting this wrong thing to me but it’s wrong.

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: You’re saying there was never any- well I’m sorry, I seem to remember quite a lot of discussion because we were doing interviews about it and that was the-

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Maybe those interviews were wrong as well.

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: Well the past is a different place.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Well you’re still wrong. Today as you were three years ago.

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: I wasn’t saying it Chris Pyne.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: I mean this is ridiculous Matthew. We have-

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: No it’s not. It’s not ridiculous.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Okay.

DAVID BEVAN: But people are entitled to ask, Christopher Pyne, because you’re spending so much of their money, and lives will be at- will rest upon these decisions. People are entitled to explore the process. And you dismiss it by saying well that’s wrong, that’s wrong, that’s wrong.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Well if they are wrong, then they should be pointed out being right, that they are wrong.

DAVID BEVAN: Absolutely. Absolutely. But if…

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: …and most of the things you’ve put to me this morning are false, and the advertisement in the newspaper was full of things that were false.

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: …Okay. Are you suggesting- just humour me here, Chris Pyne.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: I’ve been humouring you for years and years and years, Matthew. I’m quite happy to humour you this morning.

DAVID BEVAN: Let’s not be flippant, these are serious matters.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Well, I’m not the one being flippant.

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: Chris Pyne. Are you saying that prior to the competitive evaluation process – so we’re going back to Tony Abbott – there was no serious discussion by Defence or by Cabinet of going for an established design, because it would have been cheaper? Still building it here, you know, bolting it together here.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: The only decisions the Government have made about the submarine project – the Future Submarines – was to establish a competitive evaluation process, and to then allow that process to run. Speculation is not decisions by government.

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: But that wasn’t speculation, that was serious consideration. I mean, what was Tony Abbott doing-

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: No. It was never seriously considered.

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: So when the Prime Minister has a conversation with people in Japan, that’s not serious?

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: The Prime Minister has never said that he had a conversation or anything else with people in Japan about an off the shelf design for submarines, so you’re putting things to me that aren’t true, and pretending that they are, and quite clearly that’s just wrong. We had a competitive evaluation process for a unique design for Australia’s needs. We’ve gone on through that process, we have chosen DCNS, we will build 12 submarines in Adelaide, creating jobs and investment in our country and this is a very good thing for our economy and our future national security. These speculative conversations that apparently have been held many years ago for [indistinct] are things that either I can’t comment on because I don’t know, or are just wrong.

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: Okay Chris Pyne, before you leave us, the plebiscite, we’re told that there’ll be $7.5 million allocated to each side, the yes and the no case, do you know who gets that money, has anyone worked that out?

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Yes the committees – the yes and no committees are for the plebiscite will be allocated those funds and there will be ten members of each of those committees, five of them will be MPs, five of them will be representatives of organisations and they will plan the yes and no cases. Of course beyond that, anybody can spend whatever money they want to on the plebiscite in terms of campaigning and there’ll be safeguards of course to ensure that the advertising is

not such that the Government wouldn’t allow it to be aired.

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: And who gets to decide who’s on the committee?

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Well the Opposition will be asked to nominate two members, the crossbenchers one member, the Government two members, and there’ll be a process yet established to choose the five community representatives.

DAVID BEVAN: Right but you don’t know how the five community representatives will be chosen?

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Well in the past there’s been nominations by government and other times there’s been elections, I don’t – well there certainly won’t be an election on this occasion.

DAVID BEVAN: No.

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: Is this a unique process or is there a precedent for this – the way you’re doing this, this mechanism?

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: We’ve followed the precedents from previous referenda and plebiscites and this is basically the same as the 1999 referendum on the republic.

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: Right and will the outcome, should the referendum go ahead, and it’s not clear that they will because Labor may oppose it, but if the poll goes ahead next year, will it affect the way that you vote, Christopher Pyne, or have you made up your mind anyway on a matter of principle you’ve thought this through?

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Well I’ll be voting yes in the plebiscite for marriage equality and if that plebiscite passes and that bill comes to the House then I’ll be voting yes in favour of that bill.

DAVID BEVAN: Right.

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: If the plebiscite says no, will you be voting no, I suppose that’s the…

DAVID BEVAN: Yeah.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Well if the plebiscite votes no there won’t be a bill presented to the Parliament.

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: Right.

DAVID BEVAN: So it’s binding?

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: But if the plebiscite says no to changing the law, why would the Government introduce a bill to change the law?

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: Okay.

DAVID BEVAN: Okay.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Clearly if the plebiscite says no that’s the end of the matter. If the plebiscite says yes the Government will introduce the necessary law to change the law.

DAVID BEVAN: Alright.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: So that’s the way the Government works.

DAVID BEVAN: Well it’s just that for instance, the Labor Party is saying you shouldn’t have a plebiscite and you should just go to the Parliament and have a vote so it’s not going to be the end of the matter for a lot of MPs is it, regardless of what the plebiscite finds? But look I take your point, if the plebiscite says no, certainly the Government won’t be pursuing it any further.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: No there won’t be a bill into Parliament to introduce marriage equality if the plebiscite says no, so obviously that’s a decision of the people and we want the people to have a say unlike the Labor Party who don’t trust the people to have a say on something that’s a very significant social change.

DAVID BEVAN: If it says yes, if the plebiscite decision’s yes and you introduce legislation, you would expect all members of the Coalition to say – to vote yes?

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Well that’ll be a matter for their conscience. Now I mean I think anybody who doesn’t vote according to the way the plebiscite is decided is taking their own political career in their hands I guess because they’re saying to the public well you’ve spoken but we’re not going to actually follow what you’ve suggested which is kind of brave but…

DAVID BEVAN: Well no you might represent a… you might represent a very conservative electorate. It might be brave to follow the result of the plebiscite.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Look this is a matter for people’s consciences, they’ll have to make that decision themselves but I have absolutely no doubt that if the plebiscite says yes, I’ll be voting yes because – and I’ll be voting yes obviously for the machinery bill and I’ll be voting yes in the plebiscite so because I’m a very positive person, I’m always saying yes.

MATTHEW ABRAHAM: [Laughter].

DAVID BEVAN: Well you don’t always say yes to us.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: No, no, it just depends on which questions you ask.

DAVID BEVAN: That’s because you’re a fixer. Chris Pyne. Christopher Pyne thank you for talking to us.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Pleasure thank you.

DAVID BEVAN: From Canberra, he’s a Liberal MP for Sturt, very influential person in the Turnbull Government and the Liberal Party particularly, not just federally but certainly in South Australia, he’s the Minister for Defence Industry.