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Updated September 28th, 2021 at 16:52 IST

Labour organisations lament job losses after Australia's AUKUS agreement with US and UK

Australia's top labour organization has slammed government's decision to cancel submarine deal with France, warning that it has put thousands of job at risk

Reported by: Aparna Shandilya
Australia
Image: AP | Image:self
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Australia's top labour organization has slammed the federal government's decision to cancel a $90 billion submarine deal with France in favour of building a nuclear-powered fleet, warning that it has jeopardised thousands of employment.

According to the Australian Council of Trade Unions, the new AUKUS agreement with the United States and the United Kingdom will deprive Australia's shipbuilding and manufacturing communities of "good jobs for centuries to come". The position pits the union movement against the federal lab, which has broadly supported the plan despite citing worries about Australia's sovereignty.

In a letter to Prime Minister Scott Morrison, ACTU assistant secretary Scott Connolly and Australian Manufacturing Workers' Union assistant national secretary Glenn Thompson stated that the agreement's announcement earlier this month "understated both the challenge and degree of change necessary."

They also expressed worry that the agreement with the United States and the United Kingdom lacked "the Australian content commitments of the previous treaty with France". The deal with the French Naval Group includes a requirement that work worth at least 60% of the contract value be completed in Australia. This is because the nuclear-enriched reactors will arrive built, which means it is unlikely to involve too much local effort.

Lockheed Martin, the American defence company that was to build the warfare systems for the French submarines, has already delivered termination letters to its subcontractors. While the nuclear option will provide Australia with significant advantages in terms of weapon storage, speed, and durability, the first submarine may not be in the water until 2040 - six years after the first French boat is slated to be built.

"We are upset with the government's ‘brutal and abrupt' termination of Naval Group Australia's (NGA) contract, which has put thousands of jobs at risk. This decision is a "betrayal" that would deprive Australia's shipbuilding and industrial communities of quality jobs for centuries to come.

"While we understand that negotiations with the US and UK were conducted in secret for national security reasons, it is disappointing that an agreement that had involved so much effort by so many, and on which many of our members were relying for future work, was scrapped with no warning or consultation with the affected workers' representatives", Mr Connolly and Mr Thompson said, The Sunday Morning Herald reported.

The union leaders also chastised the government for failing to confer with impacted workers' representatives before cancelling the French deal and for the "alarming" lack of detail available regarding the new arrangement and its impact on the navy shipbuilding workforce.

(With inputs from The Sunday Morning Herald)

Image: AP

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Published September 28th, 2021 at 16:52 IST

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