Submarine deal a disgrace

Can anyone comprehend the massive stuff-up that is the Australian submarine deal?

Australia signs a valid contract multibillion-dollar with France and then changes its mind, going instead with UK and US offerings, triggering a hissy fit from France.

And fair enough, a contract is a contract, but that wasn’t the end of it as it now turns out there was a cost to the cancellation and that sum is $830 million!

The government, which is in charge and meant to know what it is doing, has just paid $830 million for well, absolutely nothing.

I can’t even just blame the politicians, there would have been highly paid public sector employees behind the scenes nutting out the detail.

Astonishing, this brings the cost – so the payout and the new contract – to $3.5 billion without so much as a periscope to be seen. It is estimated the delivery cost will be $90 billion.

Remember that next time the government assures us it knows what it’s doing and that it “can’t afford” something.

What’s your pet hate of government waste?

6 comments

"The government, which is in charge and meant to know what it is doing, has just paid $830 million for well, absolutely nothing. "

No, it is not for nothing....it is for restoring good relations with France. All contracts carry a cancellation fee. 

You are so right Sophie. Scott Morrison lied to the French. Although I hate the thought of all those millions being paid out, it had to be done to take the egg off Australia's face.

I think this government got us out of it cheaply given what the previous government signed up for.

Moving forward, perhaps?? ...

Australia must build conventional submarines before escalating to a nuclear-powered model or the whole program could fail, the Australian Industry and Defence Network says. A group of submarine veterans has pushed for a “son of Collins”, or an evolved version of the existing fleet. The Collins’ Swedish designer, Saab Kockums, said it would be happy to help.

New defence minister Richard Marles has said the submarine capability gap – with the existing Collins class ageing into obsolescence before any new, nuclear submarines hit the water – is his top priority.

The French could have supplied nuclear submarines if wanted at the time.

Just scummo sucking up to the seppos

With the amount of time it takes to have these subs built, it appears to me that even before they start getting built the subs are technologically deemed to be out of date.

Politicians stretch the truth as we are all aware so one side saying we paid too much and the other side saying we got out of it lightly means that the truth is somewhere in between. According to the Financial Review, under the terms of the contract between the Department of Defence and the Naval group, which is owned by the French government, the shipbuilder was not entitled to compensation, over and above a break fee. The break fee for terminating the contract at the basic design stage of the project was €90million ($136million). If the project had proceeded to the next stage, it would have risen to about €250million ($379million). It seems that Labor paid well above the contract

 

Pink batts anyone? Or a school hall perhaps?

 

6 comments



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