Billions of dollars and thousands of jobs for WA in defence industry manufacturing
The State-owned Australian Marine Complex, south of Perth, will become home to a Commonwealth Defence Precinct to manufacture the eight Mogami-class frigates, and serve as a hub for continuous naval shipbuilding.
'This is the single biggest defence agreement ever struck between Japan and Australia and Western Australia is at the heart of it,' Premier Roger Cook said.
'We know that what we will see with the engagement of the Japanese in relation to this construction program is that they will seek to integrate Western Australian companies into their overall supply chains.
'Not only will you see great outcomes in terms of ship construction, you'll see great outcomes in terms of allied companies, which can feed into that overall supply chain.'
Defence Industries Minister Paul Papalia said the AMC was already equipped to deliver the new frigate fleet, and there was a skilled workforce capable of delivering the project.
'Austal are building in Western Australia the evolved Cape-class and Pacific patrol boats. Civmec are building the offshore patrol vessels, and we have people engaged in similar tasks for maintenance of naval ships.
'All of that workforce are highly skilled and capable of doing very similar jobs, similar roles that they'll be required to do for building frigates.'
The Cook Government is investing into the Department of Training and Workforce Development to ensure a pipeline of skilled workers will be available to meet future demands for the defence industry.
'In the near term, there's a workforce that is capable and available,' Mr Papalia said.
'We've got to grow the scale of what we have in terms of numbers over time. We're talking tens of thousands of more jobs.'
In addition to ship manufacturing, the Navy's soon to be acquired conventionally armed, nuclear-powered submarines will be maintained and housed in WA.
The Federal Government has committed about $8 billion towards expanding HMAS Stirling including wharf upgrades and construction of maintenance, logistics and training facilities.
About 3500 jobs are expected to be generated over the next decade from the project.
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