Like any newly elected government, the chant is often “Jobs, Jobs, Jobs”, but the defence manufacturing sector in Victoria has been given special attention in that arena.
Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews has made a bold announcement that the state government will establish a Defence Procurement Office in Deakin University’s Waurn Ponds Campus in a bid to boost the defence industry and ensure the state gets its “fair share” of national defence work.
The Office will act as the go-between for the Australian defence manufacturing sector and the Department of Defence as a way of securing big contracts, as well as nominating Geelong as a national “Centre of Excellence” for the multi-billion LAND 400 Capture project.
It is an industry that has an annual turnover of about $1.5 billion and includes more than 300 businesses and directly employs about 6,000 people who build equipment and provide services that are crucial for defence force activities.
The government has committed $5 million to the establishment of this project, as well as $60,500 to support the appointment of a specialist defence consultant to advocate Geelong as the centre of expertise for the LAND 400 project.
The LAND 400 project is an ambitious project valued at $10 billion from 2014 to 2034 to build new state-of-the-art military land vehicles to replace the Australian Defence Force’s existing fleet of ageing armoured combat vehicles between 2020 and 2025.
But there needs to be a working private sector industry to research, develop and ultimately build the new vehicles, so the Land 400 project represents the biggest motivator for the municipalities to push for big state and federal support to get the project off the ground.
The announcement is sure to satisfy Geelong’s deep seated defence manufacturing industry, where companies and local governments have persistently pushed for state and federal commitment to ensure the sector received greater exposure for its products and services.
This is particularly the case for the G21 – Geelong Region Alliance (G21), a formal peak body for government, business and community organisations across five municipalities including Colac Otway, Golden Plains, Greater Geelong, Queenscliffe and Surf Coast.
The military hardware presence in Geelong is also set to become even more robust as the City of Greater Geelong is presently assessing a bid from Mercedes Benz valued at $600 million to create a military vehicle assembly plant, as publicly confirmed by Mayor Darryn Lyons.
Mr Lyons championed the announcement on Twitter and congratulated everyone that “worked hard on Land400”.
“Today was a fantastic announcement for the city!” Mr Lyons said.
It ought to be, since the region has been in great need of an economic boost since the automotive manufacturing sector in Victoria and South Australia has gone south due to significant scaling back across many companies.
And other companies have completely abandoned the region to outsource manufacturing overseas, which has resulted in huge job losses at companies such as Ford, Alcoa and Qantas.
An uncertain future awaits these manufacturing professionals – and local and state government has persistently pushed for new bold plans to bring jobs back into the region.
If the new Defence Procurement Office is successful in bringing exposure to the sector, stakeholders will be relieved at the prospect of a potential recovery.
Victorian Minister for Industry, Lily D’Ambrosio said “we’ll market the skills of our local manufacturers to the biggest defence contractors in the world.”
G21 expects that the LAND 400 project would also help the transition of the region’s existing manufacturing sector by giving employment to trained industry workers.
The project would also help the transition of Geelong’s existing manufacturing sector through the re-employment of trained industry workers.
