Tasmanian Government’s Submission to Defence White Paper

The Liberal Government is committed to helping business create jobs and grow the economy.

That is why we have provided a submission to the Federal Government’s Defence White Paper process that Tasmania should be attracting a much greater share of defence spending.

The Liberal Government will always fight for Tasmania’s fair share of defence spending. Unfortunately when it comes to bases, training facilities, maintenance and repair of defence equipment, and even ship visits, we get well below our fair share.

For obvious reasons, a larger proportion of defence infrastructure is going to always be located in Australia’s north, but even taking this into account, we get a far smaller share of defence spending than other southern states.

We will fight for our fair share of defence spending, because not only will it be good for jobs and good for the economy, it will also acknowledge the very proud history of Tasmanians serving their country with Tasmania having the highest per capita share of Defence Reservists in Australia.

We must also make sure that Tasmanian businesses are bidding for and winning defence contracts. At the moment, there are 28 Tasmanian businesses that are active in the defence contracting area, and we are actively engaging with the business community to ensure more Tasmania businesses can benefit.

The Liberal Government continues to stand up for Tasmanian businesses and fight for our fair share of Commonwealth Government spending.

The Government’s submission can be viewed at http://www.defence.gov.au/Whitepaper/docs/165-TasmanianGovernment.pdf
Matthew Groom, Minister for State Growth