Shalailah Medhora theguardian.com, Wednesday 26 November 2014
David Johnston calls critical comment ‘a rhetorical flourish’ but South Australia Liberal leader says position may be untenable
Defence minister David Johnston says he should have blamed Labor rather than the shipbuilder. Photograph: Greg Wood/AFP/Getty Images
The defence minister, David Johnston, has said he is willing to apologise for expressing a lack of confidence in the government-owned shipbuilder ASC, as Labor called for his sacking.
Johnston described Tuesday’s remark to the Senate that he would not trust ASC to build a canoe as “a rhetorical flourish”. The corporation builds air warfare destroyers and maintains the fleet of Collins class submarines.
Johnston’s comments raised the ire of both the Labor party and the South Australian Liberals.
The SA Liberal leader, Steven Marshall, said Johnston’s comments may have made his position untenable.
“I think unless he can rebuild some connection, some rapport, some confidence within the industry, then I don’t think he has any alternative, I don’t think that his current position is tenable, unless he can rebuild that confidence with the sector.”
Johnston told ABC radio on Wednesday morning he would be willing to apologise to Marshall if he had caused offence.
“It was a rhetorical flourish that was not focused at the workers of ASC, it was about the way the management has simply gone ahead and not worked with government and indeed the previous [Labor] government has misled us all,” he said.
“What I should have said was the Labor party should not be trusted to build a canoe because it was their responsibility.”
Later on Wednesday morning, he addressed the Senate and offered an apology to ASC workers.
“I did not intend to cause offence and of course may I say on the record here and now that I regret the offence may have been taken. Of course I was directing my remarks at a legacy of issues and certainly not the workers in ASC who may have in my regret taken offence at those remarks. I consider them to be world class,” Johnston said.
Labor put forward a censure motion as soon as the House of Representatives sat on Wednesday, as pressure mounted on Tony Abbott to dump Johnston from the defence portfolio.
“Does the defence minister still have the prime minister’s confidence?” the opposition leader, Bill Shorten, said.
“We have seen chronic underperformance in the defence portfolio since this government has been elected. We have seen this government systematically undermine security by trashing confidence in our platforms and capacity,” Shorten said.
The manager of opposition business, Tony Burke, said no one had had the courage to tell Johnston it was time to move on.
The Senate opposition leader, Penny Wong, called Johnston “an utter disgrace” and said his comments were a “campaign of denigration” to undermine ASC.
Before the federal election, the defence minister had promised that future submarine building projects would be undertaken by ASC.
But Wong warned that Johnston was “softening up” the public for a broken promise and intended to offer the tenders to a Japanese company.
“This is a man who is in charge of a multibillion-dollar project, who has jeopardised the fair and equitable conduct of that procurement process. Does anyone believe after his performance that this minister will make a fair and unbiased decision when it comes to the future submarines project? No one in Australia believes that, no one in this Senate believes that. Not even your South Australian colleagues behind you or in fact your cabinet colleagues believe that.”
The leader of the government in the Senate, Eric Abetz, backed Johnston, saying “everyone is human”. He said: “Senator Johnston is doing a fantastic job in defence.”
The independent SA senator Nick Xenophon didn’t seem to think so, saying the government was “up shit creek without a paddle” as he arrived at parliament with a paddle as a prop.
The Coalition frontbencher Christopher Pyne refused to publicly back Johnston in an interview on Wednesday morning.
“It’s not for me to indicate my preferences for who should be in the cabinet. That is a decision of the prime minister. Certainly it’s also not my role to criticise my fellow cabinet members and I won’t be doing that,” Pyne said.
Abbott supported the SA shipbuilder on Tuesday night, which Labor said was a slap down for Johnston.
The prime minister said: “Whilst ASC has had challenges meeting the government’s cost and schedule expectations of the air warfare destroyer programme, we are working closely with ASC on a reform strategy to improve shipyard performance and productivity.”
“It is early days, but the government is confident that ASC and its partners will successfully turn the corner on this important build.”
The Labor frontbencher Stephen Conroy said there was no statement of support for the minister in Abbott’s comments. “They have no confidence in the minister,” he said.
