AUKUS: PUSH TO LIFT SPEND; WA LABOR WIN
US defence official calls on Australia to lift military spending
Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles has sidestepped US demands that Australia raise its level of defence spending by up to $50 billion. In a media interview, the Defence Minister said Australia would “continue to have a conversation” with the US on its level of defence spending, but in the last three years, the nation had increased defence spending by the biggest level in peacetime history. During his confirmation hearings before the US Senate Committee on Armed Services, US Under-Secretary of Defense (Policy) Elbridge Colby said that Australia should be pressed to lift its defence spending. He said Australia was presently well below the level of three per cent of GDP advocated for NATO, and that Australia faced a far more powerful challenge in China.
Fears over US submarine production rate for AUKUS
Meanwhile, Elbridge Colby has expressed concern over US attack submarine force structure and production rates, in the context of the AUKUS defence partnership. Mr Colby said the US must increase attack submarine production to meet US military requirements in the Indo-Pacific region, as well as to meet its AUKUS obligations. The US defence official submitted to his Senate confirmation hearings (P.41) that AUKUS was a model of the type of co-operation the US needed to meet the challenges of the 21st century.
WA Labor re-elected with thumping majority
Voters have delivered the West Australian Labor Government a decisive mandate for a third term, with Premier Roger Cook on course for a comfortable majority. Early results from the March 8 election have Labor retaining at least 40 seats in the 59-seat WA Legislative Assembly, as the Liberal Party struggled to build on its record-low of two seats won in the 2021 election. The WA Liberals are set to assume Opposition leadership, with the Nationals. An Independent candidate may unseat a WA Minister in the seat of Fremantle. Mr Cook, who took over from former Labor Premier Mark McGowan in 2023, has promised to diversify WA’s resource-rich economy.
Trade, households lift economic growth rate
Australia’s economic growth rate has picked up, recording an annual 1.3 per cent increase in gross domestic product to the end of December 2024. Figures from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) show that a rebound in the nation’s terms of trade helped to lift GDP growth in the December quarter, along with higher household spending and sustained public and private investment. Quarterly growth was 0.6 per cent, up from 0.3 per cent in the September quarter. For the first time in seven consecutive quarters, the quarterly growth GDP per capita was in positive territory, rising 0.1 per cent, as the population increased.
Albanese rules out earlier election date
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has quashed speculation that voters would go to the polls early next month, ruling out calling an election during a major weather emergency on the east coast. A potential election on April 12 would have necessitated a campaign starting by March 10, but the PM said he would not be distracted from the aftermath of ex-tropical Cyclone Alfred in south-east Queensland and northern New South Wales. Easter and Anzac Day fall over late April, making the next potential election date on either of May 3, 10 or 17. That would also leave the Federal Budget to go ahead as originally scheduled on March 25.
International trade firmly in the black
While experiencing a fall in iron ore and coal exports, Australia is still recording healthy monthly international trade surpluses in goods. ABS figures for January revealed a $5.6 billion surplus, seasonally adjusted, in trade of goods, driven by higher exports of non-monetary gold and a 7.7 per cent fall in the import of capital goods. Goods exports rose by 1.3 per cent, and goods imports fell by 0.3 per cent. During the post-Covid period in mid-2022, the monthly international goods trade surplus surpassed $18 billion.