Doorstep Interview, Japan

SUBJECT/S: Mogami general purpose frigate; Department of Defence; Ukraine

JOURNALIST: Yeah, look, just a quick couple of questions, really. I guess you know, you've stressed that you picked Australia picked the Mogami because of its capability. Just in a nutshell, I guess, what is the some of the most impressive features you've found about this ship and why it's suited for Australia?

DEPUTY PRIME MINISTER, RICHARD MARLES: Well, this is literally a general purpose frigate. It has 32 vertical launch cells, which gives us a capability in that respect, but it also has very capable sonar capabilities as well. And so it is able to perform looking up and looking down, so to speak. It is a ship which, in terms of the class that we will have, will have a displacement of around 6,000 tons and yet operate a crew of just over 90. You compare that to what we have today with the Anzac class frigates, which operate a crew of 170 with a displacement of about 3,500 tons. So this is a really efficient ship, and in that sense, it'll be very cost effective over the life of the ship. As you can see, its profile is very stealth. It has great range and capability. We're really excited about the ship entering the Royal Australian Navy.

JOURNALIST: Yeah, just on the question of Donald Trump announcing his plan to rename the Department of Defense, the Department of War; something that Pete Hegseth, the Defense Secretary, has said is partly about installing a warrior ethos in the United States- any chance of Australia planning to instil the same kind of warrior like ethos?

MARLES: Look ultimately, that is a matter for the United States. We have the Department of Defence. We’ve had so for a long time. We've got no plans to change.

JOURNALIST: Just on Ukraine, we heard overnight of this ‘reassurance force’, and Australia is one of the Coalition of Willing nations. We don't know the details of what type of deployment there will be, but what timeframe are we realistically looking at? What are the kinds of capabilities that Australia may be able to do in this so called ‘reassurance force’, in other words, boots on the ground?

MARLES: Well, look, right now, we're focused on supporting Ukraine in its conflict with Russia, and that is the focus. We've made clear that we are a part of the Coalition of the Willing, that at some future point we wouldn't be willing to look at how we might make a contribution, but it's really difficult to speculate about that now. And really the focus, from our point of view, is to be supporting Ukraine in its conflict with Russia, or for as long as it takes for Ukraine to resolve this conflict on its terms.

JOURNALIST: Just one final question on the Mogami class frigate. Obviously, you haven't quite put pen to paper- you plan to do that next year. What are the main issues holding that up at the moment that you're trying to get through?

MARLES: Well, there's nothing holding it up. I mean, what we've done is to down select this to the to the Mogami class frigate. That's the process that would normally take place. And now that we have had a down selection to one platform being this, we are now moving into the negotiation phase in relation to the signing of a contract. We're very confident that that will happen quickly, that will form very much part of the conversations that we had today in both the 2+2 and the bilateral Defence Ministers Meeting, and we look forward to signing a contract in the early part of next year.

ENDS