Avalon Australian International Airshow

Mr FULBROOK (Playford) (14:59): My question is to the Minister for Defence and Space Industries. Can the minister update the house on South Australia's participation in the 2025 Avalon Australian International Airshow?

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN (Lee—Treasurer, Minister for Defence and Space Industries, Minister for Police) (14:59): I thank the member for Playford for his question, because a lot of defence industrial activity occurs in our northern suburbs, which the member would be well aware of. Last week, Australia's largest international airshow, the Avalon Airshow, was held and I was very pleased to participate in the largest South Australian delegation to attend an Avalon Airshow.

We had 60 local defence and space organisations coming along to Avalon, the vast majority of them attending as part of Defence SA's stand. Defence SA continues its record as an organisation that not just establishes our credentials as the defence state in our nation but takes a leadership role in making sure that of all the states and territories in our nation South Australia has the most significant and the most sophisticated presence at these defence tradeshows.

It was really pleasing to see so many businesses present and showcase their capabilities in advanced manufacturing, in artificial intelligence and cybersecurity, in the space-related industries, and also in their capacity to provide services to defence industry partners and global decision-makers. In that respect, it was a great pleasure for me on the Tuesday, followed by the Minister for Trade and Investment on the Wednesday, to engage in meetings with major defence companies and the opportunities they are actively pursuing here in South Australia. We also had the state's three universities present there, highlighting their capacity to support research activities across defence.

But, of course, this was an airshow focused around the aerospace industries. South Australia is very fortunate to have one of the RAAF's two largest bases in Australia out at Edinburgh. The broader Edinburgh defence precinct holds not only a lot of defence companies but also the largest installation of the DSTG group, with more than 800 staff.

The state government has partnered with the RAAF in the construction of the $200 million Deep Maintenance and Modification Facility. It is currently underway, being constructed, to make sure that the RAAF does all of its maintenance, upkeep and modification of the P-8 platform in South Australia. A great announcement from Avalon is that that is now going to be expanded, with aircrews and their airframes from both the United States and New Zealand bringing their aircraft to South Australia for maintenance and modification, building out the capacity of this important facility that the government of South Australia has built for our air force.

There was further good news in the last two weeks, with the intention of Canada to purchase the Jindalee over-the-horizon radar network that several of our defence primes located in Australia are responsible for delivering—but from South Australia's perspective in particular, BAE Systems. This is a more than $6 billion contract which, once granted approval, will see a significant further uplift in industrial output from the northern suburbs of Adelaide, providing this advanced technology for our global partners.