Public Inquiry Calls Aukus Australia's 'Worst, Riskiest and Most Costly' Defence Decision, Urges It Be Scrapped

A public inquiry into Australia's 368 billion dollar Aukus nuclear submarine agreement has called the plan "the worst, riskiest and most costly defence decision ever made by an Australian government" and urged its immediate termination.

The inquiry was led by former Labor senator and Midnight Oil frontman Peter Garrett and former chief of defence Admiral Chris Barrie. Dominated by critics of the deal with the United Kingdom and the United States, it recommended suspending plans for new bases and holding a royal commission into the agreement signed under the former Morrison government. Its report is titled "Surrendering Australia: the Aukus Deception."

The report says Australia risks being dragged into a military conflict with China because of the presence of powerful nuclear submarines. It says Aukus badly undermines Australia's sovereignty and undercuts the country's longstanding commitments to nuclear non-proliferation.

The report also calls for a rework of the second pillar of the agreement, which covers technology and defence capability sharing, and for a fundamental recalibration of Australia's relationship with Beijing.

After hearings around the country and more than 1,000 public submissions, the inquiry highlighted a lack of scrutiny and oversight over the five years since Aukus was announced, and called on the auditor general and the federal parliament to launch independent reviews.

Speaking at the National Press Club in Canberra, Garrett said Labor had failed, since coming to power, to conduct a thorough review of this most significant defence agreement. "Conceived in secret, Aukus has spurned established defence and parliamentary oversight practices," he said.

Garrett said the Stirling defence precinct in Perth risked becoming a "de facto US base" hosting as many as 2,000 serving American personnel, and that nearby communities including Rockingham and Fremantle would become targets for attack.

Barrie, who served as chief of defence between 1998 and 2002, said: "The Aukus submarine plan is not tenable. It's time for our government to take the lead on this matter. Scrap the Aukus submarine plan now, and rebuild national security decision-making processes."

Labor agreed to support the deal for Australia to acquire nuclear submarines, which was negotiated under Morrison, then US president Joe Biden and UK prime minister Boris Johnson. Under the agreement, Australia is funding upgrades to the US defence industrial base and is due to start receiving secondhand Virginia-class nuclear submarines around 2032.

Delays and cost blowouts in submarine production for the US Navy have led to scepticism that Australia will receive the in-service boats. The UK parliament held a year-long review, and after a Pentagon inquiry in 2025, Donald Trump agreed to support Aukus.

Former prime ministers Paul Keating and Malcolm Turnbull, former foreign affairs ministers Gareth Evans and Bob Carr, environmental and security campaigners, and some within Labor believe Aukus is not in Australia's national interest. Garrett warned that any certainty the US president would eventually agree to send submarines to Australia could not be guaranteed. "There are no refunds, no enforceable obligations on partner countries, and no recourse if things go wrong," he said.

The inquiry estimates an additional 180 billion dollars will be needed to deal with the nuclear waste generated by Aukus. Australia has not identified a permanent storage site for that waste, including the high-level radioactive waste from the reactor core and spent fuel, which will remain toxic for thousands of years. The government's preferred measure puts the total cost of the deal at 0.15 percent of GDP over its lifetime. The first Virginia-class submarine from the US is due to arrive in 2032, with another arriving every four years, before the Australian-built SSN-Aukus model comes online in 2042.