The Joint Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade has adopted a new inquiry into the Department of Defence Annual Report 2023–24. This will resume the inquiry commenced by the Committee prior to the 2025 federal election.
The Chair of the Defence Subcommittee, Senator Deborah O'Neill, said 'During the last Parliament, the subcommittee received many submissions addressing the inquiry, particularly relating to Sovereign Defence Industrial Priorities. Given the importance of the issues, the committee intends to complete the inquiry into the Department of Defence Annual Report 2023–24 in the early stages of this new Parliamentary term'.
Key themes of the inquiry's focus include:
- Sovereign Defence Industrial Priorities
- Defence Estate, Security and Resilience
- AUKUS
- Uncrewed/Autonomous Systems and their integration into the Joint Force
- Progress on the transformation to an integrated focused force
- Australian international defence cooperation and competition
- Other issues as communicated to Defence
Submissions and evidence related to this inquiry that were received by the committee in the 47th Parliament have been made available to the new committee. This means that submissions related to this inquiry that have already been provided to the committee do not need to be re-submitted.
The Subcommittee is now inviting written submissions by Friday, 10 October 2025.
