The multi-billion dollar AUKUS defence pact between Australia, the US and the UK is likely to be torn to shreds by leaders of a community inquiry as they deliver their final verdict.
Former Labor minister Peter Garrett and former chief of the Australian Defence Force Admiral Chris Barrie are expected to outline the shortfalls in the $386 billion project in an address to the National Press Club on Wednesday following months of hearings.
The crowd-funded AUKUS Public Inquiry has heard from former and current political leaders since it kicked off in June with the final report to be released as the speech begins in Canberra.
It's broadly anticipated the report will voice strong opposition to the submarine program.
“In the absence of any social license for this deal I fear Australians struggling through the current cost-of-living crisis will come to see the AUKUS expenditure going to the US and the UK in a very poor light," Mr Garrett said ahead of the speech.
“People aren’t mugs. As well as helping fund overseas shipyard construction these submarines will generate high-level nuclear waste, which remains Australia’s responsibility."
The AUKUS pact was agreed to in 2021 under former Liberal prime minister Scott Morrison and the Biden administration in the US.
The $365 billion decades-long defence program has come under fire in recent months after the United States government confirmed it will only give the ADF second-hand Virginia-class submarines.
A report out of the University of NSW has also warned of major workforce strain across the Royal Australian Navy as it prepares to introduce over a dozen new warships in the next 15 years.
The lack of long-term planning for the navy's surface fleet and failing to extend the life of the existing Collins-class fleet could bring the number of operational submarines down to just three in the 2030s.
Report authors Peter Jones and David Shackleton have recommended Australia look to develop a shipbuilding partnership with Japan by the end of the decade and establish east coast manufacturing to deliver the impending backlog of new Navy vessels.
Without action, Professor Jones and Dr Shackleton said Australia could recreate the costly "boom and bust" cycles that have historically undermined Australia's sovereign maritime capability.
