Welcome to all to the Autumn edition of the AIDN Newsletter. I hope that this finds you all well and hopefully doing well in your businesses.

 We have once again asked for an article from the Minister for Defence Industry, the Hon Melissa Price MP, so we do thank the Minister for taking the time to provide some thoughts and updates from Government.

 In the interests of operating as the bi-partisan organisation that we are I have also asked Matt Keogh, the Opposition Spokesperson for Defence Industry to contribute to this newsletter.

I believe that it is important to provide you the members with insights from both the Government and the Opposition, we will make this a regular feature for this newsletter. 

 It continues to be busy for AIDN, as you know AIDN across multiple fronts. We are in the final stages of creating AIDN as a not-for-profit company limited by guarantee. We are finalising the administration and all documentation has been submitted and we are awaiting final approvals so that we can commence the transfer of employees, membership, assets and cash reserves. After this process is finalised we will be sitting down with all the states and territories to understand their financial requirements going forward and setting appropriate budgets for them to ensure that each state and territory is undertaking networking and other events. 

The transition has been a long and deliberate process and it is important to thank both the current and previous boards who having recognised the advantages and power of an national  entity pushed strongly. Whilst singling out individuals is not always appropriate, given the amount of work everyone has contributed, it is important to both acknowledge and thank Carl Quarterman  for his drive and focus to achieving this successful outcome.

 Whilst the process to finalise the national organisation from a technical perspective we have been operating as a national organisation since I came onboard. We are at the forefront of the debate to ensure that Australian companies are being given every opportunity to succeed. AIDN is an invited contributor to all the reviews that Defence is conducting and we are a strong contributor. Reviews such as the AUSDEFCON template update and the Major Service Providers being a couple of the very important elements.

AIDN has advised both major parties that we will be undertaking a review into their Defence Industry policies in the lead up to the next Federal election and we will provide our analysis to the membership, as well as all members of Parliament and the media, AIDN has made it clear to all sides of the political spectrum that we will represent the needs of Australian industry via every means at our disposal.

We continue to drive the debate in this important area and hopefully you are taking the time to read the OpEds that we are producing, the last four OpEds have generated close to 15000 reviews and this is important as it demonstrates our growing influence. 

 There remain many challenges for all of us going forward, and there are some fundamental basics that require attention. So, during this year you should be aware that we will be advocating for a clearly defined definition of ‘sovereign capability and industry’, however we are not simply calling for a definition we are also calling for the plan to achieve this. 

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