Federal election 2025: Peter Dutton promises $21 billion more for Defence

Peter Dutton is set to reveal in Perth on Wednesday that if he wins the election on May 3, he will pump at least $21 billion more into defence than Labor by 2030.

The Opposition Leader will pledge to increase defence funding to 2.5 per cent of GDP within five years and by the end of the decade lift that to the Trump administration’s 3 per cent target.

A key Trump administration figure in March had called for Australia to lift its spending to 3 per cent while President Donald Trump has leant on other nations, particularly in Europe, to increase their own defence capability.

The Coalition had previously promised to spend more and spend faster than Labor’s trajectory to reach 2.23 per cent of GDP over the next four years and 2.3 per cent by 2033-34.

Mr Dutton has described that target as “totally inadequate” in the face of geostrategic turbulence.

“The Prime Minister and the Deputy Prime Minister regularly tell Australians that we live in the most precarious period since the end of the Second World War. Yet, over the last three years, Labor has done nothing about it, other than rip money out of Defence, weakening strength and morale,” Mr Dutton said.

“The Coalition will strengthen the Australian Defence Force and support our servicemen and women to keep us safe today and into generations ahead.”

He is yet to announce details of what the money will be spent on, other than the $3b promised last month to buy 28 more F-35 fighter jets.

Mr Hastie said the promise to increase funding would ensure the ADF could equip its people with the capabilities they needed to defend Australia.

“There must be a sense of urgency to equipping the ADF and rebuilding our sovereign defence industrial base following three years of neglect under Labor,” he said.

“A Dutton Coalition government will back Australian workers and businesses in the defence industry to develop the sovereign capabilities our country needs. They are a critical enabler to the Australian men and women in uniform.”

Defence Minister Richard Marles said the test for the Coalition’s policy was to meet the high bar it had set for the Government.

He called for Mr Dutton and Mr Hastie to clearly articulate how they saw Australia’s strategic circumstances and key strategic challenges, what that meant in terms of specific requirements for ADF capability, and when and where the money would flow.

“I say all of that because that is the standard to which we have been held as a government,” he told reporters in Perth on Tuesday.

“It won’t cut it to have vague numbers, to have aspirations, to have signposts in the future. There needs to be a great deal of specificity in respect of what that defence policy looks like and I assume that the shadow defence minister is currently working on that.”

Respected Defence analyst and navy veteran Jennifer Parker said in March that it might be helpful for international comparisons to look at funding as a percentage of the economy, but that wasn’t a useful measure “when it comes to working out what capabilities we actually need”.

Australian Strategic Policy Institute senior fellow David Uren has also previously warned that merely showering money on Defence would lead to it disappearing “with nothing much to show for it”.

Labor has queried how the Coalition would pay for increased Defence funding, claiming the Opposition had already made $50b in election promises.