South Australia is unlikely to get a fourth Air Warfare Destroyer shipbuilding contract and concern is growing that there will be a lack of industry work after 2016.
Defence Industries Minister Jack Snelling has told Parliament the Federal Government "has not been receptive" to his lobbying to have a fourth Air Warfare Destroyer built at Outer Harbor's Techport facility.
The Federal Government has pledged to build 12 submarines, valued about $36 billion, at the site. However, it is not expected that program will begin until the early stages of the next decade.
The current Air Warfare Destroyer build program is expected to conclude at Techport in 2016.
It has raised industry concerns that small firms will run out of work to carry them through until the submarine build takes off in earnest, and lead high-skilled defence engineering workers to abandon the state.
Mr Snelling has told Budget Estimates he is investigating "strategies" to overcome the shortfall.
"We clearly are concerned about there being a gap between the wind-down of the Air Warfare Destroyer project and the start-up of the future submarine project," Mr Snelling said. "Obviously we strongly believe that the fourth Air Warfare Destroyer would help fix that, but Commonwealth has not been receptive.
"We are looking at other strategies that we might be able to formulate in order to overcome that problem."
The delay in the start-up of the future submarines program has been caused by lack of federal funding.
However, it is expected more work will be needed at Techport to extend the life of the current Collins Class submarine fleet.
Opposition defence industries spokesman Steven Marshall said the Federal Government has created "chaos" for the SA sector by denying it full details on future plans.
Mr Marshall said an extended period without a major federal boat-building project would undermine plans to build an advanced manufacturing industry and retain skilled workers in SA.
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