FORMER Australian prime minister Paul Keating launched a blistering attack today over his nation’s plan to buy nuclear-powered submarines from the United States, saying “it must be the worst deal in all history.”

Speaking at a National Press Club event, Mr Keating said that the submarines wouldn’t serve a useful military purpose.

“The only way that the Chinese could threaten Australia or attack it is on land. That is, they bring an armada of troop ships with a massive army to occupy us,” Mr Keating said. 

“This is not possible,” he said.

Mr Keating mocked the cost of the deal, which Australian officials have estimated at between A$268 billion and A$368bn (£145-200bn) over three decades.

“For A$360bn, we’re going to get eight submarines,” Keating said. “It must be the worst deal in all history.”

Mr Keating said members of the party would “wince” when they realised a Labour government was “returning to our former colonial master, Britain, to find our security in Asia — 236 years after Europeans first grabbed the continent from its indigenous people.”

Australia’s deal — announced on Monday in San Diego by US President Joe Biden, Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak — came amid scare-mongering about Chinese influence in the Indo-Pacific. 

China said on Tuesday that the US, Australia and Britain were travelling “further down a wrong and dangerous path.”

Slamming the deal, the Communist Party of Australia tweeted: “Remember, the A$368bn price tag is only a current estimate. The cost will blow out further, as these things always do. 

“It’s sickening to think what this money could have been spent on, instead of underwater tubes to protect our trade routes from our largest trade partner.”