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The agency leading Australia's push to acquire nuclear-powered submarines is paying a global consultancy firm $9 million for "management advisory services" amid claims the American-owned company also worked for the Chinese Communist Party and military.
Tender documents reveal the Australian Submarine Agency (ASA) awarded the lucrative AUKUS contract to the local subsidiary of McKinsey & Company last month, around the same time US legislators were highlighting its links to the People's Liberation Army.
Leading US Republican figures in October unveiled "new evidence" accusing McKinsey & Company of failing to disclose and misrepresenting consulting work for the Chinese government while receiving hundreds of millions to consult for the US military.
The chairman of the US House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party, John Moolenaar, along with Republican senators Marco Rubio and Joni Ernst, said McKinsey & Company had "equipped America's foremost adversary".
In an October 17 letter to US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, the politicians warned "McKinsey's activities pose a serious risk to US national security and may have failed to meet McKinsey's obligations under federal law".
"McKinsey has chosen to profit from governments and state-owned enterprises whose goals are fundamentally at odds with US national security interests, economic aims, and fundamental values," the Republicans wrote.
"While providing consulting services that helped the [People's Republic of China] to rapidly develop its military and economy, McKinsey substantially increased its defense-related work with the U.S. government, granting it access to classified or otherwise sensitive national security data."
So far, McKinsey & Company has not responded to the most recent allegations in the United States, while the ABC has approached the ASA for comment but is yet to receive a response.
Under the $368 billion AUKUS partnership, US and UK nuclear-powered submarines are scheduled to begin rotations out of Western Australia from 2027, before Australia begins receiving its own Virginia-class submarines in the 2030s.
Australia is eventually aiming to construct a new fleet of British-designed nuclear-powered submarines in Adelaide known as SSN-AUKUS, with the ASA boss telling the ABC in September the ambitious venture was on track.