The PM says the base price for eight new submarines was $16 billion but ballooned to $386 billion after he added on heated leather seats, roof-racks, sports styling, Parking Assist and a range of other dealer extras.
“I got a bit excited in the show room,” Albanese admitted in an interview today. “Joe said he’d throw in the floor mats and window tinting for free, but I didn’t realise they’d be an extra cost for the keyless entry, or the reversing camera. Or the extended dealer warrantee if I’m honest. Turns out it all adds up quite a bit”.
The PM said some of the extras were worth the money. “We never had roof-racks growing up, so that was an obvious one, as were the extra cup holders. And the leather-appointed seating seemed like good value. But I’ll admit the Bose surround sound speakers was a little splurge on my part. But then an extra $10 billion isn’t that much for listening to The Pogues in surround sound when you average the cost over thirty years”.
Asked why he also chose to add on alloy wheels for all eight submarines, Albanese said it seemed like a good idea at the time. “Joe was just so convincing. I can see now that having wheels on an underwater vessel might seem silly, but if you were there in the showroom with me, you would’ve got swept up in the whole thing too.
“I will admit that the childproof rear door locks probably weren’t necessary. And the ‘Find My Sub’ feature that I added on might not be great for security, so we’ll probably need to disable that one. But the Blind Spot Monitor will be appreciated by the sailors when they’re in heavy traffic, and at just an extra $9.6 billion that seemed like a no-brainer”.
