Getting something like JSS built outcan would have been doable, but would have needed Cabinet to waive the Made in Canada policy for shipbuilding that has been in place since the 60s. It also would have needed a standard commercial contract, not NSS terms, which have IRBs, 100% equivalent dollar value returns in Canada under the Value Proposition and all the other stuff we require the yards to report on (and pay for it as part of the overhead).
The mandarins that push for outcan want to have their cake and eat it too; no foreign yard is going to commit to IRBs or any of that other stuff that is part of NSS and every other large DND contract with a Canadian firm.
the NSS yards meet 95% of those just by being physically located here. Someone like Hyundai would meet 0%, but wouldn't change their business model for a single contract. Canada is a bit of a Karen for a customer.
Politically outsourcing ships that can be built in Canada is suicide, which is why most countries on earth have an NSS equivalent. Something like the big aluminium catamaran ferry for one of the east coast ferry services couldn't be built in any of the Canadian yards, and the subs is another good example to offshore build, but for the rest it's sending billions out of the country.
Nothing wrong with NSS as a concept, it's the MPs that let the yards bypass the actual contractual requirements and kneecap the projects by taking the calls of the owners and advocating for them. There were penalties and other things in the contracts that could have been enforced, as well as monitoring of production efficiency and other things that weren't done due to political pressure.
