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The Forum > Article Comments > The guardians must still be accountable > Comments

The guardians must still be accountable : Comments

By Gary Brown, published 4/3/2011

The litany of procurement fiascos in Defence makes sobering reading, but succesive governments have been mute.

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Part of the problem with Australian Defence procurement is that the available pool of good people in Canberra is very small.

Get Defence back to a major city and it will be able to attract people from a bigger pool. Currently good people in Canberra rise to the top quickly by zigging and zagging around the public service.

Poor performers cannot be sacked, can go no further and are happy to remain doing a poor job because they have little ambition to progress or improve themselves. Their management cannot do anything about poor performers if they want to remain in the system themselves, as long as a poor performer meets the majority of their performance indicators, they are doing a "reasonable" job.

Only one of those indicators (out of possibly 15 other measures) may be the delivery of functional, good quality and supportable equipment to the warfighters.

The imposition of corporate standards from industry by Dr Gumly is tempered by the Public Service act and various industrial relations acts .. you can't get rid of or do anything about poor performance in the Canberra Public Service. So while they can reward, they cannot punish.

Go to one of the Canberra defence buildings canteens any morning of the week and see hordes of public servants sitting for hours chatting and drinking coffee, while all signed on "flexy time", try that in private industry!

There is a social culture in defence in Canberra that is uninhibited by the actual role of supply the ADF.

Close it down, move it to Melbourne or Sydney and fix it .. it's a failed experiment.

mind you, why don't we move all immigrants, however they come to Canberra to grow the city? Why do we let them settle in Sydney or Alice Springs? I mean, surely if the politicians are happy to be there and make decisions for the country about immigration, why not grow our capitol first?
Posted by Amicus, Friday, 4 March 2011 11:01:19 AM
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Very thought provoking. Almost too kind to the Naval hierarchy.

Lack of accountability at the top seems the main problem.

For any major weapons system or personnel stuffup responsibility can be so evenly shifted between:

- senior military officers (though female officers seem to draw disproportionate blame)

- Defence public servants

- DMO

- foreign and local prime contractos

- sub-contractors

- current Ministers

- previous Ministers same Government

- previous Ministers, previous Government, now in Opposition

The buck lands nowhere. Nothing sticks.

One common denominator in the naval (worst service performer) problems is Chief of Navy, Admiral Crane http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russ_Crane . He appears to be perplexed, distant and always on the side of the angels regarding each of the endemic naval problems.

He must have a special gift of spin in avoiding responsibility. Defence Ministers clearly accept his assurances that however bad things are no-one, least of all Ministers, or senior officers, will need to accept any blame.

Pete
Posted by plantagenet, Friday, 4 March 2011 11:54:31 AM
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In the face of all this adversity, all this condemnation, we still have time to pose with pompous politicians, assist in disaster zones and pull idiot civilians out of the drink in 50 degree latitudes.
Posted by Wakatak, Friday, 4 March 2011 1:24:13 PM
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well not quite wakatak, Minister Smith's recent outburst about HMAS Kanimbla, Manoora, and Tobruk was because they were not able to assist (if required) in recent cyclone disaster support in north Queensland.

It's a very inefficient defence force, way overspends underachieves and panders to the overblown egos of some of our military who seem to not understand we're a small nation and cannot be like the USA or UK or China, and expect public servants to go out and buy a minimum of equipment, badly to make us seem we can play with the big boys .. we're a pissant country, once again trying to puff ourselves up into something we are not.

honestly, we do this all over the place, defence, climate change drama, arts and film, alternative energy, Julia Gilliar memorial halls, places on the UN security council, giving adive to all and sundry on how to run the world and all we do is draw attention from the rest of the world to our shortcomings and "look at me" stupidity.

we need to have a bloody good look at ourselves, stop p*ssing away the wealth of country by governments on dreams and ego trips, and then tell us we can't afford to look after pensioners .. what? But we can waste billions on climate change mitigation, home insulation, solar and other green dreams, NBN and the list goes on how much we waste .. if you ran a household like this you'd be called, "irresponsible"
Posted by Amicus, Friday, 4 March 2011 1:42:05 PM
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A Defence Force full of inefficiency and expensive underachievers eh?

Tell that to the Members of each of the three Services sent on multi billion dollar illegal invasions based on a load of cooked up garbage simply to prop up the political ambitions of a gutless draft dodging coward.

How the hell Defence is connected to your hysterical rant on NBN, solar, global warming, insulation and Green Dreams is a mystery unto the Fairies.

One suggests you get the facts first Amicus...then distort them later.
Posted by Wakatak, Friday, 4 March 2011 2:34:22 PM
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Hi Amicus

I agree with Wakatak that its best to stick to defence sector points.

Scattergun condemnations of the whole political system just weaken this whole thread.

Gary has written a serious essay based on decades of writing on defence issues which (I think) deserve on-point comments.

BTW core departments like Defence will not pick up and move to state capitals - its a pipedream.

Pete

Pete
Posted by plantagenet, Friday, 4 March 2011 3:24:04 PM
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