Page 45 - Australian Defence Magazine Nov 2018

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including a possible west coast allowance. “Don’t believe all the words about subma- riners going to the west and never wanting to leave. 90 per cent of the recruit pool lies in the 90 per cent of Australia’s population on the east coast, that’s where their families are, and a lot of them would return to the east if they could,” commented a former
Collins executive officer.
“The first-of-type Future Submarine
won’t go to sea till around the early 2030s so we’ve got another 12 or so years until we have to find that first extra crew, but 12 years goes pretty quickly and you have to build up your reserve of sailors and officers,” Sander commented separately.
“And don’t forget we have to have industry support for those submarines and that’s going to be more challenging as well, given the re- quirements at the same time for the new Hunt- er-class frigates and offshore patrol vessels.”
Culture shift
Finally, Sander warns not to underestimate the cultural shift involved in moving from one platform to another.
“The Collins people viewed the old Oberons as diesel dinosaurs and Collins was the new way of doing business, there- fore a lot of the lessons we had learnt about how to do submarine operations were not forgotten, but discarded.
“Good submarine practice is the same no matter what platform you’re in and many of the procedures, the processes we had always always use with our O-Boats were just put aside on the argument that this was a new type of submarine.
“That’s a dangerous thing to do; it’s a cul- tural issue which has been identified and I’m sure will be addressed for this new sub- marine,” Sanders said.
The people part of transition will be key to the success of moving from Collins to the Future Submarine.
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