At the Defence & Industry Conference, Chris Burns, AIDN South Australia president and CEO of the Defence Teaming Centre, presented a paper on the challenges for an indigenous Defence Industry in Australia.
The main points covered in the paper entitled "Challenges for an indigenous Defence Industry in Australia" were:
- Defence industry is Fundamental Input to Capability;
- Diversity is the key to success for Australian industry;
- Continuous build programs for the ship building industry;
- Create a productive ship building industry through long term commitment and investment;
- Welcome the First Principle Review of Defence and the DMO, a revised Force Structure review, a renewed White Paper, updated Defence Capability Plan and a replacement of the Defence Industry Policy Statement;
- Delays in Defence capability acquisitions and sustainment due to the reviews;
- If offsets and defence industry protection is practised by most other nations, why do we stand alone?
- Government should be compelled to consider ‘value for money’ in the context of holistic whole-of-life cost benefit analysis from a national perspective.
- Benefits to the nation of an indigenous defence industry include: maximising the return of Australian taxpayers’ dollars to the Australian economy, assuring the security of our nation, growing innovation and inspiring our future workforce, enhancing technology transfers, securing intellectual property, and sustaining our nation’s industrial capability.
- Need to have a national definition of ‘value for money’
- Transparency and a level of independent review of ‘value for money’;
- Engage in performance based contracts determinations;
- Appointment of a Defence Industry Advocate;
- If the Australian Government really wants an indigenous defence industry, then it needs to promote and partner with it to collaborate and deliver military capability;
- To assure our national security and ensure we are not reliant on other nations to repair, maintain, upgrade and overhaul our military hardware, having a viable defence industry is a ‘must-have’.
AIDN’s president, Alan Rankins, stated that Burn’s speech is fully endorsed by AIDN National.
Rankins then went on to say that AIDN does not believe that Australia’s defence industry is in a position to withstand further delays in Defence procurement.
“Decisions and acquisition project commitments must be made in the near term to avoid further business withdrawal or closure in the Defence SME space. The next Defence White Paper, Industry Policy and Capability Plan must clearly define what the Government will commit to in terms of a sovereign industry to enable business to invest in real opportunities and clarify the future for its SME base.”