Volume 11, No. 57, November 30, 2006
Quicklinks to Letters
Room for change
Policies technical
Torn between two loves
Product of the old school
Same story the world over
Cooking up a catering storm
HOW
TO GET A LETTER PUBLISHED
Room for change
I AM seeking clarification on the supply of married quarters to members.
I understand that married quarters are supplied by DHA for members with families and, if there are surplus married quarters, these can be supplied to single members.
What do DHA constitute as surplus? Recently I contacted DHA Brisbane to inquire about having a married quarter supplied to a single member only to be told that there were no surplus married quarters in the Canungra area. I found this hard to believe as I was aware of at least four (two of which I was offered when I arrived in January).
The member in question did end up being supplied a married quarter. It just seems strange to me to give a single member rental assistance rather than a vacant married quarter, especially as DHA has to pay for the upkeep of a married quarter regardless if it is occupied or not.
My other query is that if married quarters are supposed to be supplied to Defence members, why have Defence civilians been supplied a married quarter?
Is it a case of DHA gets more money from the Defence civilians as they pay market rate rather than the stated contributions that a Defence member would pay? This I don’t understand as these personnel would be disadvantaging Defence members more than supplying a married quarter to a single member.
Sgt N.L. Warncken
HQ LWC
Canungra
Adrian Wellspring, Director housing and removals policy;
Service Residences are usually supplied to Members with Dependants (MWD). If no MWD is forecast to occupy the home in the next 12 months it is considered surplus. A surplus service residence is then available to Members without Dependants (MWOD) or MWD (Unaccompanied) (MWD(U)) if they are eligible for Rent Allowance.
This policy helps to minimise the costs of a vacant residence while ensuring as far as possible that a service residence will be available for allocation to a MWD who needs it.
Housing may be provided to Defence APS employees where the employee has an ongoing obligation to supervise personnel or oversee property on-site (eg caretakers), where there is no viable rental market in reasonable proximity to the workplace, or where there are particular recruitment and retention issues associated with staffing of a key position in a particular locality.
APS employees allocated a service residence for these reasons occupy the home on the same basis and pay the same rental contribution as a member of the ADF. The proportion of Defence APS employees living in service residences is very small.
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Policies technical
- HAVING just experienced a doctrine review process for engineering and maintenance in Defence, I am amazed at the bewildering array of Defence technical regulation policy. Each Service has created a slightly different, yet equally valid, technical regulatory “system” or “framework” (even these words are not common).
These regulatory policies are Service-specific yet give domain-specific (maritime, land, aerospace) advice and mandatory direction. Hence the operator of land materiel in a RAAF unit must know to use, and understand, the two-inch thick Army policy, on top of their own.
The doctrine team battled with creating a single, succinct chapter on technical regulation within Defence, because each system defines terms and processes differently, and many of these differences are apparently completely unnecessary.
Further, threaded through these existing technical regulation and other Defence policies are domain-specific defective/unsatisfactory performance reporting systems, usually managed by DMO, but each with its own name and process.
While these are all valid, functioning systems with worthy intent, I ask Defence to brave the triservice policy arena and consider combining current policies into a single Defence-wide technical regulation policy.
This should include a singular defective/unsatisfactory performance reporting system if possible – so that any Defence member can easily report any materiel deficiency, using the same form, process and language.
These suggestions will simplify and strengthen our assurance of technical integrity, and can only make our jobs easier.
Maj Matt Shepley
Land Engineering Agency
Melbourne, Victoria
Col Jim Phasey, Director Technical Regulation-A replies:
Technical regulation is governed by a single ADF policy document [DI(G) 4-5-012] jointly authorised by CDF and the Secretary. The DI(G) details the relationship between the environmental divisions that apply to ADF materiel and the technical integrity responsibilities allocated to the Service Chiefs as Capability Managers of those environmental capabilities. In order to fulfil their technical integrity responsibilities, each Service Chief appoints a Technical Regulatory Authority (TRA).
In simple terms CA retains capability management and technical integrity responsibilities for land materiel regardless of which Service or Group uses it. For Army, the DTR-A performs the function of land materiel TRA. Similar responsibilities apply to the technical integrity of air and maritime materiel, where the TRA functions are performed by DGTA-ADF and DTR-N respectively. It is worth noting that regulating materiel by the environment in which it operates is not just specific to Defence. For instance, in Australia, CASA is responsible for aviation regulation, and similarly AMSA for vessels and shipping, while state authorities regulate road transportation. This situation pertains to most other first-world nations as well.
While on the surface Major Shepley’s suggestion of a single set of technical regulations seems attractive, there are considerable differences in the operational and technical risks of each domain. This results in differing operational and technical requirements that are reflected in the different regulatory implementations, although these are all based on the same principles. While there are differences, the ADF TRAs work closely to ensure that wherever possible they standardise on process and terminology. Through the TRA Council the TRAs meet to agree lead-TRA for new projects and emerging capabilities and in turn the lead-TRA becomes responsible for representing the interests of the other TRAs. Cooperatively, the other TRAs recognise the certifications of the lead-TRA to eliminate ‘overlapping regulations’ and duplication of effort.
At unit level, it is not true that an operator of land materiel in any Service or Group has to digest the TRAMM, nor the TAMM or ABR6492 for that matter if they operate air or maritime materiel such as UAV or Army watercraft. Given the cooperative approach mentioned above, the operator must simply know and follow the unit’s accredited maintenance management plan that should govern how the unit conducts all materiel maintenance.
Maj Shepley has also identified that the DMO manages a number of inherited defect-reporting systems that have developed to meet the unique requirements of various materiel categories such as medical and dental equipment, and parachutes.
If DMO was able to rationalise these systems without precipitating any additional overheads and still preserve the unique requirements, such an initiative would be welcomed by the Services, materiel managers and operators alike.
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Torn between two loves
- SURELY you are not serious, Sir. I am sorry you are not receiving two wages for doing one job. (In reference to WO2 Dale Jenssen’s letter in Army, November 16).
The fact that a Reservist who owns his own business can pull two wages is beyond logic. Not to mention the allowances. Sir, you are on a very good wicket.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but didn’t you decide to do the full-time service? I am sure there was need in your unit for your specific skill set and obviously that need could not be filled by an ARA member. Whingeing about only getting paid what the rest of us get paid is a complete joke. I am sure that you do a fantastic job, but seriously are you worth two wages? Next time you pull on your cams, Sir, remember it’s not just about the cash, and if you think it is, perhaps your private business needs you more than the green machine.
Sgt Robert Mills
URLO
5CSSB
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Product of the old school
I REFER to the article in Army, November, 16, IETs march in to their own unit. The article implies that IET training in 1RAR was a new concept. I would like to point out that if anything it is an old concept and just being reintroduced. I, as I am sure many of your readers can tell you, am a product of IET training at the unit and not of a corps school.
WO1 Mark Levine
RSM, LWC-SQ
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Same story the world over
AS an Australian Army Reserve officer on a four-year exchange posting with a Territorial Army (TA) unit in the UK, it is interesting to observe the Australian Army from afar and the debate in these pages over a range of recent issues.
The issue over the delay of campaign medals rings true equally here in the UK. Soldiers from my squadron who served in Iraq on Operation Telic in 2004 were only last month officially presented with their campaign medals. Australia, like the UK, is experiencing a very busy period operationally and the respective medal offices are struggling to cope with demand. Something that is acceptable practice in the UK (although not officially condoned to my knowledge) is for members to wear replica medals until the official one is issued.
Related to the above is the issue of deploying reservists on operations. This is one area where the UK is years ahead of Australia, and I honestly hope that one day in the near future politicians and senior leaders in the Army have the moral and political courage to deploy significant numbers of reservists on operations.
In my regiment, for example, more than half its posted strength has served on operations in Iraq since 2003. The culture of the Australian Army, particularly the attitude towards reservists, must change to allow this.
It is interesting to hear the views many of the regular Army’s permanent staff instructors have of TA soldiers after serving with them on operations. It would also surprise many of your readers to know that British TA soldiers are in many respects not as well trained as their Australian counterparts.
It begs the question: why has Australia not made full use of this valuable and relatively well-trained resource? The decision to deploy a Reserve sub-unit to support RAMSI is a good start in my opinion.
Pay and conditions provide other interesting comparisons. Regular pay on operations in the UK is taxable, and they have only recently decided to change pay and conditions to provide some tax relief.
Reserve pay is also taxed; however, they do receive a tax-free bounty each year for completing minimum training requirements and their Military Annual Training Tests, which are similar to AIRN but with less emphasis on PT.
The Australian Army is held in very high regard in the UK and I have thoroughly enjoyed my time over here. Anyone interested in living and working in the UK for a couple of years should seriously consider getting an exchange posting to a TA unit while you are here.
Capt David Brown
1/15RNSWL
attached RHQ
Royal Yeomanry, London, UK
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Cooking up a catering storm
I WOULD like to reply to Leigh McJames A/DGRB, whose response to WO2 Dean Maher’s letter (“Contract makes mess of dining-in plans”, Army, August 10) is a little patronising and, to say the least, denigrating to those members of the Army who have trained as chefs in the ADF.
Do you not realise that the chefs in Army uniform are trained to a very high standard at the ADF School of Catering at HMAS Cerberus, Victoria? The ADF has guidelines that it must also follow when training its chefs and it must meet strict legislative requirements when presenting its training. I am sure, also, that the ADF chefs must also meet food and occupational safety standards before they are deemed competent.
Please have a think about ADF chefs presenting rations in an environment where they have to prepare food to the strictest of standards when they are feeding hundreds of service personnel in messes around the country. They have to know what they are doing as, you can be assured, there is nothing more angry than hordes of service personnel that get mucked around by their chefs.
I believe there are still messes around the country controlled by the very caterers and SAMs that WO2 Maher referred to, so I do think that they are trained professionally enough to know what happens in a kitchen.
Also, you would probably find that those catering contractors that you referred to as having to meet those strictest of guidelines started their life in uniform as an ADF chef, so please give our chefs some small credit, especially where it is due.
Don’t think that because our uniformed catering personnel are trained to prepare rations for not only large numbers, they are also trained to provide for more sedate numbers, as is found in some sergeants’ messes. And, I am not sure what you alluded to when you said that short-term use of messes by Army catering staff reduces the ability of contractors to meet their obligation.
I thought that both Army catering staff and contractors had the same obligation, that is, to provide a service to their customers in the military dining rooms. Let’s get away from this “them and us mentality”. This is why you have issues among contracting staff and the military when you patronise us with responses as you did.
WO2 Mark Williamson
ArmySAFE Advisory Service
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