Key signals of submarine project blowouts being ignored by Government

NXT Senator Rex Patrick is calling on Defence Industry Minister, Christopher Pyne, to establish an independent panel of experts to have oversight of large Defence projects noting Defence's denial this morning that the Future Submarine Program has any problems. 

"There have been a litany of failures and blowouts in Defence projects over the years costing tens of billions of dollars with Defence never having once identified early in the piece that those projects were going off the rails," said Senator Patrick.

"Navy's Seasprite helicopter project is a case in point. Navy were holding on to that project right up until the day it was cancelled. In that project, $1.4 billion was spent with absolutely no outcome for Defence or the taxpayer.

"Defence have a long track record of refusing to publicly acknowledge procurement problems until those problems are so big that they cannot be denied and the responsible managers have already moved on." 

Senator Patrick's call for an independent oversight body consisting of expert project managers and system engineers from outside the Defence sector comes after Defence brushed aside the fact that some early Future Submarine Project milestones had been missed.

"These milestone signals are like the canary in the coalmine," said Rex (who has run a number of projects in a former Defence Industry role). "In this case, the canary has fallen off the perch and Defence are ignoring that fact. In the context of a $50 billion project spanning multiple decades, these small problems can easily cascade and turn into years of delays and billions of dollars of additional cost."

Senator Patrick is not alone in making a call for independent oversight. As early as 2011, the Australian Strategic Policy Institute called for experienced project management involvement in the Future Submarine Program and SA-Best leader Nick Xenophon did the same back in December 2016. 

"No disrespect is directed at the Admiral running the project. Just as you can't post an experienced project manager into the position of submarine Commanding Officer, you can't take a submarine Commanding Officer and place them in the position of a senior project manager," said Rex. 

"An independent oversight body is an absolute necessity. This is just too important. There are also serious national security implications at play here.

"On one hand, the Government is cutting welfare, education, health and other important community programs while slipping through the fingers of the other hand are billions of dollars in Defence project blowouts."