All Change?

The prospect of change is encouraging after years of a light-handed approach to aviation under the previous government. Aviation deserves as much, as we look forward to reporting on the new Minister’s progress.

But while with a new government there are clearer directions for civil aviation, there’s less of an indication of what the new government will do in defence. But interestingly, new Defence Minister Joel Fitzgibbon does plan to review Australia’s air power requirements.

In all likelihood this will see the status quo maintained, with JSFs acquired to supplement the 24 Super Hornets now on order.

But it does open the door to some intriguing possibilities. The new Labor government is not wedded to the JSF like the Coalition administration was; Fitzgibbon has in the past said a Labor government would ask the US to approve export of the F-22 so that it may at least be considered as an option for the RAAF; and the centre barrel replacement program for the existing Hornet fleet remains in doubt.

Surely the F-22 is out of contention? Not only is it expensive (about US$132m each), but even if the US cleared it for export the first international customer would need to spend over $1bn funding an export version, and an order would need to be signed quickly, as under current plans production will wind up in 2011.

More likely could be a change in the mix of Super Hornets and JSFs acquired, as the price of the former continues to come down (Boeing estimates a unit cost below US$50m in the next multi year contract being negotiated with the US Navy) and the costs of the latter continue to rise (early production JSFs will have a unit cost of around US$100m). Perhaps an additional Super Hornet squadron will be acquired at the expense of JSFs instead of replacing the centre barrels on a large number of ‘classic’ Hornets, and buying more time to wait for cheaper JSFs.

More broadly it seems likely that the Defence path the Labor government takes will in time diverge from the previous government’s, it’s just that leading up to an election it is easier to ‘play dead’ on an issue which traditionally is one of your political opponent’s strengths. But we’ll have to wait for a new White Paper and Defence Capability Plan to see exactly how that plays out.

Interestingly this where the air-to-air focused F-22 could come in. Labor traditionally has focused its defence efforts on defending the sea-air gap, rather than the Liberals’ focus on expeditionary and coalition warfare, where multirole JSFs and Super Hornets make more sense.

Aa’s Logies Moment

If you’ve read through the magazine already, you’ll have noticed our spread from page 52 covering the annual National Aviation Press Club (NAPC) awards, held in Sydney in late November. Australian Aviation did very well this year, including your editor winning the main ‘Aviation Journalist of the Year’ award and deputy editor Andrew McLaughlin winning ‘Defence Story of the Year’.

These are terrific results for the magazine, which we’re very proud of. But I did want to point out that the article spread wasn’t meant to be too self-indulgent and self-congratulatory.

That feature comes from an arrangement AA has with the NAPC to cover the awards every year, and like the 2006 event (see Jan/Feb ’07 AA) in the future we’ll cover the awards in the same detail regardless of AA’s performance. It’s important to have a media forum to recognise the broader aviation journalism profession’s achievements.

But if I can be a little self-indulgent for a moment, I was really pleased in my citation for ‘Journalist of the Year’ that the ongoing improvements we’ve made to the magazine were recognised. And I would like to use the magazine to say a few ‘thank yous’.

So again thanks to the NAPC’s organisers for putting on the awards night, to the industry sponsors of the awards – Airservices Australia, Cathay Pacific, Rolls-Royce, Boeing and Hawker Pacific – for their support in encouraging quality aviation journalism in Australia and New Zealand, to the rest of the crew at Australian Aviation, and to my family who support me through all those monthly deadlines!