[Peetwo]

CEO's, bus drivers and lapdogs - Part II

ASA's OneSKY project just keeps on giving, according to 'that man' in the Oz today..

OneSKY head’s appointment raises eyebrows

• Ean Higgins
  
• The Australian
  
• March 11, 2016 12:00AM
  

Chris Deeble has been named the OneSKY program executive.

Airservices Australia has ­appointed a top RAAF officer to take charge of the $1.5 billion OneSKY next generation air traffic control program, reporting ­directly to newly appointed chief executive Jason Harfield.

But the move has raised questions among Airservices staff, as until last week the new appointee was a director of the obscure Canberra organisation whose consulting contracts for OneSKY are under investigation by a government watchdog.

The Australian can reveal that Air Vice Marshall Chris Deeble, who is in charge of the troubled Joint Strike Fighter program at the Department of Defence, will take up the role of “OneSKY program executive” later this month.

As a decorated RAAF pilot flying among other aircraft Canberras and F-111s, Mr Deeble accumulated 2500 operational flying hours, and has held a number of senior administrative defence appointments including one covering the problematic Collins class submarines.

In his new role, Mr Deeble will be in charge of the $1.5bn One­SKY program to integrate civilian and military air traffic control and navigation systems in a state of the art national network.

As of late last week, when The Australian started making inquiries concerning Mr Deeble, he was listed as a director on the website of the International Centre for Complex Project Management, a Canberra-based organisation with military and aerospace links. But this week he was no longer listed as a director for ICCPM.

A web search shows Mr Deeble was active in ICCPM, delivering an address to a symposium organised by the group and being ­appointed a fellow in December.

Following a request from the Senate rural and regional affairs and transport legislation committee, the Australian National Audit Office last year launched an investigation into alleged possible conflicts of interest between ICCPM and Airservices over OneSKY contracts. It is due to report to parliament in May.

The audit office says it is investigating “whether Airservices Australia has effective procurement arrangements in place, with a particular emphasis on whether consultancy contracts entered into with ICCPM in association with the OneSKY Australia project were effectively administered”.

A Senate committee hearing last year heard of how a “husband and wife team” had been on opposite sides of a contract transaction between Airservices and ICCPM over OneSKY.
Steve Hein, who worked for ICCPM until hired by Airservices in a senior managerial role, processed a contract as an Airservices executive with ICCPM, where his wife Deborah Hein is managing director.

The committee heard that Airservices had outsourced the job of negotiating with the lead contractor for OneSKY, aerospace giant Thales Australia, to former RAAF officer Harry Bradford, an ICCPM director, when the chairman of ICCPM, Chris Jenkins, was Thales managing director.

Mr Bradford had been paid more than $1 million by Airservices by the middle of last year.
“The perception of conflict of interest is all over this,” Labor senator Joe Bullock said at the committee hearing in August, joining chairman, Liberal senator Bill Heffernan, in describing the ­arrangements as “incestuous”.

An Airservices source told The Australian staff in Canberra were “shocked” when rumours of Mr Deeble’s appointment surfaced in recent weeks, given the ongoing nature of the audit office investigation, saying there was a perception problem in “having anyone responsible for finalising contract negotiations between Airservices and Thales also being a current or recent director of ICCPM.”

An Airservices spokesman said the government-owned organisation had no concerns about how the appointment of Mr Deeble would be perceived in relation to his ICCPM links.

Mr Deeble was not available for interview.

 
Jeez...in my next life I want to come back as a RAAF AVM

MTF..P2