Australia - Defence solves problems with subs: new boss

DMO General of Australia's submarines David Gould.

After two decades of problems the new man in charge of Australia's submarine fleet says the government is now on top of the maintenance work for the troubled Collins class fleet.

In his first interview since stepping into the job of general manager of submarines two months ago, David Gould said the Defence Materiel Organisation had sorted out one of its biggest headaches.

''We are now confident, backed by evidence, that we have the Collins sustainment issues solved,'' the 63-year-old Mr Gould told the Sunday Canberra Times.

Fresh from Britain, where he spent almost all his working life within senior ranks of the defence bureaucracy, Mr Gould has now moved into a rented house at Campbell and plans to spend three years in the job.

The keen angler and one-time school teacher must straddle two difficult areas competing for his time: keeping Australia's six Collins submarines seaworthy in a timely fashion; and helping to design a new type of underwater fleet to be built in the next 25 years.

Creating a new generation of submarines was, in his words, as complex as constructing a space shuttle.

''Human beings are not supposed to survive down there [underwater],'' he said.

Even though the Collins submarines have made bad headlines since they were built - with problems varying from engine failures to excessive noise - Mr Gould said this was mostly because of maintenance problems.

At the moment, three of the six Collins subs are in the docks and he expected submarines to spend up to half their lives being maintained.

He said the Collins class submarine had many good qualities that should be kept for the newly designed submarines.

The achievements of the Collins were particularly notable because it was Australia's first attempt at parent its own submarine fleet. Before 1990, whenever Australia had a problem with the Oberon submarines, it could always call on Britain or Canada for help and information.

This changed when the Collins was designed specifically for the tropical water and long distances of Australian missions.

''Australia had to change,'' Mr Gould said. ''It was now the only user [of these submarines]. It had to become the parent navy.''

In the past 20 years in Britain, Mr Gould's positions have included under-secretary for air force supply and organisation, under-secretary for policy in the Ministry of Defence, deputy chief executive and chief operating officer of the Defence Procurement Agency and chief operating officer for Defence Equipment and Support.

In 2008 he retired from the British public service, started his own consultancy and served as executive chairman for SELEX SI.

In his Russell office he regularly gets emails from friends with progress photos of a project he was involved in - the 65,000-tonne Queen Elizabeth II aircraft carrier.