What a load of rot. Crab clearly knows bugger all about civilian helo operations and in particular the servicability rate.
To see the difference please ring Culdrose SAR and ask them what their servicability record is. Also ask them how many aircrew, maintainers and support personnel they have on watcgh at the moment. Then ring up Portland SAR and ask them the same. Think you'll be pleasantly surprised.
I only have evidence of Portland and Lee SAR units as well as having served with 771 and I can asure you that the civvy guys are head and shoulders above their military comrades...why? because the Navy guys do the job for 2 years and then go and drive a desk in MOD or fly Merlin. I can point you to at least 6 guys at PO and LEE who have over 5000 hours SAR alone. One particular oppo of mine has been flying SAR operations since 1986....Thats why they are so good at it.
As for servicability....How do they manage to maintain such a high percentage of servicability with so few maintainers? In fact if you were to ring LEE you would find there is only 1 maybe 2 maintainers on watch. So, how do they do that? easy - they don't change components until they are broke. If it aint broke don't fix it. The military over maintain their aircraft.