Dick,
TAAATS was years late and overbudget, its a fact. It was a worlds first and most projects like this do tend to go this way. It is a huge improvement on what we used to have, and was worth the extra time and expense.
It was cobbled together from proven systems, and it was the ATC and the Techs of Australia, together with the mostly French suppliers who did it.
Someone has to prove the systems in the first place though.
Australia , due to its large and diverse area, and lack of sovereignty issues, is probably the foremost area in the world to develop new ideas in ATC. We have the advantage of a busy Eastern seaboard, with some of the busiest city-pair air routes in the world. Combined with a huge expanse of basically nothing. We can be busy USA, or the backblocks of Siberia, and most places in between.
We have robust discussions here, so imagine what it must be like in Europe. The politics, potential suppliers, and sovereignty issues must make us look like a love-in.
ADS-B is up and working in areas of Australia, the trial has been going on for years and it is being implemented. It is evidence that we can do it, it will be a huge boost to those areas in the West, the discussion about GA costs will continue. Have you thought that there are probably "other countries Dick Smiths" pointing to Australia and saying they are using it, it is a proven system and what the hell are we doing wasting money.
As for the Hughes system in NZ, it had alot of teething problems, but having seen and played on both systems in the last couple of years, I believe that for outside of radar coverage that the Hughes system, at the moment, is a better piece of kit.We have some improvements, that are due to go on, that will bring us up to speed and allow User Preferred Routing, that are only being held up due to our staffing problems.