Hello Scran.
I erred; there are now 3 separate ministers governing the Defence organisation, Minister for Defence, Minister for Defence Material, Minister for Defence Science & Personnel plus a Parliamentary Secretary for Defence. Appreciable shuffling of politicians through defence related appointments since 2007.
Both DMO and DSTO now have their own separate ministerial clout whereas the military is subordinate to the Secretary of Defence/CDF diarchy under the Minister for Defence. Once upon a time, each of the armed forces had their own ministerial representation with public service elements embedded in the respective military departments and that worked well.
In theory, DMO ought to be just a project co-ordination agency but it certainly wields more power. If I recall correctly, former Ministers for Defence Fitzgibbon and Faulkner both expressed frustration at being unable to exercise adequate control over processes in DMO.
My point is nothing works effectively unless appropriately organised and the whole defence structure is really a fragmented dysfunctional mess; but I doubt that the politicians (of either major political party) have the fortitude to restructure back towards a semblance of the system that once worked pretty efficiently. Things may get a whole lot worse if DMO gets spun off into a separate corporate entity, which has been proposed.
Last edited by Bushranger 71; 7th Feb 2011 at 17:20.