There is a book written by a US journalist - I'm sorry but forget the name of both - which tells the story of the Hudson airbus. There were many interviews with senior Airbus development pilots and designers. One of the comments is that the a/c did what it was designed to do, more than the piloting skills. A lesser a/c would have needed much more skill to achieve what this one did. Perhaps true, I don't know. I've always thought that the real skill in that scenario was to make the ditching decision in the first place. I suspect many lesser experienced captains, of which there are a great many, would have followed their homing instinct and tried to make it to a runway with most likely horrific consequences. The point in the book is that Airbus seem to think it was the a/c that saved the day. Hm!?
Moving on to handling skills, and my thoughts that we are the final insurance policy. Let's take a B737. Could have a 30min or 60min battery. Classics & NG might have either, I think; and with total AC failure might have EADI or PFD display on Capt's side for the life of the battery. Let's take the best case and say 60mins and full display. Now, you have total AC failure at cruise FL. and plunge into QRH's and discuss and descend and divert, but you are on the edge of the 1hr circle to an airfield. So, the battery, with no guarantee of 60mins, dies at 45mins. You are left with 2 good engines, normal gear & flaps etc. but only the tiny SBY instruments. You have radar and an airfield ILS, or perhaps only an SRA, with 5km's & 500' ceiling; would the pax expect you to be able to land safely? I think so. How many think they could do it? In one command upgrade conversion I did, from B732 - B757, it was a requirement to do a basic SBY insytrument ILS. In my present enviroment, of 10years, I do not know of any training having been done using the basic SBY's. This is because the battery gives full PFD: yes, but for how long? I even wonder some of them flying a HDG SEL V/S NDB approach. There is no training. SOP's for normal ops is follow the magenta line: Oh yes, but if the approach is not in the FMC then use basic modes, but they still fly the magenta line.
I once trained an OCC for an captain who had been a B727 captain and was now B738 HOT. He was joining us on B733. This is not a GPS a/c and NPA's have to be flown in HDG SEL and fly the needles. He just flew the magenta line, which had map shift, and never looked at the needles. He was nowhere near the centre line; way out of limits. Descending on finals outside centreline. Had no clue. Common type rating. Frightening.