Surely, with such a huge investment in 'state of the art' modern aircraft and superbly trained crews - it should be much, much better, not just 'as good as'! .....
A good point Crab. However, I am concerned that it is a point that you then go on to over-play.
Until now the different providers have had different career paths and different crew structures including approaches to captaincy and command. Amongst bidders for this contract, there were also slightly different approaches in career path and command.
There will now be no three year tours, not everyone up front will have to be captain qualified, no commander up the back, and other differences. Although there will inevitably be a few who leave after a few years, we can expect most crew members to have a long career building up considerable experience in the way that you and others have done in SAR Force and the Fleet Air Arm.
I know that some on the bid teams looked at these factors during the bidding process. Perhaps one of them can step in and give us a thorough analysis.
The amount of training with MRT under the new regime has been questioned by teams across the country. However, the history is of teams not asking for enough from either military or civilian flights.
(Three months from now it will be a brave man who tells a certain
about to be former Master Aircrew that he's doing a crap job just because he's wearing a different colour onesie and using a shed load of better kit.)