While I love to join in these discussions I fear that Dick and the rest of you are right - nothing will change so why does he keep bothering us with these repetitive posts?
Because he is right that's why!
I am amazed that you all would rather critisise a man who has seen what the flying world could look like and come back to tell you about it, instead of backing him to the hilt and demanding that our politicians do something.
Hours of diversions are racked up every year by civilian pilots, private and commercial, flying around holes in the sky populated by one military aircraft. The USMC has more aircraft than the entire Australian ADF and does not have a restricted area to it's name. It has Military Operating Areas but they appear and when used, disappear allowing civilians to get on with their flying lives. In the UK there is a line of military bases stretching all the way from London up to Scotland. They accommodate fighters bombers and trainers and they do not have even a restricted area round their bases never mind about where they fly their missions. (Except for the Scottish Highlands)
Both these countries have reacted to the availability of surveillance to free up their airspace and treat it like a national asset, part of the nation's infrasctructure, to be used by all efficiently and for the good of the country. Australia is stuck is some kind of 1950's time warp ruled over by Sir Donald George Anderson. All pilot's are idiots and have to be protected from themselves. The military believes that it's needs are greater than those of the nation and people they serve. They simply don't understand that you do not need an R Area as big as Germany so that two F18s can play catch with each other. They don't care that civil airliners have to fly dozens of extra track miles so that their Hornets can bomb a target at Evans Head, when that target could be out near Longreach miles away from busy East Coast air routes.
Who will change all this 1950s thinking - well actually no-one because we don't get out much when it comes to comparisons. And when someone does we treat them with contempt and vilification - after all what would they know, life was truly great when we had Flight Service everywhere!