Is it true that MOD is planning to cut RAF RANKS by a 3rd come May 2011
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Is it true that MOD is planning to cut RAF RANKS by a 3rd come May 2011
It has become apparent that a memo has unfortunately been released a mere six weeks too early, informing the people in the know of such matters to recomend slashes to be made to RAF manpower, to enable the force to be reduced by a third by the year 2011, thus coinciding with a very neat bit of trimming stitching and closing of certain Stations around the uk. news of this it seems was also relaid to one to many prying ears at a recent xmas function in the mess at a rather large well known establishment in the South West of England. Mind you, you just never can tell eh...obviously not one to start a rumour but if you fellows and ladies of course were privvy to this info then prey do tell.
any spelling well really its just not on is old beaners
any spelling well really its just not on is old beaners
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lord trench lend me a maggot i just might
Lordtrenchard and all you other crazy folks.....
I would love to have info at hand as to where these killer cuts will be made, alas as I said it was over heard, at which point i must remind you it was merely that. (overheard). I posted the info as I assumed it may trigger a blurred thought pattern of some partied out beer call, regular who would then let the rest of us mortals know...CHECK THE MEANING PPRUNE I posted a rumour as the web address suggest we just might like to.
By the way i am fresh out of wrigglies so lend uz a maggot and i may well just find an ice hole to plug and fish eh my old chum....merry christmas to one and all....never mind for all of you in the fearsome force fear not as I forsee a redundency, for at least 90% of the force would be more like a liberation. Your lives would far improve and the world would be a rosy place once again. oh news in an old dear in elgin just mailed to say she'd love to go to joanna's on a wed only its RAF Seduction night and she can't meet the criteria only being 52........only joking before you all try to castrate me......toddle pip
I would love to have info at hand as to where these killer cuts will be made, alas as I said it was over heard, at which point i must remind you it was merely that. (overheard). I posted the info as I assumed it may trigger a blurred thought pattern of some partied out beer call, regular who would then let the rest of us mortals know...CHECK THE MEANING PPRUNE I posted a rumour as the web address suggest we just might like to.
By the way i am fresh out of wrigglies so lend uz a maggot and i may well just find an ice hole to plug and fish eh my old chum....merry christmas to one and all....never mind for all of you in the fearsome force fear not as I forsee a redundency, for at least 90% of the force would be more like a liberation. Your lives would far improve and the world would be a rosy place once again. oh news in an old dear in elgin just mailed to say she'd love to go to joanna's on a wed only its RAF Seduction night and she can't meet the criteria only being 52........only joking before you all try to castrate me......toddle pip
I don't own this space under my name. I should have leased it while I still could
5Kstrop
If it is NOT true now it probably will be by 2010.
The number of WSO we need will be down dramatically. The number teaching new ones down too. We are cutting the EFA by a tranche. If that tranche is not needed, why keep the aircraft it was to have replaced.
So that is another third of the F3 force. They will need less tankers and they will probably be flown by 55 year old American pilots working for a well-known record lable company.
Air Traffic Control will be largely contractorised, only 'cause they have a piss poor recruiting and retention record.
Fighter Control - no fighters and an AWAC so no need for a control.
Dark blue looks better on ships so the Harrier replacement guys will probably wear sandals and navy blue shorts.
Only a third?
If it is NOT true now it probably will be by 2010.
The number of WSO we need will be down dramatically. The number teaching new ones down too. We are cutting the EFA by a tranche. If that tranche is not needed, why keep the aircraft it was to have replaced.
So that is another third of the F3 force. They will need less tankers and they will probably be flown by 55 year old American pilots working for a well-known record lable company.
Air Traffic Control will be largely contractorised, only 'cause they have a piss poor recruiting and retention record.
Fighter Control - no fighters and an AWAC so no need for a control.
Dark blue looks better on ships so the Harrier replacement guys will probably wear sandals and navy blue shorts.
Only a third?
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THANK YOU PONTIOUS
PONTIOUS
Like Ihave said in the title, thank you!
It seems strange to have a real answer for a change, with a tit bit of info to chew on to boot!
Have a merry christmas one and all i hope the harrier guys toes don't blacken what with wearing those sandals on deck..peeep peeeep pipe him aboard Cappin flint warkkk warkkk
Like Ihave said in the title, thank you!
It seems strange to have a real answer for a change, with a tit bit of info to chew on to boot!
Have a merry christmas one and all i hope the harrier guys toes don't blacken what with wearing those sandals on deck..peeep peeeep pipe him aboard Cappin flint warkkk warkkk
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RAF ATC - suggested solutions
Pontius Navigator
Having spent nearly 30 years as an RAF air trafficker, I think your recent post deserves a response.
There have always been problems with recruiting and retention in air traffic, for two simple reasons, firstly an absence of any form of specialist pay (why put up with all the hassle when you can earn the same and get promoted far quicker in almost any other ground branch), secondly the lack of any form of structured crossover training to a civil ATC licence.
The absence of specialist pay is due entirely to the inability of those in high places to neither recognise the need, nor wish to set a precedent from the ‘all of one company syndrome’. The absence of crossover training is almost entirely due to the inability of certain senior ATC officers who refused to even attempt to understand the benefits and consequently never really pressed for such a system to be implemented, despite a number of overtures from SRG. The work being undertaken now by HR is welcome, but will probably be too little and too late.
The suggestion that military ATC in the UK could be contractorised to a civilian organisation is interesting, I take it you don’t recall what happened when this was tried at Boscombe Down? Firstly, comparable civilian controllers will cost more and secondly where would you find them? Currently, NATS cannot recruit, train and retain enough staff to man their own units and are already ‘poaching’ as many staff as they can from the RAF in an attempt to solve their problems. Also, there is no ‘pool’ of competent licensed civil controllers sitting around just waiting for a job to come along, if they’re any use, they’re already in work and are unlikely to be tempted to work in the kind of free-for-all operations in the open FIR that characterises RAF ATC – particularly for the sort of money that would be on offer.
The real threat to current RAF ATC is not actually a serious lack of numbers, although current trends do give cause for concern and options to address the shortfall are being considered. The real threat is actually the extremely low levels of experience at RAF ATC units, which has just got continually worse over the years and yet is just ignored as long as the ‘numbers’ stack-up. Nothing will ever change until the real issues of some form of specialist pay and cross-over training are addressed, but these cost money, so it’s much easier to adopt the same policy that has always been employed – ignore the problem, hope that no incidents take place which could be a result of inexperience and then with any luck it’ll all go away.
Having spent nearly 30 years as an RAF air trafficker, I think your recent post deserves a response.
There have always been problems with recruiting and retention in air traffic, for two simple reasons, firstly an absence of any form of specialist pay (why put up with all the hassle when you can earn the same and get promoted far quicker in almost any other ground branch), secondly the lack of any form of structured crossover training to a civil ATC licence.
The absence of specialist pay is due entirely to the inability of those in high places to neither recognise the need, nor wish to set a precedent from the ‘all of one company syndrome’. The absence of crossover training is almost entirely due to the inability of certain senior ATC officers who refused to even attempt to understand the benefits and consequently never really pressed for such a system to be implemented, despite a number of overtures from SRG. The work being undertaken now by HR is welcome, but will probably be too little and too late.
The suggestion that military ATC in the UK could be contractorised to a civilian organisation is interesting, I take it you don’t recall what happened when this was tried at Boscombe Down? Firstly, comparable civilian controllers will cost more and secondly where would you find them? Currently, NATS cannot recruit, train and retain enough staff to man their own units and are already ‘poaching’ as many staff as they can from the RAF in an attempt to solve their problems. Also, there is no ‘pool’ of competent licensed civil controllers sitting around just waiting for a job to come along, if they’re any use, they’re already in work and are unlikely to be tempted to work in the kind of free-for-all operations in the open FIR that characterises RAF ATC – particularly for the sort of money that would be on offer.
The real threat to current RAF ATC is not actually a serious lack of numbers, although current trends do give cause for concern and options to address the shortfall are being considered. The real threat is actually the extremely low levels of experience at RAF ATC units, which has just got continually worse over the years and yet is just ignored as long as the ‘numbers’ stack-up. Nothing will ever change until the real issues of some form of specialist pay and cross-over training are addressed, but these cost money, so it’s much easier to adopt the same policy that has always been employed – ignore the problem, hope that no incidents take place which could be a result of inexperience and then with any luck it’ll all go away.
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I was once told that the RAF have more personel per airframe than any other air force on the planet and having worked in Aldergrove for some time I can see that that is entirely feasible.
Chop em all, especially those idiot RAF Police bods who think that it is within their remit to tell me when I should or should not wear a beret!
Chop em all, especially those idiot RAF Police bods who think that it is within their remit to tell me when I should or should not wear a beret!
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5KSTROP,
Picked you up on another thread somewhere this week. Just wondered why you as a brown job should be at all concerned about RAF manning levels.
The standard of your grammar,punctuation etc also reminds me of another chap, isitd I believe he calls himself, although he has been quiet for awhile now. Did you two go to the same school or are you his doppelganger ?
Picked you up on another thread somewhere this week. Just wondered why you as a brown job should be at all concerned about RAF manning levels.
The standard of your grammar,punctuation etc also reminds me of another chap, isitd I believe he calls himself, although he has been quiet for awhile now. Did you two go to the same school or are you his doppelganger ?
I don't own this space under my name. I should have leased it while I still could
Proletarian,
I agree with all you say but . . .
my contractor is offering ATC services and we ARE short of controllers. I don't mean to imply that all ATC will go grey suit. We need green suits to sit in windowless control towers like Kabul International etc.
I agree with all you say but . . .
my contractor is offering ATC services and we ARE short of controllers. I don't mean to imply that all ATC will go grey suit. We need green suits to sit in windowless control towers like Kabul International etc.
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Ponitius
How about the Norwegian solution then - ATC are civilians but are also all (?) reservists therefore they can be called out to go to Kabul etc.
Interestingly the next team into Kabul will be the Icelandics taking over from the spike helmeted box headed ones. The Icelandics will all be civvies.
Personally I think it would be a sad day to see RAF terminal ATC made civvie - big loss of rapport not to mention the odd cute thing around the mess.
How about the Norwegian solution then - ATC are civilians but are also all (?) reservists therefore they can be called out to go to Kabul etc.
Interestingly the next team into Kabul will be the Icelandics taking over from the spike helmeted box headed ones. The Icelandics will all be civvies.
Personally I think it would be a sad day to see RAF terminal ATC made civvie - big loss of rapport not to mention the odd cute thing around the mess.
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The thread title implies that Whitehall plan ahead on defence matters - such suggestions can only possibly be tabloid sensationalism. The truth is that important decisions are only ever made on the hoof and about 24 hours after the events that trigger them.
Talking of forward planning: cutting the number of Typhoids. It's easy to save some cash now by reducing the order, but what about 10-15 years down the line, when 10-15 of them have been crashed or shot down, and 20 of them are christmas trees, robbed so that the rest of the fleet can share around a few serviceable engines and black boxes. We'll wish we had a few more then, but IF it's possible to get them they'll cost twice as much as buying them now.
Ask a politician about foresight and he'll think it's the thing in a jar of formaldehyde in his bedside table. Happy New Year.
Talking of forward planning: cutting the number of Typhoids. It's easy to save some cash now by reducing the order, but what about 10-15 years down the line, when 10-15 of them have been crashed or shot down, and 20 of them are christmas trees, robbed so that the rest of the fleet can share around a few serviceable engines and black boxes. We'll wish we had a few more then, but IF it's possible to get them they'll cost twice as much as buying them now.
Ask a politician about foresight and he'll think it's the thing in a jar of formaldehyde in his bedside table. Happy New Year.
I don't own this space under my name. I should have leased it while I still could
Max, we will probably get a lease back from the Ities who will take some part used F3s in exchange.
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3xgreens
hello old boy!
whilst punctuation and grammar are not my strong points (see earlier post) good wit, innane banter and a solid professional opinion are almost guaranteed! throw in endless friendship to boot, too!
ah, tarquin. on the whistle, over the top you go, old chap!! and thank the lord for the royal flying corps!!
what with massive reductions in the raf and the ever increasing expansion of the green machine, are we about to see the re invention of the wheel? bi planes et al?
lfogootfw!
hello old boy!
whilst punctuation and grammar are not my strong points (see earlier post) good wit, innane banter and a solid professional opinion are almost guaranteed! throw in endless friendship to boot, too!
ah, tarquin. on the whistle, over the top you go, old chap!! and thank the lord for the royal flying corps!!
what with massive reductions in the raf and the ever increasing expansion of the green machine, are we about to see the re invention of the wheel? bi planes et al?
lfogootfw!
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FO Max Stout,
I'm not entirely sure that cancelling tranch 3 of the Tyhpus virus will save us loadsa money. Some, for sure, but I understand the multinational aspects of the contract are such that if we reduce and the other nations don't then we pay a disproportionate amount of their R&D costs - in effect we discount their buy.
Believe this is an area where no one wants to blink first and all four nations must blink together - of course they may have already done that and I'm behind the curve: haven't been able to get too worked up about FCA/Eurofighter 2000/Eurofighter/Typhoon for some years now!
I'm not entirely sure that cancelling tranch 3 of the Tyhpus virus will save us loadsa money. Some, for sure, but I understand the multinational aspects of the contract are such that if we reduce and the other nations don't then we pay a disproportionate amount of their R&D costs - in effect we discount their buy.
Believe this is an area where no one wants to blink first and all four nations must blink together - of course they may have already done that and I'm behind the curve: haven't been able to get too worked up about FCA/Eurofighter 2000/Eurofighter/Typhoon for some years now!
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Pontoious, I would be very interested to see how your "contractor" could resource ATC services as I think you will find there is a dearth of controllers across the board. Colour of suit/uniform matters not. The problem the MoD faces is that, in such a market place, it is almost impossible to recruit, retain or provide an effective service on the cheap.
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Cuts
Hm lots and lots of valid points but what worries me is that all you splendid chaps have presented sound military and even financial reasons why cuts shouldnt take place in certain areas.
However, these cuts will be made by Civil Servants and politicians who can only recognise savings at face value. Retention, recruitment, morale and efficiency are meaningless when it comes to the jolly old chop.
Contracts are in vogue and the disasters that have befallen the medical and catering branches of all services have been ignored.
Sigh, its a cruel world
However, these cuts will be made by Civil Servants and politicians who can only recognise savings at face value. Retention, recruitment, morale and efficiency are meaningless when it comes to the jolly old chop.
Contracts are in vogue and the disasters that have befallen the medical and catering branches of all services have been ignored.
Sigh, its a cruel world