Australia should move quickly on building its defence workforce - and learn from the UK

The defence and nuclear workforce challenge is large, UK firm Babcock says, but lessons can be learned from how the Brits have tackled the task.

Defence companies need to think more broadly about where they source the workers of the future - as Australia faces an unprecedented uplift in naval shipbuilding - with lessons able to be learned about how the UK has attacked the problem, Babcock International chief executive David Lockwood says.

Babcock, which currently has about 1800 employees in Australia, is looking to be a key player in the AUKUS nuclear submarine program, arguing its vast experience decommissioning and conducting deep maintenance on the UK’s submarine fleet gives it a unique position in terms of expertise.

Babcock is also hoping to pitch its Arrowhead frigate as a potential tier 2 platform for the Australian Navy, with a review of the makeup of Australia’s surface fleet expected to be released next week.

Speaking earlier this month at the company’s Devonport Royal Dockyard - part of the largest naval support site in Western Europe - Mr Lockwood said the UK faced the same issues as Australia, albeit on a grander scale.

Australia - in particular South Australia and Western Australia - will need to find thousands of skilled workers in coming years as the Hunter Class Frigate build program in SA and the AUKUS submarine build and sustainment programs across SA and WA ramp up.

In already tight markets for skilled labour it’s a pressing issue, even given the long time frames involved for projects such as the AUKUS submarine work, which will extend over decades.

Mr Lockwood said the extended time frames could engender a false sense of security, but the reality was that work needed to start as soon as possible on addressing issues such as skills and infrastructure.

“It’s very easy to believe that you’ve always got time, you can always delay, you can always think a bit more,’’ Mr Lockwood said.

Emily Taylor, Babcock mechanical engineering apprentice, Devonport shipyard, Plymouth, England. Picture: Supplied

“And I think if you talk to the Americans, you talk to the French, it’s a real problem. Because the overall program is always in decades, delaying for six months feels like it doesn’t matter until it really, really does.’’

In the UK they not only have an ongoing defence and nuclear submarine build program to cater for, but also the expansion of the domestic nuclear power industry.

Mr Lockwood said it was estimated that the industry would need another 300,000 people to join it over the next 10 years, “which even for a country that’s got a bigger population than Australia is a big number, particularly when we haven’t really talked about nuclear as a nation for a long time’’.

The UK set up a nuclear skills task force, and also set about rebranding the industry with a program known as “Destination Nuclear”, designed to attract new workers into the sector.

“If we just carry on as before, we’re not going to get enough people, so we can’t carry on as before,’’ Mr Lockwood said.

“We have to widen the funnel, we have to change the screening, we have to make it sexier.

“We have to broaden the opportunities. We just have to think of it as the chief of defence nuclear in the UK Government says, ‘this has to be a national endeavour’.’’

A Babcock Type 31 frigate being built at the Rosyth shipyard in Scotland. Picture: Supplied.

Mr Lockwood said the nuclear sector of defence particularly, would benefit from making it clear that defence industry companies are not just looking for people with advanced degrees.

There had been a concerted push within Babcock, for example, to broaden its appeal to females, and also to people who were trained in other areas, but were willing to learn.

“If you don’t recruit from the female population, you’ve excluded half your population before you start,’’ Mr Lockwood said.

“If you then make it feel like you’ve got to have a nuclear degree, even if it’s not true, you start to scare more people off and suddenly, there’s probably only 10 or 15 per cent of the population even thinking about working with you.’’

Mr Lockwood said he had spoken with a worker at Babcock’s Devonport site just recently, who had retrained from being a chef after talking with his mates about the opportunities at the shipyard.

While the skills crossover might not be immediately apparent, Mr Lockwood said attention to detail, systems, processes which ensured food safety, all of these aligned with the attributes needed to contribute in the shipyard.

At the company’s Rosyth shipyard near Edinburgh in Scotland, Babcock pioneered a program training what it calls Production Support Operatives - workers who initially work alongside skilled tradespeople, lightening their workload while also learning on the job.

That program has been successful in bringing in people, many of whom are looking for a late-stage career change, who can then progress through an apprenticeship if they so wish.

So far about 170 PSOs have been trained, which both assists tradespeople and frees them up to do high value work.

Mr Lockwood said Babcock, which hopes to greatly increase its Australian operations in coming years, can bring the lessons it has learned in the UK to Australia, enabling the sector to get a “fast-start” on recruiting.

Veronica Warner, Babcock chief welding engineer, Devonport shipyard. England. Picture: Supplied

Babcock has been tasked in the UK with maintaining and decommissioning nuclear submarines for the British Navy, with a deep maintenance cycle on a nuclear submarine demanding more than 70 million hours worth of work.

Adding nuclear fuel handling into the mix greatly increases the complexity of an already difficult task in either maintaining or decommissioning a submarine, and Babcock, Mr Lockwood says, is well suited to the task.

Babcock Australasia chief executive Andrew Cridland said they believed there was “ no one better qualified to be the nuclear partner of choice to the Commonwealth to support the nation’s AUKUS endeavour’’.

“Babcock is a world-leader in nuclear submarine capability, including in sustainment, nuclear safety and stewardship, playing a crucial role in the UK, US and Australia’s submarine programs today,’’ Mr Cridland said..

“Babcock has lived and breathed nuclear safety and stewardship for decades and therefore, we bring the heritage, knowledge and experience required to accelerate the development of sovereign capability in Australia.’’

The Devonport shipyard is currently home to about a dozen nuclear submarines at various stages of their life cycle, with Babcock designated to work on them for decades to come.

The surface fleet review was triggered by the Defence Strategic Review, made public in April last year, which recommended a new analysis of Australia’s naval fleet capability, in light of the decision to move to the AUKUS nuclear submarine platform and changed strategic considerations.

The review said the Australian fleet “should consist of Tier 1 and Tier 2 surface combatants in order to provide for increased strike, air defence, presence operations and anti-submarine warfare’’.

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Growing up in Plymouth in the UK - home to Western Europe’s largest naval base - Babcock engineering apprentice Emily Taylor was used to the sight of warships - and the occasional submarine - out in the harbour.

So when the opportunity arose, she jumped at the chance to work in the defence industry, and is now, at the age of 24, approaching the end of her apprenticeship as a higher level mechanical engineer.

“I decided to work on warships because I just I found them fascinating,’’ Ms Taylor said.

“I’ve lived in Plymouth my whole life and I’ve always seen the frigates in the water.

“So I chose warships and I’m now a design change engineer. We look at the changes that are being made to the frigates.

“There’s a massive range of opportunities that I could have chosen, and it just happens to be that warships is where I’ve fallen.’’

Ms Taylor said working in defence provided both a lifetime career, but also, given the diversity on offer in companies the size of Babcock, there was also the opportunity to skill up in different disciplines, and effectively try out new jobs, while staying within the firm.

Chief welding engineer at Babcock, Veronica Warner, 32, joined the company as an aerospace engineering graduate and followed that up with a Masters degree while working - which the company paid for - as well as an international welding engineer diploma.

Ms Warner said there were excellent career opportunities within defence, while it was also gratifying to be contributing to the national defence effort, as well as the other programs, such as humanitarian aid, which their customer - the navy - was involved with.

Ms Warner said the proportion of women in her field was growing, and particularly for young people with an interest in STEM subjects, there were interesting and rewarding careers to be had.

- The author travelled to the UK as a guest of Babcock