Patrick Durrant | Sydney 

South Australia’s peak defence industry body, the Defence Teaming Centre (DTC) announced on Saturday that CEO Chris Burns will step down at the end of June. 

The Chairman of the DTC Board, Jack Mahoney said that early in his tenure, Burns associated the phrase ‘Valley of Death’ with the unpredictable peaks and troughs of Defence projects that negatively impact on industry.  

“He has guided South Australia’s defence industry expertly through that ‘Valley of Death’ in the face of six years of underinvestment by successive Federal Governments,” Mahoney said. 

He also highlighted Burns’ strong advocacy for the nation’s defence industry as spokesperson for the Australian Made Defence campaign.  

“This has been critical in driving recent significant Defence acquisition decisions that will, in part, bridge the Valley of Death.”  

Burns said it has been a real “David and Goliath effort” trying to get the message out to Australians that “we have an extremely capable national defence industry that does not deserve much of the denigration foisted upon it”.  

"There’s a huge pie, and there’s enough for everyone – let’s not argue about how much everyone is getting, let’s try and make the pie bigger.” 

He also said “it has been a great honour to lead a fantastic team of dedicated individuals with a single-minded focus on ensuring our members maximise every possible opportunity to succeed in the defence and security related industry sectors”.  

Burns told ADM he hoped that defence industry advocacy would become a national endeavour. 

“There’s a huge pie, and there’s enough for everyone – let’s not argue about how much everyone is getting, let’s try and make the pie bigger,” he said. 

Burns felt that one of his achievements in his tenure at DTC was helping to foster and cooperation within defence industry.  

“Competing for contracts is obviously important and necessary, but once it has been decided where the work will go, there then needs to be cooperation to deliver that work,” he said.  

When Burns started in 2010, he couldn’t help but notice the “walls” being put up because “everyone was scared to talk to the competition and cooperate for fear of losing work.”  

“Now we’ve got this cooperative principle working it gives me pleasure now to attend, for example, a function where members from what were once highly competitive companies are now talking to one another.” 

Burns said that with the both sides of government firmly behind a continuous build program there was opportunity for Australian industry to become part of a globally competitive national shipbuilding enterprise. 

But he’s concerned the national shipbuilding plan promised by Senator Payne before the end of the year may not be adequate and hopes to use his remaining months in the role to advocate for a broad strategy that won’t simply encompass the Defence need.   

“It shouldn’t be the sole responsibility of the Defence Minister to develop such a plan – there are a lot more ships other than naval vessels that governments require, for example icebreakers, border protection vessels and even (should nuclear waste storage go ahead in the future) special ships to transport that waste – these ships are as complex to build as warships,” Burns said. 

Burns also said a national shipbuilding authority will be absolutely necessary to engage all of the stakeholders effectively and coordinate their efforts under the one plan.  

Burns will assume the role of SA Commissioner for Mental Health later this year, and while acknowledging the challenge that role will bring he said he’s not going into it with his eyes closed. 

“I’ve had a lot to do with mental health here in SA, I’ve chaired the Veteran’s Health Advisory Council and also been involved in relocating the repat hospital.” 

He also has many friends who are suffering the effects of PTSD and has witnessed the impact upon them and their families. 

“It’s another chance for me to contribute and I think the DTC has got to change its direction now – our focus has been on advocacy leading up to these decisions, now that the work is there to be lost, the DTC has to focus on preventing this from happening. This will involve developing skills, infrastructure, innovation and coming to grips with what this principle of continuous shipbuilding is all about,” Burns said. 

He added that evolutionary design and industry’s ability to be agile would be key to guaranteeing future work. 

“Despite the amount of work now in the pipeline, you can’t just sit back and wait for it to keep coming your way.”