Preserving capacity, General Tom Lawson, Chief of the Defence Staff, Keys to Canadian SAR
Issue link: http://vanguardcanada.uberflip.com/i/196923
C COAST GUARD established, without help. The military has a network of bases and capabilities that are used to augment those of the coast guard. Military readiness and preparedness lend themselves well to short-notice and urgent missions when mariners are in danger. Long-range aircraft for national defence and surveillance missions can be used to good effect to improve the SAR services available to Canadians and foreigners off our coasts. Naval vessels, although few in number, are fast, robust and most carry large multipurpose helicopters. The problem in managing this relationship is the cultural gulf between the civilian coast guard and the military armed forces that has resulted in a confused departmental authority arrangement and a shared operational responsibility to generate and maintain forces for SAR tasks. While both coast guard and military units can undertake the tactical duties associated with the tasks, the higher command and coordination functions are unclear, leading to numerous problems. A major and ongoing national embarrassment has been the difficulty of procuring aircraft for the SAR function. With the navy and air force bringing military cultural perspectives and the coast guard bringing a civil one, is it any wonder that questions about what types of fixed wing aircraft should be selected for SAR are problematic? The RCAF crews, operates and maintains the aircraft while the RCN is the principal maritime employer. The coast guard sees SAR as a primary mission while it is clearly secondary for the military, even though the MND is nominally in charge of the capability. This kind of dissonance happens when two groups look at a problem from fundamentally difference perspectives. Both the Canadian military and coast guard train their personnel for SAR specialist duties. This is expensive and unnecessary duplication. The same is also true for rescue divers. Because the CCG and Canadian Armed Forces are separated by a wide gulf of organizational culture, they are able to cooperate reasonably well on important but functionally limited things like SAR tasks, but have great difficulty in quickly reaching agreement on high-level issues like division of functional responsibility and capital procurement programs. It is highly unlikely that the civilian organizational culture of the CCG can be changed simply by the government assigning new roles, functions and missions. Experts in the field of institutional structure and organizational learning recognize that the culture of an organization can only be changed very slowly and that a wide variety of measures must be put into to play to accomplish it. Because of the established cultures of the federal departments involved in maritime security, it would be more effective and efficient to see the coast guard, police and navy realigned and resourced properly to carry out their primary functions. Reform of the CCG should be focused on the civil functions associated with the role of marine safety. This will clarify the departmental lines of responsibility and the operational support relationships between the departments. It will also make clear the primary purpose of major equipments and simplify the selection criteria for capital procurement programs. It is also likely that even a departmental realignment plan will create tensions between the departments over the transfer of resources and budgets. However, a clear institutional mandate is the simplest means to resolve these battles. Whether the CCG should remain within the DFO is probably the most fundamental question to be answered when considering realignment. If fisheries protection and law enforcement are the primary reasons that it is there, then I suggest the answer is "No." Reform of the CCG should be focused on the civil functions associated with the role of marine safety. This will clarify the departmental lines of responsibility and the operational support relationships between the departments. w Pr Se pu an col pri lat de O 22 OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2013 www.vanguardcanada.com O