A years-in-the-making plan to replace Canada’s search and rescue fleet has become the focal point of an interdepartmental spat over procurement policy, the Ottawa Citizen reports. Mindful of the current economic pressures, Industry Canada is pulling out all the bureaucratic stops to try to force Defence to put the bid to an open competition – thereby “creating maximum jobs across the country”. The military, however, is digging in its collective heels, and “sticking to a strict set of requirements for the search-and-rescue aircraft” – which, according to defence industry experts “makes it almost certain the Alenia C-27J aircraft would be selected.”