G'day Maam, welcome to DT. This is a very interesting question. I can't imagine that they would make a Staff Sergeant of the British Army do basic, however there would have to be some sort of "bridging" course as a minimum to make you AIRN compliant etc (Army individual readiness notice, basically your "ticket" to be able to perform operational duties, and includes current weapons qualification amongst other things).
Perhaps an IET (initial employment training) would suffice, but I really don't know. There was another British chap here a while back, who said he was a Corporal in the Royal Marines, and was contemplating the exact same thing. Perhaps if he's still around, or at least lurking he may be able to provide some insight?
If not
www.defencejobs.com.au may be of some assistance, or a phone call to a recruiting office in Australia, may be necessary. I worked with the odd Brit when I was in, but never actually knew any who made the jump, they were always on exercise "long look" equivalents.
The ADF has very good housing available at all major military bases that are provided for little or no rent. Alternatively rent assistance is provided if you wish to live off base, and has apparently become extremely generous recently (one bloke I know was getting nearly $400 a week in tax free rent assistance to live in Sydney, this is more than sufficient to pay your ENTIRE rent, in most parts of Australia btw...)
As to deployments, exercises and postings. As a regular soldier, you will most likely be posted to a "high readiness" brigade in Townsville, Darwin or Brisbane (with Brisbane generally being seen as the most desirable posting of these 3) or to a training school in Victoria or New South Wales.
The Australian Army currently has deployments to Iraq, in the Al Muthana province and a SECDET (security detachment) guarding our embassy and providing convoy protection in Baghdad.
We have a special forces deployment in Afghanistan and an upcoming PRT (provincial reconstruction team) deployment, due to head off in the middle of the year.
We also have a small force deployed in the Soloman Islands, providing protection duties to assist the country with the problems they've had with militia/insurgents in recent years.
Other than these, we have other minor deployments further afield, which mainly consist of "advisers" (Sudan, Cyprus, East Timor and the Sinai) and on-going border protection operations designed to stop illegal immigrants and illegal fishing poachers (army provide "boarding" crews etc).
There is plenty of deployment opportunities in the Australian Army at present, with "slots" always being available. Our Army is operating at it's highest operational tempo at the present time, since Vietnam,
As to the exercise cycle. It's probably not to different to the British Army. All units undergo various sub-unit, unit and brigade level exercises throughout the year and sometimes undergo Divisional level activities in major exercises usually conducted with the USA, Singapore, NZ or France.
Being deployed to a higher readiness unit, means obviously that you will conduct a higher level of exercises designed to enhance the forces ability to deploy on operations.
The "on-line battalions" are situated in Townsville (1 battalion is constantly raedy for operational deployment at extremely short notice). Being posted to one of these units, means you will have a fairly hectic work load, when you're unit, or sub-unit is "online", however things relax a bit, when the battalions rotate, as they do on a frequent basis.
The posting cycle is normally 3 years, to allow for a degree of "permanency" in 1 place, however this may change, with numerous changes planned for ADF service conditions, due to extremely poor recruiting and retention of personnel of late...
Hope this helps, somewhat.
AD
