AIR SAFETY AUSTRALIA
admin@airsafety.com.au Fax: 08 8276 4666 Phone: 08 8276 4600
PO Box 172 Unley South Australia 5061
This document is available online at www.airsafety.com.au/ba10abel.htm
10th October 2001
Dear fellow aviator,
A GREAT WIN FOR AIR
SAFETY AUSTRALIA!
WE HAVE FORCED OUT ENFORCEABLE VOLUNTARY
UNDERTAKINGS.
Great news! We have beaten CASA's proposal to introduce Enforceable Voluntary Undertakings (EVUs). AIR SAFETY AUSTRALIA thanks those who participated, 8 months ago, in the successful campaign against EVUs.
Remember the scene as it was on 8
th February 2001 when the House of Representatives passed the Bill which would have introduced this abhorrent concept. At that moment everyone was singing CASA's song. Here is what appears in the Explanatory Memorandum to that Bill"There was a high response to the discussion paper (31 external responses and 20 internal responses). The responses included responses from individuals and major aviation organisations and operators such as QANTAS, Airline Passenger Safety Association, Flight West Airlines, the Director of Public Prosecutions. There were no objections raised by any respondents to the introduction of an enforceable voluntary undertaking scheme."
That is the extent to which the grass-roots pilot had been abandoned or betrayed by his or her supposedly representative organizations such as AOPA and the Royal Federation of Aero Clubs (RFACA).
Here's what happened. CASA "consulted" and got a mere 31 responses from non-CASA people and organisations. But that consultation was done in great secrecy, with very compliant organisations. Companies like QANTAS and Flight West Airlines simply cannot oppose CASA because of the risk of being put out of business. Organisations like AOPA and RFACA can oppose CASA but choose not to for one reason or another. There was never the least doubt that grass-roots pilots thought the EVU proposal abhorrent - but not one of the "representative organisations" had the courage to say that. CASA was able to come to the House of Representatives claiming universal support for its proposal. No-one said anything different. So quite naturally the House of Representatives passed the Bill.
The Bill then went to the Senate. I quickly organized a campaign, supported by more than 1,000 grass-roots pilots, to prevent that Bill passing the Senate. On Friday 5th October 2001 we finally succeeded, when the Government abandoned the Bill. The hastily-organised campaign of February gave birth, in April, to AIR SAFETY AUSTRALIA - with its motto Qui Procurantur Procurandi - "you must represent those you claim to represent". I expended a great deal of energy, and skill, and my own money to ensure that the pilot's voice was heard in Parliament when he had been abandoned or betrayed by those who claimed to represent him.
The Former President of the RFACA even sent me (on 22
nd February) a long letter explaining what a wonderful thing EVUs would be, concluding with this threat "If your campaign continues I will be sending copies of this e-mail to all the Democrat Senators and Labor Senators, as well as otherwise promoting the legislation.." You may be sure that the RFACA did not tell grass-roots members of aero clubs anything of this CASA-kissing.Representative organisations which are lazy or compliant can do tremendous harm. When the EVU proposal reached the House of Representatives, CASA was able to say that there was "high response" of 31 people and organisations, not one of them opposed to EVUs. When the proposal reached the Senate 22 days later, more than 1,000 grass-roots pilots had written in - every single one of them opposed to EVUs. That is the extent to which lazy or compliant representative organisations can distort the scene.
AIR SAFETY AUSTRALIA congratulates John Anderson, Minister for Transport
, for listening - at last - to the grass roots and abandoning CASA's proposal to introduce Enforceable Voluntary Undertakings.AIR SAFETY AUSTRALIA congratulates the Australian Labor Party, and the Australian Democrats,
for their opposition to EVUs. Without your opposition, and your dissenting Senate report, this legislation would have gone through six months ago.AIR SAFETY AUSTRALIA also congratulates John Anderson for directing CASA not to proceed with proposal DP0115ss to require that Ultra-Light training schools be saddled with AOCs and other things that would have increased costs. This decision came about because of effective and fearless lobbying by the AUF. No CASA-kissing there! The AUF got results by going over CASA's head.
We're having an election. Make no mistake about the effect that has. Both AIR SAFETY AUSTRALIA's, and the AUF's, victories happened the very day the election was called.
THE REGULATORY REFORM PROGRAM HAS FAILED AND MUST BE HALTED
The Aviation Regulatory Reform program has failed miserably. It has delivered a few benefits, for sure. But it has also delivered many negatives.
AIR SAFETY AUSTRALIA conducted a ballot of all its members on 10
th September. Less than 1% of respondents want the program to continue under CASA. The remaining 99% divided fairly equally between those who wanted the program stopped entirely and those who wanted the program to be run by the Minister's office.The legislative torrent continues, and has taken a massive turn for the worse.
A few recent examples are:
21
st September 2001: NPRM 0115ss proposes to "level the playing field" by increasing the cost and complexity of Ultra-light training to regular GA levels. The option of levelling the playing field by reducing the cost and complexity of GA training was not considered by CASA - even though this option is supported by the AUF itself!14
th September 2001: The new CASR Part 91 resembles FAR part 91 only in that it begins with the two characters 91. The new Part 91 is even more restrictive and difficult to understand than Australia's existing legislation. And it has some horrible provisions, such as:The new CASR 91.585(1) which allows people to fly around at night without lights, provided they take off in broad daylight. Heaven help us! Who on earth (except CASA, our supposed safety regulator) wants people flying around at night in the circuit area without lights? And who ever complained about Australia's existing rules for lights, anyway?
Did CASA ever say they are inadequate or unenforceable? Did any user ever say they were unduly restrictive? If not, why change them at all? And if we ARE going to change an Australian rule, we ought to copy the proven working USA rule. All the USA rules are known to work. Here we have a bunch of power-hungry, careless people inventing new, unique Australian rules instead of keeping the rules we have or copying other rules which are known to work.
The new CASR 91.605(5) which, effective 1
st January 2002, bans the purchase of ELTs unless they transmit on 406 MHz and are approved under Part 90. But Part 90 does not even exist yet! And 406 MHz ELTs cost more than $5000, compared to just $200 for 121.5 MHz ELTs.24
th August 2001: The new CASR Part 47 establishes yet another new system of aircraft registration. But even CASA admits that it does not solve the very problem which CASA itself last year said was the reason a new system was needed. The new system is dangerous to your ownership of your aircraft, and dangerous to your wallet (unless you're an aviation lawyer, that is). The new 47.035 says "A certificate of registration for an aircraft is not conclusive evidence of any legal or property interest in the aircraft". And the new 47.095 refers to 47.022, which does not exist - illustrating the carelessness with which it was drafted. There are heaps more problems with the new CASR 47. By far the biggest problem is that the existing system is not broken and does not need fixing! Again some power-hungry, careless people are rushing around creating unnecessary new laws. Sadly, one of AOPA's Committee members (who is an aviation lawyer) was a member of the CASA-dominated sub-Committee which created the proposed new CASR 47.Make no mistake! This plethora of change is not going to improve air safety in any way. It is a job-creation scheme on a breathtaking scale that has been sanctioned by the supposed representative groups by their very willingness to cuddle up and sit on the various committees. These committees are going nowhere in respect of meaningful reform and have in fact set GA back years. That is why, following our democratic ballot, AIR SAFETY AUSTRALIA makes the following call to our politicians.
AIR SAFETY AUSTRALIA calls upon the Coalition and the ALP to promise to halt the present Aviation Reform program with one month of winning Government.
AIR SAFETY AUSTRALIA further calls on the Coalition, and the ALP, to promise that, by 1
st December 2002:The Minister responsible for aviation will convene, and personally chair, a half-day meeting of interested parties to recommend whether the Aviation Reform Program should be resumed at all, and if so by whom it should be conducted and on what basis. That meeting is to be publicised, organised, and run entirely by the Minister's staff - not by CASA. CASA's participation is to be that of an interested party - a very important one, but an interested party nonetheless. The Minister himself is to decide which individuals may speak at the meeting, but allow anyone at all to make a written submission and/or attend as an observer.
Boyd Munro, 10
th October 2001.If you are not yet one of AIR SAFETY AUSTRALIA's 741 members, we want you!
Please call us on 08 8276 4600 to join up.
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