[Peetwo]

miniscule a'la King - GWEP WOFTAM...cont/-   

Via LMH: The Last Minute Hitch: 17 February 2023

Hitch has now put up and replied to Sandy's post: http://disq.us/p/2t6kq3v

Quote Hitch :- “So, right now I can't decide if gathering feedback on the terms of reference is a sign of transparency, or consultation overkill.” Consultation for terms of reference? Surely you jest, or maybe the Minister is having a laugh!

Well mate let’s have a look back nine years to the much vaunted Forsyth ‘consultation,’ forget all the predecessors of that inquiry. We made hundreds of submissions to Forsyth.

What happened? Ok for one we got SIDs that soaked Cessna owners $millions and depleted the fleet and bottle necked the maintenance sector. And then, wait for it, Part 61 to wreck the training sector, loss of hundreds of flying schools. Then CASA inexplicably quashed Glen Buckley’s umbrella flying school business that might have kept a number of smaller schools going. That is a salutary lesson for anyone attempting to deal with CASA.

Fast forward to Senator McDonald’s fizzled out inquiry, not to mention the 3000 replies to my Change.org including hundreds of comments, virtually the whole lot about all of the extreme and debilitating effects of a runaway regulator upon our much struggling General Aviation industry.

The monopoly corporate CASA created by Transport Minister Gareth Evans in 1988 to rid his Department of the administration of aviation is the root cause and no new inquiry will change the failed model of governance until Parliament places aviation into a Department of Government with a responsible Minister at its head.

The denial of Ministerial responsibility, undeniably a cornerstone of the Westminster system of democratic control, is at the heart of our problem. A problem that is counter to the National interest, aviation mobility is a crucial aspect of our strength from a security point of view, quite apart from the obvious utility of GA, employment and our general prosperity.

LMH reply:

SteveHitchen Mod to Sandy Reith
a day ago

Sandy. It gets greyer. Word out of the department is that I was correct in the first place and the consultation was supposed to be on the white paper, not the terms of reference, which were apparently "set in stone" before the minister's announcement. It looks like this is a case of the right hand not knowing what the right hand is doing.

From Hansard:

Senator McKENZIE: This is an election commitment. The terms of reference has taken nine months. Is that usual for a white paper process?

Ms Purvis-Smith : I'm not sure. I don't have the history of white paper processes, unfortunately. The government went through their processes and agreed to terms of reference and released it recently, on 7 February I believe.

Senator McKENZIE: Who did they consult on the construction of the terms of reference?

Ms Purvis-Smith : We'd been working with the government on the terms of reference. It was an election commitment. It wasn't a separate consultation process on the terms of reference. The government decided on the terms of reference to be able to release it as the basis for consultation.

Senator McKENZIE: Okay—got you.

Mr Betts : And in terms of the time frame, the government decided that it wanted to release the white paper in mid-2024 and we worked back from there. So it's wrong to characterise it as seven months of delay. We are timing the process that we will follow in order to enable us to release the white paper in a predetermined time frame.

Senator McKENZIE: The terms of reference, then, were developed in the department. The terms of reference for the consultation, rather than having a discussion paper, were developed in the department and sent up to the minister's office?

Ms Purvis-Smith : It was in the department. We consulted with some other government agencies, including CASA. My colleague Ms Werner will be able to take you through that in more detail.

Ms Werner : The initial draft terms of reference was developed by the department based on the government's election commitment. The terms of reference was then shared across the Public Service with PM&C, Treasury, Finance, department of climate change, DFAT, Austrade, Home Affairs, department of industry and Defence, and with the portfolio agencies, Airservices, CASA and ATSB, for comment. The draft terms of reference were then provided to the minister, who then sought agreement to them from the Prime Minister.

Senator McKENZIE: Did CASA or Airservices Australia add anything to the terms of reference?

Ms Werner : Unfortunately, Senator, I don't have that level of detail with me.

Ms Purvis-Smith : We can take it on notice.

Senator McKENZIE: Thank you.

Or from 09:30 here:

MTF...P2