[Peetwo]

Security impost should be shared - expert  

Via the Oz today:

Security costs ‘must be spread’
12:00amANNABEL HEPWORTH
With a push for greater security at regional airports, an expert has called for costs to be spread across the industry.

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The cost of any security crackdown at regional airports should be spread across all air passengers including those from capital cities, according to an aviation security expert.

As state, territory and local governments line up to warn that tougher security at regional airports could see some air services to the bush perish, security expert Geoff Askew says the costs should be shared.

Mr Askew, who ran Qantas’s security and emergency management for 20 years and is now principal at consultancy Askew & Associates, has told the Senate’s inquiry into regional air services that the security threat to aviation “is as real in regional Australia as it is in the capital cities”.

“There is a significant cost associated with the provision of leading-edge security technologies,” his submission says.

“The downside, particularly for regional airports with smaller passenger numbers, is the cost.”

He told the committee that aviation security costs should “be equally proportioned across the industry as a fixed-fee-per-passenger” cost in order “to preserve and encourage growth in vital air services to regional communities”.

This should include an approach based on the Canadian Air Transport Security Agency, where there was a centralised screening model to manage airport security.

The comments come as the government considers options to strengthen aviation security, including for regional airports.

Former infrastructure and transport minister Darren Chester ordered the Inspector of Transport Security to conduct the review last year

There are suggestions that requirements to screen travellers on aircraft weighing more than 20 tonnes will be extended to all regional public air services.

The office of the Minister for Home Affairs, Peter Dutton, recently said the government was “mindful of the impacts that security measures have on industry, particularly for regional and remote aviation” and that it was “important to balance regulatory costs against maintaining the overall security and sustainability of the aviation network”.

This comes amid a slew of warnings that tougher anti-­terrorism measures such as more screening could put an end to some air services in rural and regional areas.

Australian Airports Association chief executive officer Caroline Wilkie said “any changes to security requirements at regional airports must be funded by the federal government.”

“With regional airports already struggling to fund vital infrastructure maintenance and upgrades, it’s important the government provides funding certainty with any plan for new security measures in the regions,” Ms Wilkie said.

“The wide range of infrastructure and requirements at airports across the country mean that costings for security are often site-specific and require a tailored cost-recovery solution.”

She said security measures needed to be “proportionate”.

MTF...P2