[Peetwo]

Sorry Gobbles more SMH from Electric Blue Harfwit...

Doom & gloom at ASA.. , via Binger in the Oz today:

Airservices Australia to slash staff by 20 per cent

• Mitchell Bingemann
  
• The Australian
  
• 12:00AM August 26, 2016
  
• @Mitch_Hell
  [img=0x0]http://pixel.tcog.cp1.news.com.au/track/component/author/4c134add4c3a9e4881f7841b69d9ac85/?esi=true&t_product=the-australian&t_template=s3/austemp-article_common/vertical/author/widget&td_bio=false[/img]
  

Airservices Australia has confirmed it will cull 20 per cent of its staff, reducing employee numbers to levels not seen since 2010, as the air traffic overseer slashes $150 million worth of costs from its bottom line.

Jason Harfield, the chief executive of Airservices — which manages air traffic at the nation’s major airports as well as co-ordinating on-site rescue and firefighting services — has confirmed reports in The Australian that it will make 900 jobs redundant by July and reduce staff to 3600 from the current peak of 4500.

But Mr Harfield said the safety of the nation’s passenger aircraft would not be compromised by the drastic staff reductions as a “detailed and rigorous assessment” was conducted on each individual redundancy to determine any potential impact on the safety of Airservices traffic controller or aviation rescue fire fighting operations.

“We have quarantined our frontline service delivery staff from these changes,” Mr Harfield told The Australian.

“All the changes have been put through a risk assessment to make sure there is no impact on services or the safety of our services.”

About 600 jobs have already been cut from Airservices since the start of this year and another 300 are tagged to go by the end of June. “The headcount has been in excess of what we really needed. We still have a little bit more work to do to make sure some areas are as efficient as possible so you will see some further reductions,” Mr Harfield said. “We … will probably end up around the 3600 mark which is … the right capacity to focus on where we are going.”

The cuts form part of Airser­vices’ 12-month transformation program called Accelerate, which will slash 15 per cent of its costs — or about $150m — and make the organisation more efficient.

“The Accelerate program is in full swing now. The industry is as relentless as ever and the pressures aren’t waning anytime soon,” Mr Harfield said.

“This is about repositioning Airservices because where we were going was not sustainable. This is not just about refocusing the operating model but it’s also about reviewing projects and asset management to make sure they are as efficient as it possibly can be.”

Airservices will spend $185m implementing the Accelerate program. About $105m of that budget has been set aside for voluntary redundancies, $35m for project implementation costs and $45m for new technology.

While the organisation continues to pull in more than $1 billion a year in revenue from fees paid by airlines, its costs continue to eclipse its income.

The organisation has recorded a loss — its first in two decades — of more than $10m for the 2015-16 year. But Mr Harfield said the changes to Airservices would put it on track for a $20m profit next year and a $50m profit by 2018.

This would allow it to return a dividend to the government, which funds the body.
Mr Harfield laid out some of the ambitions behind its Accelerate program to industry and stakeholders at Airservices annual Waypoints powwow in Canberra this week.

“Our assets and projects refocus is a significant area for improvement. It’s clear in this area that our approach, especially in developing new projects, hasn’t been working and something needed to change,” he said.

“Assets and projects are at the core of how we deliver existing and new services to you but they can contribute significantly to our costs. And we need to manage these and extract the highest rates of efficiency.”

“All the changes have been put through a risk assessment to make sure there is no impact on services or the safety of our services.”  - Considering what's at stake here, you'd better not be cooking the books on that one Harfwit...  

ASA is now ripe for the picking I'd suggest -

"Privatisation? PICK ME! PICK ME!"


MTF...P2