[Peetwo]

Dear miniscule,

Please take note your Murky Mandarin could be leading you up the garden path...

Thailand admits 'urgent' need to improve aviation safety

 


Thailand admits 'urgent' need to improve aviation safety

Bangkok (AFP) - Thai authorities Monday said they would use special powers under junta rule to "urgently" improve airline safety as several carriers face bans on new international flights following concerns raised by a UN aviation agency.

The International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), a United Nations body, recently reported "significant safety concerns" to Thailand's Department of Civil Aviation (DCA) after an audit earlier in the year.

In response Japan last week blocked new flights from Thailand in a move affecting charter services by budget carriers Thai AirAsia X and NokScoot as well as Asia Atlantic Airlines, the DCA said, adding existing flights would not be impacted.

Flag carrier Thai Airways has also been hit, saying in a statement on its Facebook page Saturday that two charter flights scheduled for Japan next month had been affected.

At a press conference Monday junta chief and premier Prayut Chan-O-Cha told reporters he would use Section 44 of the interim constitution -- imposed after he seized power from an elected government last May and which gives him absolute powers over legislative, executive and judicial decisions -- to expedite safety improvements.

"We have to accept that we are losing revenue from this, I am serious about solving the problem," he said.

In what appears to be a growing fallout of the ICAO decision a transport ministry official, deputy permanent secretary Voradej Harnprasert, told reporters that airlines including Thai Airways and Nok Air may also face a potential ban on new flights from Seoul and Beijing. It was not immediately possible to confirm these bans.

Prayut also said that he had raised the aviation safety issue with the Japanese prime minister and the South Korean president on the sidelines of the funeral of Singapore's founding father Lee Kuan Yew on Sunday.

- Slipped Standards -

The UN body has flagged several safety concerns including Thai aviation department personnel failing to meet international standards and a lack of full aviation regulations, Transport Minister Prajin Juntong told the press conference.

"The audit revealed some concerns relating to air operator certification procedures," ICAO spokesman Anthony Philbin told AFP by email, stressing that ICAO audits review the capability of civil aviation authorities to monitor and manage operational aviation safety.

Thai authorities have set up two new committees to tackle the concerns and will send teams to South Korea, China, Australia and Germany to discuss the issues following a trip to Japan late last week, Prajin added.

Earlier in the day the minister had said Thailand was warned about its aviation management after an earlier ICAO audit in 2005. "(They) asked us to improve our systems. I understand we have to improve urgently."

In its statement released last Thursday the DCA had said it would provide new training for staff and increase airline inspections as part of its overhaul.

Section 44 has been under the spotlight in Thailand in recent days after Prayut Friday said he was considering lifting martial law, imposed two days before May's coup, and replacing it with an order under this controversial portion of the interim charter.

Several local rights groups have urged the junta chief to rethink the plans, issuing a joint statement maintaining their call to lift martial law but saying the impact of invoking the new order would be "much worse".

Under martial law Thailand's generals have banned political gatherings of more than five people, outlawed criticism of the ruling regime and tried civilians in military courts.

Ben on the Thai admission:

Thai carriers under threat of air safety downgrade


Ben Sandilands | Mar 31, 2015 4:50PM |



Past problems at Bangkok's main airport . Are they now coming back?

Thailand is at risk of an aviation safety downgrade by ICAO and is taking urgent action under martial law powers to avoid the damaging commercial consequences that would follow such a decision.

It’s a story that ought to be of concern to Australian international carriers, given factors that could also cause a similar outcome because of the scandals and failures associated with CASA and the ATSB in recent years, and the inability of regulatory reform programs to meet declared targets under successive Labor and Coalition governments.

Most of the world’s aviation sectors, including those of Thailand and Australia, are rated as Level 1 states when it comes to having comprehensive, properly functioning and resourced air safety regimens.

But the dog’s breakfast of the Pel-Air scandal, where the regulatory shortcomings were actively suppressed and denied, and then saw an ATSB accident report failed in critical parts by a peer review by its Canadian counterpart, persist nearly five and a half years after that particular air ambulance flight was ditched near Norfolk Island in 2009.

It isn’t necessary to have a recital of the many past stories about these problems to understand the seriousness of issues that Thailand is now attempting to address and how equivalent sanctions or restrictions on Australian flag carriers could prove damaging.

Should Thailand, or for that matter Australia, be busted down to Level 2 status,  the flag carriers of each country would be prohibited  from starting new services or adding capacity to existing flights to the US, or codesharing with US carriers, or face similar restrictions in some countries in Asia, with the latter situation already a problem for some Thai carrier access to Japan and South Korea as set out in the story linked to above.

Such sanctions applied to Qantas or Virgin Australia would be manifestly unfair. However they apply to the flag carriers of countries in which the public administration of air safety is derelict by standards, resources and effectiveness.

A potential case of airlines of the highest standard being punished for the sins of the bureaucracy supposed to regulate them, and the governments supposed to be deeply and meaningfully engaged in their performance as measured by an audit process.

Thailand’s problem is not with what its goals or ambitions for aviation administration might be, but with their current state of delivery. Critics of CASA and the ATSB have in the recent past documented the poor state of such administration in Australia, but neither the previous government nor the current one have lifted their game above taking the advice of the very bureaucracies that are failing to perform.

Taking the advice of the Australian public service that everything is fine in the administrative side of aviation for which those same bureaucrats are responsible can bring the Australian airline sector undone.

The Thai situation ought to jolt the Australian government into taking a similar interest in the aviation industry. It probably won’t.

Take heed miniscule...Thai takeaway might be the last thing on your mind but the big Q & the big V will not be happy if you have not considered the very real implications of an ICAO downgrade.

P2...