[Peetwo]

LMH 18 May '18 - WTD 

– Steve Hitchen

Lawyers, guns, money. Misusing any of these three things generally brings heartache and pain and rarely advances the cause for which they were originally employed. Take, for example, the Australian General Aviation Alliance's (AGAA) plan to involve a quarrel of solicitors operating pro bono at their summit in July. The intent, according to inside sources, is to use legal arguments to support their case and counter anything CASA can put up against them in their quest to remove the primacy of safety from the Civil Aviation Act 1988. I believe this is a plan to fail. Firstly, this summit needs to be about the general aviation industry, what it wants and what it needs. The GA community needs to be able to converse with each other, bounce ideas off each other and come up with a good plan that can be presented to the minister after only two days. Involve the lawyers and at the end of it all you'll be right back where you started. The lawyers will pick apart any and every argument you can put up for new wording to the Act and find fault with just about everything you write. The summit will effectively be strangled by legal opinion and the opinions that count the most will be lost. Secondly, I have it on pretty good authority that CASA won't put up any arguments to be countered. Why would they? CASA has two instruments that it must abide by: the Civil Aviation Act 1988 and the minister's Statement of Expectations. It's not their place to put up counter-arguments and I don't think they'll do it. The Act is, literally, an Act of Parliament, and so is owned by parliamentarians. They might put up counter arguments, but most of those arguments will be based in politics, not law. Get the industry consensus on paper, present it to the minister, then let the department deal with the legalities to make it work. Let the aviation community breathe and achieve at the summit; you won't be able to do that if you misuse lawyers in an attempt to make your solution foolproof.

On that note: David Forsyth has come out in support of making changes to the Act. This is very surprising given that his ASRR in 2014 didn't recommend this despite many submissions that supported it. However, his explanation behind the changes of heart is pretty solid: attempts to bring about economic release through other means have failed, so now the big bat has to be used. This is a huge feather in the cap of the change proponents, as Forsyth is one of the most respected people in the aviation community, and his opinion travels miles around Canberra...

Read more at http://www.australianflying.com.au/the-l...S5zxhqU.99

David Forsyth, Chairman of the Aviation Safety Regulation Review (ASRR) board.

Forsyth throws his Weight behind Act Amendment Efforts
18 May 2018

David Forsyth, author of the 2014's Aviation Safety Regulation Review (ASRR) report has come out in support of amending the Civil Aviation Act to force CASA to take into account economic factors.

The ASRR specifically avoided recommending changes to the Act despite receiving several submissions to do so.

Speaking to Australian Flying, Forsyth said that he felt moves to change the Act were now needed due to slow progess on reforms recommended in the ASRR.
"I am fully supportive of Dick Smith’s proposal to modify the Civil Aviation Act, and sincerely hope that it is successful," he said.

"During the ASRR, the panel specifically did not recommend a dual mandate, in part due to debate about dual mandates being unworkable as part of the Royal Commission into the Pikes River disaster in New Zealand, and issues arising from the Valujet accident in the USA.

"Countries like the UK and NZ which had dual mandates also had an aviation regulator who had a wider remit than CASA – the UK CAA also regulates commercial issues in aviation and NZ also covers security. 

"The panel also believed at the time, that with the right approach and a willing regulator, a better balance of sustainability and safety would be achieved. That belief proved to be misplaced, as for the two years after the ASRR, the regulator continued to demonstrate its unwillingness to change its culture or to take a more balanced approach. 

"Fortunately that has improved since Shane Carmody took up the DAS role. The ongoing concern, however, is that when Shane leaves CASA, it is likely that the old culture could return.

"That is why I agree with Dick that the Act needs to be changed, to ensure that the regulator does not hide behind the primacy of safety to the exclusion of everything else, including sustainability."

Dick Smith and the Australian General Aviation Alliance (AGAA) have come out strongly in favour of making the change, with AGAA organising a summit of associations in July to reach industry consensus on how the Act should be worded and what the intent should be.

Forsyth also said that any wording changes to the Act would need to be carefully chosen.

Read more at http://www.australianflying.com.au/lates...ZcM8j56.99

MTF...P2   on Hitch..