[Peetwo]

On the pointlessness of the Commonwealth Ombudsman Office (et.al other like agencies) -   

Via the embuggerance thread:

GlenB embuggerance update: 22/06/2023

Clinton McKenzie

Originally Posted by glenb [/url]

Dear Mr Buckley,

I refer to your email dated 28 March 2023, in which you expressed dissatisfaction that Catherine’s decision letter did not express a view about whether APTA had been treated fairly compared to other Flight Training Organisations (FTO). Catherine is on leave from the Office but, in her absence, I reviewed her records of investigation. From these, I can see that she considered, and sought information from CASA about this issue and ultimately decided she could not confidently conclude who (within CASA) knew what about your business model at what time, to assess the way your business was treated compared to other similar organisations. I apologise that this conclusion was not explained more clearly in her letter of decision.

Noting this investigation is closed, our Office may file but not necessarily respond to any further correspondence you send on the matter.

Kind regards

As I said in one of our recent video discussions, Glen, the most appalling thing for me out of the RoboDebt Royal Commission hearings was the revelations as to the extent of the deterioration of the Commonwealth Ombudsman function.The Ombudsman’s Office was sent some ‘RoboDebt’s all fine and dandy and legal, nothing to see here’ correspondence from the policy Department, the Ombudsman’s Office asked ‘are you sure about that and have you given us all the legal advice you’ve received’, the policy Department said ‘yep’ and the Ombudsman just drank that Koolaide.

The Ombudsman’s Office was fed misleading information, the Ombudsman’s Office suspected the information was misleading, but didn’t dig any further.We know, from the hearings of the Royal Commission, what would have been dug up if the Ombudsman’s Office had done its job properly.

The ‘explanation’ given to you for the ‘conclusion’ of and the closing of the ‘investigation’ of your allegation that ATPA was treated differently and unfairly compared to other FTOs by CASA is, in and of itself, an admission that the Ombudsman’s Office did not do a proper investigation! It’s breathtaking that the Office is now so busted that it thinks that a reasonable explanation for not finding out whether APTA was treated differently and unfairly compared to other FTOs is that the Ombudsman’s Office looked at some information provided by CASA and couldn’t work out who in CASA knew what.

Differing levels of knowledge and ignorance of different individuals within CASA could be the cause of the very problem which the Ombudsman was supposed to be investigating! The Ombudsman’s Office’s job was to first get to the bottom of whether APTA was actually subjected by CASA to regulatory requirements to which other FTOs were not subjected in similar circumstances, irrespective of the cause of that differential regulatory treatment. If APTA was in fact subjected by CASA to regulatory requirements to which other FTOs in similar circumstances were not subjected – such as APTA being required to provide copies of contracts, containing clauses to the satisfaction of CASA, because non-employees were engaged in the delivery of flying training under the authority of APTA’s AOC, but other FTOs who engaged non-employees were not required by CASA to provide copies of contracts with those clauses - that’s the failure of administration that the Ombudsman’s Office is supposed to identify.

The next step is to identify the cause of that failure and to fix the cause. For example, if it turns out that CASA is an internal governance basket case, such that different silos of the organisation have different levels of knowledge and views about what regulatory requirements apply to FTOs in similar circumstances, and interpret and enforce those requirements differently while having internal arguments about who’s right and who’s wrong, that governance failure is the cause of the problem. Best to fix that.

I shake my head in disbelief in much of what I read coming out of the Ombudsman’s Office on this and other matters in last few years. It’s no wonder to me that faith in politicians and the institutions of government is at an all time low.

Sandy in reply, via the UP:

CASA “basket case”

CASA is a basket case and so are all the independent government authorised monopoly bodies that purport to carry out duties that should be undertaken by Departments of Government with a Minister at head.

Unfortunately there’s been an almost universal and naive belief that all ills will be banished by appointing an independent body to administer parts of government responsibilities, an umpire just like the footy! The rules of football are simple in the extreme compared to the ever changing complexities of society.

These bodies inevitably become self serving because human nature needs incentives to keep the line. It’s one thing to create a limited time task force or inquiry for one off concerns, entirely another to expect one government body to be critical of another or work to crucial time lines in an economical and efficient manner.

IBACS, Ombudsman offices for just about everything, the likes of CASA, ATSB and AirServices, and don’t worry numerous others can be found in the 1200 Commonwealth instrumentalities.

We should disband the lot and put all those main areas of government administration into Westminster style Departments with Ministers at head.

For the others, properly resource the police, courts and MP’s offices and let the voter decide.

I’m afraid we are all responsible for letting silly ideas like ‘Ombudsman’ become established with zero critical analysis.

But back to the thread, we need full publicity to influence the body politic, maybe coupled with legal action.

Also via the UP jj232, on the [url=https://www.pprune.org/australia-new-zealand-pacific/653244-alice-springs-airport-tower-closing-due-staffing-levels-2.html#post11455843]'Alice Springs - Tower Closed' thread, brings into light why it is the current status quo, of federal independent statutory agencies being unaccountable and 'a law unto themselves', won't be changing anytime soon...  
  

Originally Posted by A320 Flyer 

What an absolute disgrace this country has become…. Probably all somewhere for an inclusivity and diversity conference…. Possibly a presentation on “the voice to parliament and it’s importance to air traffic services”

Its all purely because ASA management has always believed the job can be done with less people, Covid was the green light to take risks they never would’ve any other time. Obviously this was never the case and what your seeing now is the result of the decision to make large numbers of ATCs redundant. They have now gone on a large training and hiring drive but it will take 10 years to get numbers to where they need to be.

Unfortunately we have a transport minister who seems uninterested in actually doing anything. She recently received a letter from a local Federal member in her own party in Sydney telling her he believes they are some big problems in ASA and could see meet with certain union members. Her response was she has spoken to ASA and they have assured her they are fixing it. Wouldn’t even allocate 30mins to hear from them. I feel sorry for industry but nothings going to get better for a long time.

Ahh...but the miniscule did mention the dreaded "A"-word in recent days...

Ref: miniscule a' la King actually mentions the "A-word"??

Via Twitter:

Catherine King MP
@CatherineKingMP

We rely on aviation[/size], but to reach our net zero targets we have to find a way to cut aviation emissions.

Today we announced the members the jet zero council & $30 million of funding for sustainable aviation fuel.

https://t.co/0HldnG87d5
@Bowenchris @ALeighMP

God help our GA industry because the miniscule and Albo, or indeed the Ombudsman never will! - 

MTF...P2