NATCA fighting privitization in US

[Scott Voigt]

If y'all hadn't heard, we are fighting hard to head off our administrations goal to privitize half of the govt. workforce. For saving our peice of the pie we are begining legislative efforts as well as media and general public education. We are handing out the following information as well as releasing many press releases...

http://bbs.natca.net:8080/~members/upload/privatization%20brochure.pdf

regards

[ATC Watcher]

Good luck to you.
Incidentally, the last remark on your leaflet :
" I do not suport in any way the privatisation of ATC " by N.Minetta your Transport secretary, reminds me of the " I will support PATCO " letter by Ronald Reagan, that the then PATCO litterature was using to promote their cause....back in 1981.
Never trust a politician .
Who knows, N. Minetta might get an Airport named after him if US ATC privatisation goes ahead...

[SM4 Pirate]

In OZ we have been fighting the same fight; all-be-it less publically.

The legislation that would allow competition in Australia has been recently made law. This opens our skies to competition by anyone that can get a licence to provide such services.

Only problem is that you can only get a licence if you're on the schedule and the only one on the schedule is the monopoly employer/provider Airservices Australia.

Competition is still goverment policy but they didn't have the Senate numbers to get anything else through. This may be able to be changed through parliament in the future if the numbers change etc. But for the next 2 years we're safe.

Good luck wherever you are regarding this issue... profit before sfaety is paramount from companies that report to shareholders not the community.

Bottle of Rum

[Scott Voigt]

Well, good luck to all of us... It appears that the handwriting is on the wall as to what this administration wants to do. We can all see what is in store if it happens too. Makes me very happy that I am close to being elligible to retire, if they don't take that away from me....

regards

[Minesapint]

Those words also remind me of "our skies are not for sale". Good luck to you in the US.

[fen boy]

Hi Scott,

just curious do you know where the people who wrote the US leaflet got their stats from? Particularly interested in the UK stats saying incidents almost doubled as I can't seem to stand that up with nay of the figures from the UK's Airprox board

[EuroATC]

Very nice brochure and all, what you say about Canada is true about longer shifts etc... but when you write that Nav Canada had to raise fees 6% to cover a shortfall, this was post sept 11th when traffic dropped 30%. Look at pre sept 11 numbers. The company had great revenue. In 1999 when we settled our first contract, we in Toronto got a 38% wage increase. Nav Canada in the last 6 years has put in a few new radars and has almost completely updated all equipement in the country not including a few brand new control towers.

Yes I agree, privatisation has it's downside, the way I look at it though, it's the only way the US will be able to update it's equipment and staff it's centres. Maybe with privatisation you will start looking at hiring expats which will solve your staffing problem.

[BEXIL160]

privatisation has it's downside, the way I look at it though, it's the only way the US will be able to update it's equipment and staff it's centres

Except that iy doesn't work that way.

The myth that a privatised ATC provider will invest where government can't or won't is oft quoted by those in favour of this ludicrous idea.

Just like any other private company, they will invest the LEAST for the BIGGEST return. A private company has a responsibilty to it's shareholders, and first and foremost, it is to MAXIMISE profit for the least investment.

Rgds BEX

[Iron City]

Scott, if I remember properly the Secretary of Transportation at the time, Drew Lewis, was aided by and then became one Andrew Card,the current Bush Junior Chief of Staff. FAA Administrator was J Lynn Helms and his API -1 also supported this stuff.
So you didn't have to be a genius to predict the privatization thing before the election.


As far as whether private or semi private is better BEXIL is on the right track. They buy low, highly leveraged and would sell high if they could, but I don't think anyone ever has (think about it...no market liquidity). So how to make money other than on the front end through the magic of sweatheart financing and bags of gold that seem to disappear, though somebody is on the hook to pay it back.

How about provide the service for less cost, cus' you aren't going to be able to change the navigation fees and such very much or very frequently. The cost is composed of labor and capital. labor cost changes help or hurt you immediately, capital can take a little longer to help (years) but starts costing as soon as you pay out. Or creatively use the capital available to you. For example, with property going the way it is is West Drayton more valuable to an industrial estate developer than as an ATC facility?


The other factor is liability. Can't imagine anyone wanting to provide ATC services (or CNS for that matter) and still having liability for anything that happens. Bet there is an indemnification clause buried someplace in all the privatization schemes that says the government will cover it.

In the US case all the money spent for capital improvements comes from the Airport and Airways Development Trust Fund that is funded through taxes on tickets, fuel, spares, freight and stuff. But is still must all be authorized and approrpiated by Congress and this year (FY2003 from 1 October 2002 to 30 September 2003) no appropriation has been made yet. And of course this money is under the control of Congress where all politics is local and all manner of interesting things get directed. And in spite of what you might be told there really is no cash in the trust fund because it all got spent as it was taken in.

It is possible that privatization on the order of what you are fighting could occur, but not without an act of Congress and it will be tough to get an evenly divided legislative branch to agree on anything.

Privatization is happening right under your nose and has been for years. The FAA supply system is essentially privatized, the data processing is all contracted out, all the facilities maintenance, lots of the second level engineering labor hours are expended by CSC, LM and others and if that isn't privatization I don't know what is. When will ER get the contract to run the Academy?

edited for spelling

[EuroATC]

BEXIL160

The reason the US will not hire expats is because THEY CAN NOT.

You have ot be a US citizen to work for the FAA.

If the whole system was private, then you are no longer working for the government. I know because I have tried to get in to the US. It's impossible.

It has nothing to do with investment and the rest of the blah blah.

"The myth that a privatised ATC provider will invest where government can't or won't is oft quoted by those in favour of this ludicrous idea. "

It's not a myth, Canada is a perfect example. Talk to anyone who works in Canada, as much as the company might be hard to deal with, they did spend alot of money on the system.

New towers, new radar sites, new ops room Montreal ACC, new displays accross the country, new information display system, the list goes on...

[BEXIL160]

Err... I didn't ask about ex-pats in the USA... the idea is tempting though, just as long as I could pick where I went.....

NAVCANADA is supposed to be a "Not for Profit Trust" or something like that, not the model that the US Government is looking for, which is out and out PRIVATISATION.

I stand by my comments about private industry.

Rgds BEX

[Scott Voigt]

EuroATC;

Well, I don't think that you have talked with Canadian Controllers as to how they feel about NAVCanada. They are not at all happy with it. As to the infrastructure, they don't have a whole lot of it. The "NEW" equipment that they have is still not as capable in many respects as what we have been using here for quite a long time. Ask them about their automation and how they get initial flight plans into the system...

NAVCanada is now letting the reduction in fees that they put into place expire and will be charging more once again. That will also go for the few general aviation aircraft that they have. Here in the US we have a very, very active general aviation community. Easily the most active and prolific in the world. To privitize and then go to a user fee of some sort, would do nothing but damage our general aviation. Not to mention what it would do to our corporate folks.

The safety and the regulation of our skies is a governmental responsibility. We should NOT be selling that off to the highest bidder and then require the US taxpayer to pickup the tab for all of the things that the private company doesn't or can't pay for.

Oh and whoever asked about it. The stats that we used were either from publications or from govt. sources.

regards

[EuroATC]

svoigt,

first, your stats do not tell 100% of the story, your union has picked out the items to help their arguement along and have left out that maybe some of those stats are post sept 11th. Like every ANS in the world almost, Nav Canada is also losing money. But I guess the US ANS system has nothing to do with the fact that the US gov is going to run a 100 billion deficit this year?

second, I know how it is in Canada, I worked in Toronto ACC. The ATC system has come a long way since it was privatised in 1996, alot more than what it would have with the government who was running the system at a loss. Yes you're right, alot of controllers are pissed off in Canada about the working conditions but no one complains about new equip and a 38% i say again 38% percent wage increase they received a few years ago.

third, I don't see how privatisation would hurt general aviation, you talk about the US taxpayer picking up the bill if the privatisation cannot pay for itself... Well what is the US taxpayer doing now?? He/she is paying for 100% of it!!!

[West Coast]

If filing a VFR flight plan will cost $xx in the future, fewer will file them, safety degraded where the rubber meets the road.
If getting clearance for an ILS on a marginal day costs, a percentage that would have will now scud run. Ditto.
If it costs for each trip around the pattern at a controlled airport, well the training mission is going to be cut short.
In the US nowadays over 50% of the future airline pilots come from a GA background. Burdening GA further will have ramifications down the road, beyond the immediate safety issues. Some jobs are inherently a function of the government, not the lowest bidder.

[EuroATC]

Maybe stats will prove me wrong but from 1996 til 2001 I worked in Toronto (private since 1996) and general aviation was alive as ever. Yes you are right, I am sure that some would not fly if the fees were implemented.

Decision has to be made, do you not privatise to preserve the general aviation? Don't worry about the airlines, they will do just fine since they pass on the cost of the fees to the traveller which intern is only a few dollars per ticket. As for training airline pilots, the US doesn't seem to have a problem in that area. Actually there are too many pilots in the US. Many without work these days that are actually moving to Europe to fly for small regional airlines. So I don't really understand where you have a solid arguement.

1. there is a over abundance of pilots
2. airlines can easily pass the cost of user fees on the the traveller
3. you might lose 10% of your general aviation

You can talk about safety, once again maybe stats will prove me wrong but I believe that Canada has maintained it's best in the world safety record since privatisation in 1996.

[Iron City]

Just to burden the discussion with a few facts (darn, not a PPRUNE tradition but ...)

Funding for the US FAA is appropriated by Congress ...all of it, every cent, regardless of where it comes from. There are two major sources of funds (1) airport and airways development trust fund and (2) general revenues (what the IRS vulture collects from everybody).

ALL the capital costs in the Facilities and Equipment and Airport Improvement appropriations come from the trust fund which all comes from taxes and fees on aviation. For the Operations appropriation it is about 70 percent trust fund and the rest general revenues, it's different each year. The philosophy on this is that the military and other public use aircraft compose about 20 percent of so of the aircraft operations and they don't pay any taxes so that proportion of the cost of running everything should come from the general revenues, not the trust fund. There are also functions that the FAA does that are functions of soverignty like international relations, spectrum management and just existing and other misc. stuff that a country should do anyway so the general revenues should pay. The research and development appropriation is a pitiful $100M or so a year, a little more than the total of the navigation fees collected, a relative drop in the bucket.

The notion that if direct fees were introduced then GA would not use services that maybe they should (IFR and ATC services in marginal weather, for example) has been around awhile. It seems a logical argument but I have never seen it proven. Would be interesting to see what has happened in other countries.

It seems that there may be a chance of privitizing some services and functions, but what has been going on for years is the "stealth privitization by parts" by contracting out engineering, services, support and other functions while keeping the in-house capability small, weak, and tied to things that no company wants to do.

[West Coast]

EuroATC

1. One plans for the future. With the current downturn there are lots of pilots available. Many who will not be willing to go back and make the wages they did when they started out. Of the dozen or so I know who are on furlough from a number of majors, none are willing to go back and start over at the bottom wrung. The military is producing fewer pilots, and the possibility of GA doing the same is a problem in the making down the road, Not now. Private starts are down as is. Again dont look at the current atmosphere, look to the future. I promise you, these are not my thoughts, but those in the industry who know the facts unlike you and me.

2. Are you kidding? We are having a problem filling the planes now with other than bargain fares. We are losing a boatload of money now just to maintain cashflow. Drop your notional 10% on top of that and I am out of a job.

3. What type of modeling did yoy use to come up with your number of 10%? A number you pulled out of thin air, or one
that has been researched.

[EuroATC]

West coast,

In response,

1. How do european carriers get all their pilots? If GA is so important to train your airline pilots, how does Lufthansa, BA etc get pilots when GA is almost non existant here. The fact about US pilots not wanting to start at the bottom again...well that is up to them to decide, the fact is that there are pilots available and will be for quite some time. Don't get me wrong, I am just playing devils advocate here, I do see the downside of privatisation but the arguements used against it on this site are weak.

2. Look at EASYJET, record profits, bargain fares and they are subject to all the user fees in Europe. The salaries are not bargain basement as some US regional carriers... so how do they do it?? There is also Ryanair that does quite well with the same concept. We have to stop using this excuse, it's time for the big boys to be accountable and to run a business properly. The days of huge airline infrastructure are dying, just look at USAIR, UAL, the proof is there folks. How does Southwest and Jetblue make money in the US?? Are they giving bargain fares just to maintain cashflow, last time I checked they are turning a profit. User fees work out to merely dollars per ticket sold.

3. I will reseach and get an exact number, I am sure there are stats in Canada that show the drop if any in GA after the ANS became private with user fees.

I compare this with ATC, in Canada, you now have to pay to train as an air traffic controller. The basic training is no longer free. If it was this way when I went through the system I probably would not have pursued it since it would have been to costly to me. The same goes for aviation, yes you might deter people from flying by charging user fees but you will still have those who want to become pilots and will pay. Just look at some of the flight schools in Florida, people pay upwards of 30 K to get an IFR rating so they can go work for COMAIR and make peanuts.

The statement made on this site about safety where a pilot might not shoot an ILS approach in bad weather because of user fees where he would have before because it's too expensive??? Now come on, any pilot that does this should not be a pilot, period. Putting himself and his aircraft and crew in danger is irresponsible and anyone with a conscience would not do this. It boils down to, if you wanna play, you gotta pay. Pure and simple.

[West Coast]

Slightly differing order

1. Europe is not dependant upon GA for its supply of pilots. The US is. That is comparing apples and oranges and cannot be done in a paragraph or two. To compare the two theories is irrelevent. Ab initio may be the norm on your side, but not here The path to the right seat would change fundementally if GA is heavily burdened.

2. Paying to be a controller. Beyond my perview. Reminds me of the Comair academy you mentioned, pay for training.

3. Can't speak to Jet Blue, as they are a new company with little history, promising however. SouthWest on the other hand I can as my airline competes against them in many venues. They are profitable for a number of reasons, too many to list. They all lead to the basic building blocks at the base of the pyramid. I promise you if even they were burdened with a 10% tax as you suggest, they would lose pax. We often dont compete against each other, we compete against the car. SW has a number of city pairs that compete directly with a chevy. The ability to drive there in a reasonable period of time vs the crowds of an airport, security hassles, wait time, and all the other joys of flying. Now add in 10 % and the decision is made for a family of four or five now must now pay a much larger percentage. The US culture is based largely on automobiles, Fair to say Europe less so.

4. As to safety. Its not like we dont have pilots scud running now.
Add in added costs and that number will increase. To say that they shouldn't be pilots is a nice pie in the sky observation, but it misses the fact that they are already flying. It is happening as we speak. You think tacking additional costs wont change things? Unless the FAA puts inspectors beyond every rotating beacon its gonna happen.

[Scott Voigt]

Euro ATC;

The US trains MANY of the worlds pilots. Come on over and look at our flight schools in Florida, Texas, and California as well as Arizona. You will find that we train MANY, MANY foriegn pilots. In fact, one year a stat came out from one of the flight training magazines, that the US trains more pilots then the rest of the world combined every year.

As to where does Lufthansa get it's pilots? Well they do indeed get most of them ab initio. Guess where they train them? The US! JAL does the same. You will find all JAL pilots trained here. There are others that you will find too. Our General Aviation is greater than the rest of GA in the world. That is just a fact of life. If you want to compare to the traffic load between the US and Canada, take a look at the US provided TSD's that we share between countries. It will not only display the aircraft that are flying in the US, Canada, Japan and England, it will also count them all for you. The numbers are impressive for the US and speak for themselves.

GA does NOT flourish in the rest of the world due to the HIGH cost of flying. In part some of the high costs are due to paying for the services as you go... Try flying around different parts of the world. It is REALLY expensive.

As already explained, the US aviation pretty much pays it's own way as far as aviation services goes. There is some that comes out of the general fund, but that covers pretty much the military and the govt. service aircraft as well as some of the other governmental functions that the FAA handles. The bulk though comes from the Aviation Trust fund which comes from airline passenger ticket fees, fuel taxes, freight lading taxes etc... Everyone pays their fair share...

regards

[ferris]

Scott, how do you collect revenue (from GA) at the moment? You imply that you are moving to a user pays system- paying per approach or ILS or whatever. You believe this will result in a reduction of use of services. So how does GA pay now?

[EuroATC]

Some great posts!!

Just to clarify a few things..

About the 10% i mentioned, I was not saying fees would add 10% to the ticket price, what I was reffering to was a possible 10% decrease in GA usage. This number I will reseach with some friends who still work at Nav Canada to see the actual if any drop in GA since user fees came in effect. The actual fee added to a passenger ticket is minimal.

US airlines compete with cars, Europe competes with trains.

Yes you are right, alot of airlines train their pilots in the states and would keep on doing so even if there was user fees. Yes you are also right, flying in Europe is expensive, if you think it's only because of fees think again. EVERYTHING is alot more expensive in Europe, my apt costs 2000 USD per month, a kid a McDonalds makes 12 USD per hour, dinner for 2 at an average restaurant cost 60 USD.. need I give more examples.. just the scale of the economy, this has everything to do with the fact that an hour of flight time is 2 to 2 1/2 times more expensive than in North America. You talk about the road to the right seat being different here than in North America, you are right, but there is something very wrong when guys are willing to fly for free to build hours on regional airlines. Maybe there are just too many pilots in the US. This was happening even pre sept 11th. Time to change the system? Would maybe stabilize the profession a little?

I am not questioning or asking about the traffic loads in Canada or the US, I know there is a ton of traffic in the US, more than anywhere else in the world. In Toronto, we used to average 100,000 movements per month, but I was not reffereing to that, the number I want to know is the decrease in percentage of GA flying since user fees were implemented.

About scud running pilots, WOW that is all I can say, maybe there should be inspectors to yank these licenses away.

[ATC Watcher]

Roger out : you were against privatisation in the UK? I do seem to remember a loat of moaning against SERCO but everyone seemed happy to go to bed with the airlines group , or did I miss something ?
As to the bloody Europeans ( the French for instance ) , they are the only one at the moment having strikes against their privatisation, and they seem succesful so far. ( time will tell however )

I do not seem to recall any form of industrial action in the UK against NATS privatisation at the time.

Nothing is free anymore I am afraid...

[Scott Voigt]

Ferris;

In the US General Aviation pays a tax on aviation fuel. This covers everything from ATC, to aviation weather to Flight Service and NOTAMs. It also helps pays for the airport grants that the FAA gives out to help improve airports and such...

regards

[BEXIL160]

Roger Out ... many of us really wished to take some form of industrial action in the UK prior to privatisation. Unfortunately it would have been against the UK Trade Union laws, so a non- starter.

A great pity, as I believe that with some form of action the media and the public would have taken note of, the government would have had enough serious doubts to end the proposed PPP (regardless of Gordon Browns spending / income plans).

As it was the PPP in the UK was forced through by a Government with a very large, and unassailable majority, regardless of the debates held in both the Lords and the Commons.

The result? A complete disaster.

Rgds BEX

[Checco]

Roger out:

"many of us really wished to take some form of industrial action in the UK prior to privatisation. Unfortunately it would have been against the UK Trade Union laws, so a non- starter"


Checco: Industrial relationship are very different between UK and Continental Europe. This could explain why your laws did not allow to go on strike against privatisation. See the below link:

http://www.eiro.eurofound.ie/2001/11/feature/TN0111148F.html


ATC in France:
The ATC in France seems under scrutiny as the report of the "Cour des Comptes" would show. You can download it at :

http://www.ccomptes.fr/



The title of the report is:
LE CONTRÔLE DE LA NAVIGATION AÉRIENNE
_______
RAPPORT AU PRÉSIDENT DE LA RÉPUBLIQUE
SUIVI DES RÉPONSES DES ADMINISTRATIONS
INTÉRESSÉES
---------
NOVEMBRE 2002

[Iron City]

Ferris: Revenue is collected from GA in a number of ways: The federales collect a tax on aviation fuel and on parts and appliances (any aircraft spare parts, new radios, tires, and other aircraft peculiar stuff etc) as well as a tax on airline tickets and freight waybills that gets money from airline passengers and freignt shippers. Airports are also allowed to collect money from GA in the form of landing fees and this is on a case by case basis. Most small airports don't bother or don't bother if you buy gas their or RON. Some big airports that have landing fees don't bother if you are a transient one time only light GA aircraft.

As far as inspectors to catch scud runners sounds like a typical European solution. Actually a European named Darwin figured out how to stop this without any significant new expenditure of resources for inspectors and various other nannys to babysit everyone. You scud run long enough you will kill yourself. Then you won't scud run anymore. Simple. But do it befoer you have kids and it will improve the gene pool too.