The sense of deja vu while reading this thread is enormous. I have spent the last few years as safety manager of a medium sized GA operation. I am no longer as I have decided to retire and have nothing to do with aviation ever again. During that time I was trying to draft a new SMS that would incorporate the two, and soon to be, three areas of activity that require a SMS.
The premise I started with was that it was to be easy to understand and use. I understood that there were some essential elements required and that it had to include some hefty provisions for change management. Once drafted it was sent to CASA for comments and approval.
Now, to be fair to them, they did pick up on some internal consistencies that I had overlooked but they also wanted much more detail on some points than I considered necessary. An example, they wanted a time limit on safety report investigations (a month). This I considered was unnecessarily restrictive given that sometimes people who need to be consulted or questioned are absent; reports requested sometimes take longer than expected to be received and so forth. No, there had to be a time limit and whats more, and extension for a longer time period had to be authorised by the accountable manager.
This was process gone mad. When I sat back and looked at what was being required it was nothing more than audit points. Items that CASA could look at when conducting an audit and say "you have not complied with section whatever in this safety report". The whole issue of whether there was a safety risk inherent in the report is immaterial. At one stage they were looking to impose an interim safety committee to decide issues before the mandated safety committee would meet.
I am glad I am out of it. While the industry (GA) continues to act individually rather than taking a unified position with the government it will continue to be screwed.
Last edited by PLovett; 26th Mar 2018 at 11:17.