Nulli Secundus, over the last few years I have received some of the most incredible emails and letters from people who are absolutely struggling in aviation. Some were either going to lose their homes (or possibly have lost their homes) because of CASA decisions. These emails and letters have asked me for advice on how they should act so they could return their business to profitability.
In the early days I did give advice and suggested that they contact their local member or write to the Minister. Invariably, when I look back this advice has been wrong. The ones who stayed on ended up being closed down but with a greater loss.
Yes, if you are wealthy and fly privately you are not going to be affected by the one-way ratchet of increased regulation, red tape and costs - but most Australians are not like this.
Things are really bad now, but the Minister is not doing anything about it – in fact, he is making things worse by taking advice from CASA and not allowing the Act change to make it clear that you have to look at cost as well as safety.
The logic and rationale in what I say about getting out comes from the fact that I believe once we reach a critical point, where the local Parliamentarians can’t even get a charter flight, that is when we will start being able to make the necessary change decisions.
You have to understand that the people at CASA seemed to be covered by some type of “group think”. That is, they alone in aviation can ignore the reality of the marketplace and just write rule after rule that “improve safety” and everything will be OK. As most of us know, this is not so.
My advice to these smaller commercial operators, who are suffering, is based on me telling the truth. I simply can’t see any light on the horizon and I can see all the smaller ones being driven to bankruptcy. What is wrong with telling the truth? Everyone can make up their own minds on what advice they want to take notice of.
There is just a small chance that someone may say to the Minister, or to Mr Carmody, that Dick Smith is advising people to get out because he believes they simply can’t run a viable general aviation business. You never know, that may have the impact that gets the Minister, or Mr Carmody, to make some sensible decisions.
Here’s hoping.