Legislative background
Following is a historical overview to the current situation. Cheers. Glen.
March 2002 In March 2002 CASA commenced the“Part 142 Project”. It was scheduled for completion of implementation in 2005.There was no mention that schools such as mine would lose access to the Integrated 150 hour CPL which my Business derived 90% of its income from.
July 2003 CASA released Notice of Proposed Rule Making (NPRM312FS). It made no mention that schools such as mine would lose access to the Integrtaed 150 hour CPL
2006 I opened my Business, and in accordance with my Business Plan derived 90% of my revenue by delivering the 150 hour CPL. There had been no suggestion that schools such as mine were to lose access to the 150-hour CPL.
December 2011 CASA produced a consultation draft of the upcoming legislation. It made no mention of the loss of the 150-hour CPL to my Business. It dealt entirely with other non-related matters.
December 2012 CASA released the Regulation Impact Statement
February 2013 Part 61/141/142 became law and was scheduled to commence on 4th December 2013. This was a complete overhaul of the entire legislative framework.
Early November 2013 Repeated CASA assurances that new legislation was commencing on 4th December 2013, despite the fact that it appeared to Industry CASA would not be ready.
Mid November 2013 CASA reversed decision and announced delay to Part 61/141/142 until 1st September 2014. This had a cost impact on the business as significant resources had been diverted to the project.
September 2014 New legislation commenced and schools had until September 1st 2017 to Transition to what was classified as a Part 141 (lower category) or Part 142 (higher category school)
April 2017 APTA completed Transition approximately 4 months ahead of schedule.
In December 2012, CASA released the Regulation Impact Statement (RIS) on the impact of the new regulations (Part 61/141/142) on Industry. This Regulation Impact Statement covered in detail the proposed CASA changes and their impact on Industry. Significant decisions were made by CASA based on this document, and my own Business depended on its contents. I trusted it, and it was grossly inaccurate. With the passage of time that statement is easily supported and 100% of Industry will concur.
I will draw your attention to the section that addressed the impact on business.g with the impact of the proposed regulations on Businesses
“Businesses- The existing flight crew training businesses will be required to meet new standards, however, again, whilst these represent a deviation from existing standards the changes are relatively minor, which is supported by the feedback that CASA obtained from the consultation process”
There can be no doubt that statement was grossly incorrect. In fact the changes were the biggest changes ever to the flight training industry in Australia, and that has been the experience of the entire industry.
Importantly, the RIS still did not mention any suggestion that my Business was to lose access to the 150-hour CPL. We now know that the RIS was substandard at least.
Under FOI I obtained documentation and I wholeheartedly disagree with the statement, “which is supported by the feedback that CASA obtained from the consultation process”. The information released to me by CASA under FOI does not support that contention and in fact I claim that to be an untruth.
In fact the proposed changes were not supported by feedback from Industry.
The new legislation was scheduled to commence on December 4th 2013.I prepared as best as I could. This included contractual obligations with staff and significant diverting of resources. This process was made substantially more difficult as CASA obviously had not finalised most of the supporting material, and particularly did not have a finalised Manual of Standards which was the underpinning document for flight schools to prepare. I asked CASA if there was any guidance material to prepare. I was told that “the expectation was that a Part 142 School would have the capability to do it without guidance material.
I had invested significant time and resources into developing my own material, when CASA reversed its decision and in fact released guidance material. My investment in time and resources had been wasted, and the process re-commenced drawing on aspects of the guidance material.
In early November 2013, I received repeated assurances from CASA that the legislation was proceeding in approximately 5 weeks’ time on December 4th 2013. This seemed absurd to me as CASA had not finalised the Manual of Standards (MOS) which was the underpinning and essential document for Flying Schools. CASA repeatedly assured me the legislation was proceeding. Nevertheless, the investment was made, and I was prepared.
Two weeks later CASA reversed their decision, and delayed the commencement until September 1st 2014, with a requirement for Businesses to have completed the Transition to a Part 142 Organisation by September 1st 2017.
My Organisation was one of less than 10% of Australia’s schools that met the CASA deadline of September 1st 2017, as I was required to, and in accordance with CASAs desire for Organisations to Transition as soon as possible. I achieved a date of May 2017, approximately 4 months early. The number of hours devoted to this project was significantly in excess of 2000 hours , and that is in line with other operators experiences.
One month after I completed the Transition, CASA announced yet a further extension to the deadline of September 1st, 2018. I estimate the cost of that delay to my Business to be conservatively a further $600,000 in direct costs. I was effectively left with a “white elephant” but stuck with the additional costings associated with the 142 Approval.
In September of 2018, CASA introduced the delayed legislation.