Just to get the perspective on this one sorted out, I have changed the title of the thread and include the details that are most likely to stimulate discussion from the BALPA website:
BALPA Press release:
BRITISH PILOTS CONDEMN EU MOVE: CHALLENGE UK GOVERNMENT
TO PUT 'NOTHING WILL CHANGE' PROMISE IN WRITING
Pilot leaders have reacted with huge disappointment, dismay and disbelief to today's decision of the European Council of Ministers to adopt flying time rules that are unsafe, unscientific and a political fudge.
The British Airline Pilots' Association (BALPA) is concerned that market competition will compel airlines to follow the poorly drafted and incomplete EU rules and has already warned that if pilots are asked to fly hours which are unsafe then they will not take off.
The Council of Ministers' decision now puts the UK Government on a collision course, despite the British Government's promise that the UK will stick to the existing British rules irrespective of what Europe says.
Said BALPA Chairman Captain Mervyn Granshaw: 'We take our responsibility for public safety very seriously, and we don't deal in fudges.
'The Government has said the new rules won't change anything for UK airlines, but we have no confirmation of this, or of how long such a promise will last.
'The Government should come clean and confirm the position in writing, unequivocally, as well as explain to the public the logic of this appalling double standard. Pilots and passengers deserve nothing less.
'Our safety record in the UK is the best in Europe and should make us leaders in Europe, not followers. It is about time the UK Government set an example rather than join in this downhill race.'
BALPA's three main concerns with the proposed Flight Time Limitations Standard are:[list=1][*]The document is incomplete and will NOT achieve the real objective of harmonisation – take standby: In UK after 6 hours the amount a pilot can be called upon to fly progressively diminishes whereas in Germany pilots can be on standby for 24 hours continuously and after 23:55 can be called to fly for a full 12 hours. Practices like this (and there are many) will not be harmonised to a safe level or stopped.[*]It has been poorly drafted by politicians and civil servants who know nothing about this complex subject – It is akin to allowing a politician to write the manual on open heart surgery procedures.[*]It reduces an already interesting fatigue boundary – let's take an alcohol comparison. In the UK the fly/alcohol is set at an appropriately low 20mg/ml of blood. The drink drive limit in the UK is set at 80mg/ml. Interestingly and coincidentally the UK Fatigue boundary is equivalent not to the 20mg limit but to the 80mg drink drive limit. If we allow this political fudge to come into force the end result will be that pilots will be able to fly aircraft when their performance is so degraded that if it were due to alcohol and they'd been driving a car in the UK they'd be illegal. Surely that is completely unacceptable?[/list=1]
Warning to operators
Sub part Q on Flight Duty Time
_These are the rules that may well regulate how many hours a pilot can fly. In the past these have been set by each country and in the UK they have progressively evolved since the 1972 Bader report based largely on scientific research and, as you are aware, are set by the UK Civil Aviation Authority under regulations guided by CAP371.
But on the 11th June - the very day after the European Parliamentary Elections in the U.K.- the Council of Ministers are being asked to set new European-wide rules that have less to do with science and more to do with political compromise. I am writing to advise you that if they are adopted as drafted they could well lead to disruption to operations where flight crew, in exercising their Licence provisions deem such operations unsafe.
A considerable amount of data has been collected over the past 20 years on the sleep and alertness of aircrew and the delivery, distribution and safety boundaries are widely understood._ The much respected European Committee for Aircrew Scheduling and Safety (ECASS Group) in a recent report concluded:
'Based on our current understanding of physiological and psychological factors contributing to fatigue in aviation operations, it is our view that there would be a significant increase in the risk of fatigue-related incidents and accidents if operators were permitted to operate to the limits specified in the EP-proposal.'
Our European umbrella organisation, the ECA, has written to the Commission pointing out where we believe science is being ignored and we are demanding that the European Parliament adheres to Article 95 (3) of the Treaty and uses the scientific evidence in drawing up laws. We have proposed changes to sub-part Q where we believe science is not being used. We have been pressing these points on Alistair Darling, as are our ECA colleagues on their Transport Ministers.
We do not think it enough to say that the UK will be immune from these changes; we are not. There will be pressure from Operators basing themselves in other countries that do not have the standards, or safety record, that we have in the UK. And, in any event, safety should be taken out of the competition equation, which is why we are pressing for scientifically based EU regulations.
Nor is this is about protectionism or restrictive practices; we need to be productive and competitive but not at the expense of safety. Indeed CAP749 from the Economic Regulation Group recently showed how we in the UK have exploited liberalisation.
So why is there potential for disruption to your operations? You should know that sub part Q contains provision 4.1 which says:
"A crew member shall not operate an aeroplane if he/she knows that he/she is suffering from or is likely to suffer from fatigue or feels unfit, to the extent that the flight may be endangered"
There are of course echoes of this in the ANO and, as we have seen over the Police Sky Marshal issue, in the event that these new provisions are enacted we will be supporting members who decide not to operate for the above reason. Our European pilot colleagues will be doing likewise.
We urge you to:
Thank you for your time and if you wish to find out more please visit our website
www.balpa.org
Yours sincerely,
Jim McAuslan
General Secretary
What appears to have escaped many of the people commenting here is that whilst here in the UK we enjoy (I use the word reservedly) relatively safe Flight Time Limitations (FTL's) which have evolved over many years with research and input from scientific experts, the main problem now lies in the fact that whilse we in the UK who work for operators with a UK AOC will not see any changes, the door has been left open for other European operators to operate to the new rules.
Whilst these new rules may be an improvement for many pilots who work to FTL's that are considered to be little more than a 'nod and a wink' between their countries regulator and the operators, and are without a doubt a danger to not only the crews but also the passengers who fly on those airlines routes, they are still less restrictive than the UK rules.
The new rules will not increase the total number of flying hours in a year but will lead to fewer rest periods and longer flight duty hours. Market competition will compel airlines to follow the "poorly drafted and incomplete" EU rules.
What this means is that our esteemed (NOT) politicians who gave the go ahead for these new rules have shown their usual lack of ability and understanding and we will now have more non-UK European operators able to operate in competition with UK AOC based airlines and get what the bosses will consider to be more 'efficiency' from their pilots. What those singularly imbecilic politicians have set up is a platform for the UK AOC operators to argue that the rules should now be relaxed here in the UK so that they don't suffer from unfair competition.
What's the bet that the pongos who run the CAA will buckle under the pressure of the operators to relax the FTL rules and come into line with the rest of Europe? We all know who butters the bread of the CAA. Now we have politicians deciding on safety related matters without any scientific input. Basically it is the 'blind/ignorant' leading the CAA and only a matter of time before we see our current FTL's being eroded to even more unsafe levels.