I've been fortunate to have worked around the world with a variety of LAEs of different nationalities. By and large, we are all similar in nature. We are also all exposed to commercial pressures and some of us do not respond as we should.
(BTW, with regard to aviation incidents/accidents, most have an element of management failing as a factor. Think of Britt Air, Alaska 261, American 191, BMI oil loss etc).
We put up with poor facilities, poor equipment/tooling, lack of spares, the old sweats who "have always done it this way and have never had an accident" (must be about due, then)etc. We also appreciate Human Factors training but, along with many managers, we ignore it.
Despite my previous carping about pilots (
), I firmly believe safety is a joint effort.
I have reservations about EASA, JAR/Part 66 and other regs. EASA believes the UK CAA over-regulates but our accident rate is very low; that said, so too is that of ECAC and EU states. 2004 was one of the best years for the accident rate: 475 fatalities from 26 accidents. However, irrefutably, maintenance error is on the increase and the fact that the statistics are not worse could be a function of inherently reliable aircraft with redundant systems.