The Australian is not quite so conciliatory;
CASA puts pilot security online
CASA puts pilot security online
Steve Creedy
MARCH 03, 2006
THE air safety regulator has set up a web page to let pilots check the progress of their Aviation Security Identification Card applications amid signs some passes will not be issued by this month's extended deadline.
Pilots will need to display the passes after March 31 in order to gain access to secure areas of regional airports but the Civil Aviation Safety Authority has so far finished processing only 4200 of the 12,500 applications it has received. About 5500 of the unprocessed applications are understood to be still undergoing background checks by the Australian Federal Police.
CASA says the new web page, which will apply only to applications lodged with the authority, will be quicker than trying to telephone with a query.
The Government has battled with the strengthened security card requirements since the move was announced in 2003. Early bureaucratic bungling caused widespread delays and confusion.
Last year the Government tried to streamline the process by making CASA a centralised issuing authority.
But it made the decision too late, and Transport Minister Warren Truss was forced to extend the original deadline of December 31.
CASA says it is now giving priority to those pilots who lodged their applications before the December deadline, and processing those that were lodged this year in the order they were received.
It is also trying to contact as quickly as possible pilots who have made mistakes in their ASIC applications. CASA spokesman Peter Gibson said it was difficult to estimate how many of the unprocessed ASICs would be through before the deadline.
"The goal is to get it all done before the end off the month," he said.
"Certainly we want to get done all those people who met the official deadline of December 31 - that's only fair to them.
"The ones that didn't meet the deadline and put them in this year, we'll get as many done as possible but it may not be possible to do all of them."
Mr Gibson said the authority was still receiving late applications and those would not be processed by the deadline.
He urged anyone who had not lodged the paperwork yet to do so as soon as possible.
The Australian
Full marks to them for doing this
Puts the remarks made by the Minister's "Spokesperson" blaming pilots for the delays in a bit of a different light.