"That is why some people can do it and with the hekp of their lawyers give two fingers to the CAA."
Thats never been the case with me - the CAA bloke just turned up cos he had to and said it's legal, thereby not necessitating the need for super slickering lawyers etc...
The poster who said after "all the hoops he'd had to jump through......" and wanting to duff people like me up in the dark or something is missing the point. It is likely that all those hoops were necessarry for what you do with planes but it just aint for me operating in the best of VFR.
Lets suppose for a moment that i go do all that hoop jumping meself. Did a degree in Physics oncet so i would hope the exams would not be too much of a strain. Pay some appalling money for some indifferent training. Eventually come out with say a cpl or an atpl etc...
Trouble with that is it would still be me in a cessna using my judgement, experience and skill to fly around low level in peachy VFR!! There is just no need for all that mince.
If the system was actually producing competant commercial pilots anymore i wouldnt mind, but the handling skills and airmanship i have witnessed from the sausage factory cpl's has been woeful of late.
One idea which i think is good is for a basic type of AOC to cover this area and also to include flying schools doing sight seeing and casual bits of transport for less than 4 passengers(why a club instructor cant fly a businessman somewhere is a real missed oportunity as a market) etc... The current AOC costs are geared up for real big businesses and prohibitive but a "mini" AOC which concentrated on developing a "responsible" management of such activities would be a goer methinks!