Clapton, the criticism of the CASA leadership shouldn't stop just at Byron. In fact, I think it would be warranted to go further up the line. He gets his marching orders from on high. A considerable part of the problem stems from Parliament House.
It appears that the CASA is just lurching from one Federal Royal Commission/Inquiry to the next. A board won't necessarily prevent the wayward application of administration within the CASA management. We saw that with Monarch.
The problem appears to stem from a Federal Government that puts an elected representative and his/her advisors in charge who might be outstanding strategists and politicians, but with absolutely minimal knowledge on the practical side of the application of regulation of aviation matters. At some stage, the political goals and aspirations of the Minister and the party in charge will inevitably clash with the goals of the CASA. For example, the unstated goal of the Minister is to stay in power. This is achieved through the cultivation of votes. It's not difficult for roles to get muddled and the CASA to be roped into vote cultivation through various means. So how do you change this short of having a referendum on moving to a republic? And even then, would anything change?
I mentioned before about external review processes. Somewhere, the current process is coming up short when the CASA situation advances to such a stage that the public feels it necessary for a Federal inquiry and a major house cleaning within the CASA. There has to be a way of getting a wayward organisation back on track before the damage is done. The CASA has been heading down this misguided path for at least ten years now. Ask anyone within the CASA aside from C level executives and the story is the same. So why has it taken so long for something to be done? The USA has some interesting policies in this regard: the General Accounting Office (GAO) on a federal level and state mechanisms such as the Texas Sunset Advisory Commission. From its website:
In 1977, the Texas Legislature created the Sunset Advisory Commission to identify and eliminate waste, duplication, and inefficiency in government agencies. The 12-member Commission is a legislative body that reviews the policies and programs of more than 150 government agencies every 12 years. The Commission questions the need for each agency, looks for potential duplication of other public services or programs, and considers new and innovative changes to improve each agency's operations and activities. The Commission seeks public input through hearings on every agency under Sunset review and recommends actions on each agency to the full Legislature. In most cases, agencies under Sunset review are automatically abolished unless legislation is enacted to continue them.
The Sunset Advisory Commission has just recently delivered a scathing report on the Texas Department of Transportation. It might not work in Australia, but it's certainly worth a look and appears to take some of the politics out of the day to day management of a government agency and regulator.