Do you really think Cost Pass Through would be a problem if Senior NATS managers were offered a £500,000 BONUS to convince the CAA to allow it?
I don't think it would make any difference. Regulators always make decisions following the guidelines in the legislation that created them. Not to do so would just see their decisions overturned at the next stage. Where they do have some discretion their decisions can appear illogical but they tend to plough their own furrow entirely unswayed by lobbying. Rather like Senior Civil Servants and high ranking Academics they cherish their independence which is unsurprising really because most were civil servants or academics.
The idea that senior managers in any regulated industry could influence the regulator more if they are sufficiently incentivised isn't supported by history. I'm pretty sure that BT managers had every reason to resist the removal of their monopoly on the "local loop" but they didn't manage to. BAA management had a lot of incentive to try to prevent the forced sale of any of their airports but they don't seem to be preventing that at present.
When NATS gets rid of its BONUS CULTURE then I can start trusting the Management again
I don't think we have anything like the bonus culture that the banks had. That culture was rewarding risk taking rather than performance. Like most in NATS I'm intrigued as to what wonderful thing the Chief Executive did to deserve such a large performance related element but I don't see any evidence that it has encouraged an irresponsible attitude to risk. If anything the opposite is true. As we enter the downturn that some seem desperate to deny it will be interesting to see what happens to those bonus payments when NATS makes little or no profit.
The Government did promise no fat cats when it part privatised NATS and you might struggle with that when almost immediately after PPP the renumeration committee decided that the senior executives were paid too little but that promise did mean that there are no share options in the executive package. That is significant because it is that sort of reward that normally drives the worst management behaviour and without share options it is far harder for the management team to benefit from the sale of the company.