LH2, the way things were done in the old days was that if the CAA consulted at all, which they very often did, they did so with various representative bodies. Individual pilots were given as much or little chance to input to those representative bodies as the latter made available. In the case of gliding, where I have been involved for well over 30 years, the BGA used to take a view as to whether to publicise to all clubs and gliding participants a matter on which views would be submitted. Generally speaking, my impression was that big issues were widely ventilated, and local ones were handled with consultation with the club or limited number of clubs likely to be affected. From what I saw of the other associations, they acted similarly.
For a large number of GA pilots who refused to join AOPA or one of the other associations, this of course meant that there was often no very good avenue for them to make their views felt.
The new way of doing things, where the authorities extend the chance to comment to the public as a whole, may appear to be more democratic. I noted, however, that the CAA comments on responses to the most recent Mode S consultation included:
“2.2.3 The data in Tables 1 and 2 above highlights that the vast majority of responses received came from private individuals operating in the GA sector. Moreover, a significant proportion of responses from the GA sector were from individuals and flying clubs involved in gliding. It is recognised that there were ‘awareness campaigns’ conducted by several of the representative GA associations to ensure that the CAA received a large number of responses from their memberships. Many of the responses received as a result of these campaigns reiterated and supported the views of their respective associations or contained a
précis of the actual consultation inputs received from the associations. In accordance with the Government’s Consultation Guidance, no particular weight has been attached to the number of responses . . . . “
So, unless an individual makes a significant point that one of the associations has not already covered, it’s going to get ignored anyway. Numbers don’t count, it would appear.
In fact, in the case of Mode S, the CAA seem to have taken the position that “ We heard you, we are doing most of it anyway; we pay no attention to the numbers. You have to pay because it benefits airlines and the UK economy.”
So much for democracy.
Chris N.