“Centralising the functions must be a long term objective of the EASA”
Isn’t one of the problems for EASA that they (Europe) are not signatories to the ICAO convention? Thus as not being a ‘national authority’ do they have any responsibility for accident investigation under Annex 13.
Currently there is no consistent high standard of accident investigation across the European nations. Many are combing their efforts, although most probably could participate under the auspices of Annex 13 – interested parties any way.
Europe / EASA need a single investigation authority, but currently I don’t see how this will occur in practice. Even if there is a central body, there could be ‘regional centres’ as with NTSB, which for lesser events can result in variable investigative and reporting performance.