Time
Lovechild, it's a culture thing - just keep your head in the clouds and you won't know what is likely to hit you. I am glad I was ignorant about the underlying (lack of) rigorous safety thinking when filling out my logbooks!
DV - You are right, downtime is one of the costs that you need to consider if you are arguing ALARP with a cost benefit analysis. The 'temporal' thing is usually considered outside that, but since everyone has their own ideas I don't think that there is a right and wrong - the only way you find our is if a Judge decides that your argument is not reasonable, I guess!
Incidentally, I was hoping that someone might comment on my possibly contradictory suggestion that you can be tolerable and not ALARP and still acceptable during the period when it is reasonable to allow newly determined ALARP measures to be introduced.
Also, apologies to the coal miners. Two counts: first I should have compared 'tolerable' to 'broadly acceptable' (not just 'acceptable'); second with the modern miners' approach to safety you might suggest that a risk that was tolerable in aviation would be intolerable in mining - if you could think of equivalent risks in the 2 contrasting industries that is. Oh well - at least my high horse is not as high as the QC's.
I have continued to read the QC's report - despite flashes of common sense it is remarkable in its ignorance and naivety. Shame - because I guess the MOD will use this as an excuse to bury it quietly and carry on much as before.