It's well worth writing or Faxing your MP and asking him to get a response from David Jamieson (Parliamentary Under Secretary of State who is at the DTLR as support for John Spellar the Minister for Transport).
These gentlemen are in charge of Aviation (and the CAA).
In addition to the loss of Vocational Tax Relief I'm going to point out:
- that the self-sponsored student has to pay fees out of taxed income
- that we have no allowance for the cost of training against future or other earnings
- that VAT is charged to the unregistered individual
Its very unfair as an Airline can recover VAT and does get training allowed against tax!!
These are all Treasury matters.... so do stress that you are writing to the DTLR as they represent the interests of Aviation and should make representation on our behalf to Gordon Brown.
There is a perception that anyone learning to fly has to be rich... I think its worth pointing out that most self-sponsored students don't fall into that category.
Please spread the word beyond PPRune and get as many as possible to write.... it might even have an effect if enough of us do it!!