Thanks for the link Sepp, I've now had a look at the accounts, and the Pilling Review (referred to in the Chairman's statement), and also to the CAA charges consultation document for 2011/ 2012.
Firstly I did not realise that the CAA's regulatory activity was entirely funded by the aviation community as opposed to being partially or wholly government funded as aviation regulators in other countries are.
Personnel licensing at the CAA is a division within the Safety Regulation Group which as can be seen from the accounts has an approximate income of 60 million per annum and costs that are again approximately the same. This does not help with my initial question because it does not detail income/ expenditure against activities within the SRG.
I did however come upon the CAA charges consultation document which does detail proposed budget and forecast income/ expenditure against specific activities within the SRG and also breaks down those activities into their component parts.
The UK Civil Aviation Authority consultation - CAA charges 2011/2012 from the corporate tab (the original link doesn't work)
Within Personnel Licensing the forecast cost of administering Professional Pilots' Licenses is approximately 7.5 million against a forecast income of 7 million and for Private Pilots' Licenses 800 thousand against 1 million.
You are quite right but items are not costed in that way. The CAA charge for some services and they have numerous functions that generate no income at all so the services they charge for are invariably well above the actual cost of producing those services.
I understand that this is indeed the case where an activity that the CAA carries out as part of its duties that does not generate income is then shared between those it is expected to benefit. I don't understand how the CAA makes this determination but I can find no mention of this with regard to costs within Personnel Licensing.
It could well be that I'm not looking at the figures right but it would appear to me that the cost of issuing and maintaining licenses and ratings is indeed approximately equal to what is being charged and this brings me back to my original thought; how does it cost so much to issue/ renew a license?