I was going to quote parts of Mad Jock's post to confirm that it is an accurate reflection of life at a small operator before I realised that it'd be pointless; every word of it is bob on.
Please, all the Airbus/Boeing jockeys asking about CAT II approaches and "why didn't they just follow SOP?" take note.
Particular resonant with me are the Chief Pilot who thinks that because he's got 40 years experience and squillions of hours flying decrepit pieces of crap around the world of yesterday, he knows it all today too; times, best practice and indeed regulations have changed but he does everything he can to resist change.
Also the bit about undue reverence bestowed on the company 'golden child'; the one who goes the extra mile to 'keep things moving', fabricates loadsheets with alarming irreverance and in all probability couldn't find the MEL in his aircraft if you gave him 20 minutes and a really big clue.
Many (most?) small operators operate CAT I aircraft only and from sad experience the autopilot might be inop most of the time anyway (only not snagged/labelled/MEL'd as such) etc etc.
Granted, perhaps none of this applies to Manx/the aircraft operator/the crew in this incident, but MJ's description of "how it really is" really is how it really is.
Apologies for the thread drift.