Well it's not just me that believes there is a problem and something is not quite adding up.
Jetstar contradicts CASA’s evidence to Senate inquiry
March 19, 2011 – 9:58 am, by Ben Sandilands
Jetstar’s reaction to the tabling of an unfavourable CASA audit of its rostering practices and fatigue management at the Senate inquiry into pilot training and airline safety yesterday contradicts the testimony given by CASA chief executive officer John McCormick.
In the Brisbane Times this morning this appears:
Jetstar spokesman Simon Westaway said safety was the airline’s priority and CASA regularly undertook such audits.He said the audit ”delivered no formal request for corrective action into areas assessed”.
”Jetstar is currently formalising its integrated fatigue risk management system in accordance with best practice.”
Yet John McCormick said:
…. that as a result of the combined audit and its recommendations being sent to Jetstar all of the those findings had been satisfactorily addressed by Jetstar.
Westaway doesn’t speak for Jetstar without his words being approved by the most senior levels of the airline. This is unlikely therefore to be a mistake, raising the question as to whether McCormick was mistaken.
Or whether McCormick is mindful of the relationship between major Australian carriers and the safety regulator to the point where documents that say in a direct manner that any of them aren’t properly managing safety issues are suppressed, edited, or otherwise defanged to avoid causing harm to the relationship.
There may be only one way that the dilemma created by Jetstar’s response can be* resolved in fairness to all parties.
That is, for the Senators to compare the human factors audit to the full audit document sent to Jetstar in May 2010.
Then, for the Senators to ask,* as some of them did yesterday, exactly what CASA required of Jetstar, exactly what Jetstar did in response, and exactly why CASA was then satisfied with the responses made by Jetstar which its spokesperson says they weren’t even asked to address and thus presumably never made.
These questions, and the resolution of the disparity in positions, is surely as critically important as Jetstar improperly changing the standard operating procedures for missed approaches on A320s, failing to keep any written records, failing to acknowledge its culpability in its Senate submission per Qantas, and leaving the pilots of one of its jets on July 27, 2007, so dangerously confused that they comes within metres of smashing the jet into the ground at Tullamarine Airport.
Jetstar is very proactive about throwing around the ‘proactive safety’ phrase. But it is very opaque and defensive, and at critical times, undocumented, when it comes proactively explaining actual events, processes and reasons concerning matters of direct relevance to its performance of regulatory obligations.
Its group CEO, Bruce Buchanan, should, with respect be begging the Senate to return and explain all of these matters, oh and a few concerning its apparent attempt to evade Australian labor laws and tax and superannuation obligations concerning its not-really-NZ New Zealand cadet pilot scheme and the offshoring of jobs and assets in Singapore.
It’s a wonderful opportunity for Jetstar to put the pro-active into ‘pro-active’ and talk these things through, one step at a time, without any flights to catch or weddings to attend or any other time pressures, in a Senate inquiry of vital interest to Australians beyond just those of air travellers.