Tragedy of Europe applied to aviation...
Silvaire, I think you are hitting the nail on the head. Most Civil Aviation Authorities, although certainly not clueless, have little more to contribute to aviation safety than the FAA.
In addition, petty political debates and sovereignty issues have made true European integration in aviation a farce. As a result, aviation regulation in Europe becomes thwarted by side issues (a bit comparable to the amendments to the TARP) and focus on the essence is lost. The failure of making a single simplified airspace across Europe is the most painful example of this.
Also, a lot of civil servants look upon general aviation with a misguided envy ("those rich people and their private planes"; as opposed to "Heiko, Reiner, Simone und Günther vom Flugverein"), which adds to a tendency to overregulate.
Finally, from what I pick up a lot of civil servants (at the Commission and the UK CAA alike), relations with the US have recently soured up, in part caused by the inability of Europe to speak with one voice (giving the Americans the impression that we are a couple of Nutters), in part by some protectionist measures regarding airplane maintenance.
Protectionist measures are of all times. I recall a 1960's story about a Belgian Company with a French subsidiary wishing to operate a few converted 707-freighters (not sure about the type, could have been constellations or something else) on the N-register. A discussion was going on about with Aviation Authority would do the technical supervision. The FAA claimed its bit, the BdL insisted on Belgian maintenance standards and of course the SGACC did on-site inspections when the aircraft touched down at the French hub. Operational costs soared and the company folded.
The morale is : protectionism kills jobs. If the US is doing something silly then Europe should
- talk it through with the US; failing that (because they don't take you seriously in aviation because of a painful history of inconsistencies as described above)
- file a complaint at WTO level; failing that (because of some bogus safety arguments put forward by the US to circumvent WTO rules)
- retaliate in a proportionate, commensurate and efficient manner.
It is this last thing that is so bad. It is disproportionate, it hurts other people than the ones you should aim for, and it is an inefficient negotiation tool.
In addition, because of the blatant violations of the democratic process to achieve it, it puts into question the role of European Institutions that, if functioning properly, could be beneficial to the European Citizens, even when taking into account their high cost base.
What we see now is
- A Transport Commissioner (Kallas) that is clueless about the issues at hand, lying to parliament and citizens alike. The irony is that most likely he does it inadvertently, because he can't be bothered to see through the fake stories his administration are cooking up for him.
- A European Commission Transport Director (Baldwin) and one of his heads of department (Seebohm) lying to a parliamentary committee
- Petty fighting between a European Aviation Safety Committee and its adminstrative counterpart at the Commission, leading to substandard legislation of which the consequenses have not been thought through
- An EASA general director (Goudou) showing open disdain for parliament; admitting to not having considered the impact of his proposals; and then having the gall to ask for more money for his agency.
I think we should bin what is on the table; and pick up the thread again by
- postponing all deadlines linked to this nonsense (suspension of article 70 of the BR is a must)
- define and agree on roles for each administrative and enforcement entity
(abolishing the Aviation Safety Directorate at the Commission, integrating it into EASA is a not unreasonable idea, but of course not the only possibility)
- consider divesting a number of administrative and rulemaking roles at the National Civil Aviation Authorities where costs can easily be saved.
- de-regulate and reduce paperwork wherever possible; synchronise regulatory requirements that burden pilots (medicals / flight reviews / language proficiency checks / etc...) and scrutinise each carefully for their necessity, formulating proposals aimed at simplifying the life of the pilot and promoting aviation as a whole.
- increase resources for physical enforcement and accident investigation at the National level; ground planes and fine pilots that mock essential safety regulations (flying without a annual inspection, without a valid medical, etc...)
- take initiatives to reduce the cost and increase the efficiency of flight training : development of training materials at cost, with a focus on air law; centralize the exam developement and provide for a large representative sample of the question database to be available to the general public; work with FTO's, RTF's and instructors with the aim of making flight training as efficient as possible, tailored to each pilot's needs
- overall, make flying available to the general public, so as to optimise airport and ATC infrastructure and to promote business and leasure travel across Europe. And design an aviation training and flying set up that can compete on its merits with the US and other countries.
Just a thought.