I have been reading a book by Ralph Nader and Wesley J. Smith written in 1993 titled: 'Collision Course: The Truth About Airline Safety'. A very interesting read with various chapter titles being: taking safety's measure, bureaucratic quicksand, deregulation, the tombstone imperatives, at cross purposes, and they have those mismanagement blues.
The book covers the ills, as seen by Nader and Smith, of the airline industry which went through near collapse following deregulation in 1978 and which in 1993 was still struggling to survive in a very imperfect commercial and regulatory environment.
In the introduction the point is made that the FAA, through rule making, establishes the minimum safety levels given its legal responsibility to write and enforce regulations. In Chapter 1 the responsibility of government is firmly stated:
For aviation to prosper it must be safe. Safety depends on many factors, such as the quality of aircraft design, the training of pilots, and excellent maintenance. But the genesis of the safety system, from which all else follows, is the vigor and enthusiasm with which the government issues and enforces effective safety standards.
When we get to the chapter titled: 'They have those mismanagement blues' I am so reminded of what I know and have been reading on this forum. I am reminded that the responsibilities of the FAA and CASA are much different but very much the same when it comes to regulating the industry.
The quality of FAA management has a direct impact on safety. …. If the FAA mismanages its meagre enforcement resources, it might have to rely too heavily on the good faith of the regulated companies to comply with safety rules. If the FAA is unable or unwilling to comply with congressional directives to improve safety, the flying public might be denied important safety benefits.
Unfortunately, the record of the FAA is all too clear. ATC modernization programs are chronically behind schedule, goals are frequently missed, the FAA work force is not adequately supervised and new safety programs often sink into FAA-limbo.
There are many similar problems in Australia today as Nader and Smith talk about in the US in 1993 including a lack of government financial commitment to building the airline infrastructure including the proper resourcing and conduct of the safety regulator.
Clearly, the Ministerial staffers and the Department
must know there is something wrong. The
CASA-limbo continues with no one having the determination or the intestinal fortitude to stop it.
No one wants to admit to an inept regulator that is all over the place and lacks international credibility. I wonder what those in Washington, Kuala Lumpur, Jakarta, New Delhi, Beijing and Tokyo (to name a few) are thinking about our amateurish attempt to conduct safety regulation of the dynamic and burgeoning aviation industry.
Sometimes you need to run just to keep up and doing the CASA-limbo rock may be keeping the bloated staff busy but is it achieving the appropriate safety outcomes required?
Keep safe,
Frank
(the better looking one)