BUT There are things that i've seen junior rookie pilots add such as "Left Fuel Gauge Overreading", now that was a "Grounding Item" but lets face it, NOT A SAFETY ISSUE, if you have a dipstick and know your fuel burn, have a Fuel Flow Meter then its not really that big a deal, heck, if everyone put down that particular item on their MR half of Australias GA Single Fleet would probably be grounded.
Whoa, hang on a second there. If it's not a grounding item, why is it a required item? This is _exactly_ why an MEL or PUS is required rather than relying on a dumb pilot to make a decision.
What are the consequences of not having that fuel gauge working properly? You've said if you have a known fuel quantity and a fuel flow meter/totaliser it's not a big deal. Fine and to an extent I agree with you... but you've already had one failure in your aircraft, what else could go wrong?
Your fuel flow meter could fail... big deal? Nah, not really, known power settings still burns fuel at a known rate give or take.
Your fuel system may develop a major or minor leak... big deal? Possibly! Where is the leak? If it's pouring out of the wing you should notice it before flight. What if you have a fuel injection system and the leak is past the fuel flow sensor on the return line? Your fuel flow meter thinks the fuel is going back to the tank, but it's not, it's now venting overboard and you're unlikely to notice. Would you notice this particular fault with a fuel gauge? Yup! How can we get back to the equivalent level of safety with broken fuel gauge then?
Well let's assume for a second this is the only possible downside we can think of to not having a fuel gauge (bad assumption, but trying to demonstrate the process the manufacturer goes down developing an MEL). The amount of fuel going through this return line is never going to be more than x litres per hour. The endurance from this tank is 3 hours. The most amount of fuel we can vent overboard might come out to 45 minutes.
So what would the MMEL or PUS say in this particular case? One I have operated under previously allowed the aircraft to continue to fly, providing...
a) The pilot is able to accurately determine the fuel quantity at each point of landing
b) The other fuel gauge remains operative (otherwise we could potentially have two leaks and double the amount of fuel we lose)
c) An extra hour of fuel must be carried
I would also disagree with your assertion that half the GA fleet would probably be grounded if pilots wrote up broken fuel gauges. The operator that obtained this PUS would have had strong words with any pilot involved had it not been written up. This same operator who from my point of view always did everything by the book with regards to maintenance, but guess what? They now have a number of their aircraft grounded by CASA due to concerns over their maintenance system. Yet according to you other muppets are still out there flying with broken equipment, not writing it up, being told not to write it up and allowed to continue flying.
Thank you for confirming my belief that CASA are going after the wrong operators in this industry. I am glad to see though that you would phone a friend after a birdstrike and get a second opinion and doing the right thing. Just disappointed to hear your maintenance organisation and senior pilots are potentially letting you down. Stay safe!