Hi you want a story.
Then write this.
UK Civil Aviation Authority brought to a standstill due to highly ineffecient paperwork forced onto the aviation industry under the new European Aviation agency EASA.
Professional and Private Pilots are having to wait for months for their licences to be issued, Normal turnaround time was ten days to two weeks. Now it is totally out of control as EASA legislation demands excessive form filling and copius amounts of application forms which are not only unnecessary but are disabling the administration system of pilots in the UK.
Pilots have to pay up to £100,000 for their training but cannot start work to pay back the money until their licences have been issued to them. Also, the pilots licence paper was sub divided whereby one cut a whole page of A4 and placed the individual pages into the page pockets on the licence. Unfortunately, EASA say that this is illegal and is promptly fining thousands of pilots for slipping into the trap of thinking logically and they now have to stuff an A4 size sheet of paper into an A5 pocket thus tearing the wallet of the licence anyway.
Coupled with (I hope you are writing this Mr reporter!!!) Coupled with the above insanity, British born English speaking people who have lived in the UK for their entire lives, have English Mothertongue, went to English speaking schools, in England, have to prove that they, speak English!
In order to do this. They have to attend an English course, and have a form telling them they can in fact speak English and have the form signed by a teacher and then trapse all the way across the country to have it countersignesd by the head of training who has to make a statement exactly as written in the instructions, so that the English speaking people in Gatwick can believe that the applicant although born in England, went to an English School, having spoken all their lives, English, can in fact speak English, after having undertaken an Airline Pilot Training course, in English!! Well, one can`t be too careful can one?
Each of the copies of the pilot application paperwork has to be filled in at the completion of the course. There are about 7 or 9 papers. All saying the same thing...........? Why is this?
In the past the UK CAA had one form for one type of licence. One form for another type of licence. So pilots filled in whichever single form was required in order to apply for their licence. Now they have 9 forms for no reason.
If ever there was a reason, an excuse for the UK pulling out of the common market - then this is it, yes, this one seriously takes the biscuit.
After shedding approx £100,000 on their training UK pilots are penalised by excessive delays having their licences issued to them, or not, as is the case.
The cabinet want to know what is happening. The CAA don`t know what is happening., EASA are causing it to happen and the pilots of the UK and indeed Europe, as the damage is not just at home, all European pilots are on the verge of a pilots strike. The British Airline Pilots Association, have yet to comment.
This is an intrusive invasion of a perfectly working system which has been sabotaged - directly - by Europe and the UK CAA have little or no say in the matter and are battling to keep their heads above water as the entire UK pilots licensing system has effectively ground to an ignominious halt.
In light of the coming holiday season it is envisaged that this will cause excessive delays as airlines will not be ablr to fly their routes due to the lack of pilots who are waiting for their licences to be issued. EASA have said that no one can fly until they have recived their licences.
Pilots phoning the UK CAA are unable to get through on the phonelines as there is simply no answer. Emails sent to the CAA are not replied to as the UK CAA are drowning in the workload. There was a suggestion that this may have been a deliberate attack on the UK aviation system by European members of EASA in order to disable UK aviation to enable European airline companies to take over UK routes and passengers and revenue.
Thereby, simply putting UK aviation out of business. A sort of ecomonic cold war. Whether we agree that this is indeed the case or disagree - the fact is, this is exactly what has happened.
Last edited by Natstrackalpha; 18th Apr 2013 at 21:53.