{Comment: Mods promise there is a point and the thread will (eventually) drift back..
}
Not wanting to detract from the intriguing thread drift over the last dozen or so posts 
, plus equally not wanting to promote further drift 
, however I noted the following statement in the McComick view thread from Waghi Warrior (post#95):
I don't work for CASA and I'm certainly not trying to defend them, however lets face it no 'R' egulator as Cactus puts it will never have a super chummy relationship with industry - fact.
The WW fact would seem to be disputed by other industry figures, here is an example from the Senate RRAT committee inquiry into Qantas's future as a strong national carrier supporting jobs in Australia (my bold)
Senator IAN MACDONALD: …The only other question I have because of time is: are you now suggesting that CASA is not doing its job?
Mr Purvinas : In my opinion CASA are nothing more than another arm of Qantas's industrial relations department. I have a very dim view on CASA's oversight of maintenance in this country and outside of Australia. I think they act in line with everything that Qantas wants them to do.
Senator IAN MACDONALD: They are not an arm of Qantas, they are an arm of the federal government.
Mr Purvinas : Maybe the federal government should pull them in and make sure that they are giving proper oversight to maintenance facilities here and offshore.
Senator IAN MACDONALD: I know this is a criticism of the last government, who had six years to do that, but I must say that I will talk to Mr Truss to make sure that CASA are not an arm of Qantas or anyone else and are an independent authority. You have no confidence in CASA at all?
Mr Purvinas : No. We do not have confidence in CASA to provide effective oversight of maintenance.
Senator IAN MACDONALD: You think that the reason they are failing in the duty that the Australian people, through their government, have given them is because they are in the pay—so to speak colloquially—of Qantas?
Mr Purvinas : I think they have been a victim of corporate capture. They have got too close to the airline. A lot of them are friends with people who work for Qantas and I think corporate capture, Stockholm syndrome, whatever you want to call it, I think CASA have some problem.
Senator IAN MACDONALD: Does that apply to Virgin as well, or is it related only to Qantas?
Mr Purvinas : I do not know how close they are to Virgin. I have not had too many indications that that would be the case there. I do know that they are coming up pretty hard against airlines like Tiger and so on. They grounded Tiger for things that are far less than what we have seen with Qantas.
&..
Senator BACK: I want to follow up with Dubai and Hong Kong. Has it been your experience, or can you document, similar failures of inspection in both the cities of Dubai and Hong Kong?
Mr Purvinas : ...We approached Qantas and CASA about it, and what happened is an example of why we have no confidence in CASA. Under the mandatory Service Difficulty Reporting scheme, which is a government standard here, all airworthiness defects must be reported to CASA. They had a facility in Hong Kong that was not bolting on engines correctly. The report should have gone in within 24 hours so they could contact the facility and let them know to check all the engines they had installed on aircraft. We were monitoring this. We know the mandatory report never went in, because they are publicly available. So we wrote letters to CASA saying: 'Aircraft has come out with three of the four engines not bolted on correctly—why has no mandatory service difficulty report gone in?' They said, 'It is okay—Qantas rang us and told us about it.' That is illegal. There are laws that are meant to protect aviation safety, and CASA are meant to make sure those laws are applied and implemented correctly.
CHAIR: Can you table those letters of concern for the committee?
Mr Purvinas : Absolutely. I think the letters are there. We also table the appropriate legislation that requires mandatory service difficulty reports.
There is also considerable evidence that the Red Rat is not isolated in receiving preferential treatment when it comes to Fort Fumble..
The classic case is nicely documented in the Senate’s PelAir inquiry versus say the FF persecution of Airtex or Barrier or..
(fill in the blank 
).
Drifting back…
The passing comment from FedSec Steve..“the federal government should pull them in and make sure that they are giving proper oversight to maintenance facilities here and offshore”…should be noted by the miniscule and his WLR team...
It should also be noted that although Steve’s primary interest is for his members, the evidence he gave yesterday (& the ALAEA WLR submission) are largely reflected in the comments made by the research team from the Australian School of Business (post#575):
Fraser: "In effect, Australia's MRO training effort has been allowed to become hostage to the strategies and fortunes of a single company. If that company now can't look after itself, how is it going to look after the future needs of the Australian industry?"
Hampson: “There are doubtless many offshore shops which give top-quality service that Australian consumers can rely on,” he says. “We know from experience that there are some which definitely don’t. The problem is that we don’t have enough good information to tell which is which.
Australia doesn’t even keep public records of which maintenance goes offshore, never mind where it goes. Once it does go offshore, no public records are kept of where the work has fallen short of standard, or what rework is needed in Australia when the plane comes back.
“The risk then is that because there isn't enough information about quality, choices will be made on the basis of price. This is a classic ‘market for lemons’ situation, where quality providers get driven out of the market and many others survive who don't deserve to."
The researchers note “a contrast between Australia's relaxed approach to the supervision of overseas repair shops handling Australian work, and the increasingly stringent regulatory approach which public concern in the US has obliged Congress and the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to apply to offshore providers”.
The FAA is subject to political supervision and accountability in ways that Australia’s CASA is not. The FAA was recently compelled by congressional legislation to tighten up its regulatory and supervisory practices. In Australia, the trend is for CASA to offshore its responsibilities to foreign aviation authorities to ensure safety standards. This leaves the certification of maintenance on Australian aircraft to the safety oversight, training and licensing procedures of another country.
“We wonder how consistent this is with the Australian safety program, as well as International Civil Aviation Organisation requirements that the State of Registry be responsible for the safety of maintenance performed on aircraft even in another country,” say the researchers.
Back on track...
One would assume that the concerns/findings of the ABS researchers will be significantly highlighted in their WLR submission..
More to follow…
Addendum: For those interested the ALAEA submission to the Qantas inquiry can be downloaded
HERE