gasax:-
Self regulation can and does work - but the organisation has to have some decent values and ethics, and sanctions.
We'll have to agree to disagree over that one. My belief is that Self Regulation is the British Disease, whether it be by the Police, Doctors, Lawyers, or the MOD. Of course those who come under those headings will be outraged at such a suggestion and angrily testify to the dedicated and honourable people that regulate their particular patch. Well they would, wouldn't they?
The particular problem with aviation is that it is trying to kill you all the time and only professional and expert input at every stage from start to finish will lend itself to obviating such malevolent intent. The particular problem of the UK Military's particular problem is that professional expertise was arbitrarily dispensed with by the RAF Chief Engineer and replaced by those prepared to sign off the Regs as complied with, even though they hadn't been. A few years of that and there is an irredeemable gap in the continuous auditing process that is the very lifeblood of Airworthiness Provision.
That such suborning can be occasioned by a few VSOs is the reason that UK Military Airworthiness must be vested in an independent Regulator which it isn't right now. Ditto the MilAAIB.
it is naïve to expect the military to have much of a conscience and so at least an 'arms length' regulator would be better.
More disagreement. It isn't the UK Military that lacks a conscience. I would suggest that there are generally higher moral standards and empathy in the UK Armed Forces than in the UK Civil Population. It wasn't they that set out recklessly and malevolently to sabotage the very aircraft and equipment on which their lives depended, but those who inhabited the murky MOD corridors of power. They are not "the military", though I confess that many wore the uniforms of RAF VSOs. They had ceased to be "the military" the moment they set out to betray their juniors.