Is there not some kind of solution whereby those wishing to become involved in running a flying school can find an existing RTF that isn't trading at the moment and change the names of the Head of Training and Accountable Manager?”
Sadly that’s not the case. The CAA won’t accept a change in legal entitiy. They make you reapply as an ATO. Which of course EASA has now delayed/scrapped as it’s deemed to be inappropriate. A fellow instructor wanted to take over a flying school as the owner decided to retire but the added cost and the delay which at the time was something like 4 months to get his ATO application approved scupper it - so much for promoting the industry
The CAA will not be accepting any new RF applications - which is no secret given that they said as much some 2 years ago now
But things have changed significantly since then so perhaps the CAA should revisit this topic for the benefit of the industry
Revised (simpler) requirements for non-complex ATOs will come into effect by 8 Apr 2015
Why? The CAA themselves say that there was no safety case for the change from ATO to Rf in the first place. Why don’t we go back to how things were (which worked and made the setting up a new flying school relatively quick and cost effective) and wait to see what EASA conclude. They could after all scrap the whole rf/ato setup although