Philby, Burgess and Maclean in the Aviation Bureaucracy?
camber3 – you are basically correct when you state,
“I've heard it's a party to address the country's sustainability problem worsened by population growth levels, lack of foresight in planning, plus reduction in bureaucratic red tape”.
About a year ago the people involved in the
Sustainable Population movement asked me if I would lend my name to a political party they were setting up. Their pretty thorough research had shown that they would get a couple of senators up if they had my name tied-up with their Party. I refused because I believe having more and more political parties is a disaster for our country – especially considering that some of them seem to be pretty loopy.
However, times have changed and I’m so bloody angry at the way the present Government is destroying general aviation – an industry I love.
Yes, I can assure you I can afford all the extra costs of Part 61 and just about everything else they throw at me. However, for me to walk around Bankstown Airport and see the hangars locked-up of businesses that were once thriving makes me feel sick.
I have been “duchessed” for the last fifteen years by people in the bureaucracy. In fact, I am beginning to feel that within the aviation bureaucracy is Philby, Burgess and Maclean. Remember after World War 2 the British and American intelligence services could not work out why, despite an enormous amount of work, they could get nowhere in the espionage game. Of course it was because these three and others within their organisations were undermining everything they do.
No, I am not suggesting there is a “traitor” or “communist supporter” within the bureaucracy, but I think there are at least three people who have been there for years and have deluded themselves into believing that no changes are necessary. This delusion has become so overpowering that they do everything they can to stop the move to reducing costs.
And they are successful. We have a Government that said they are going to reduce unnecessary costs and red tape when clearly the opposite is happening in aviation.
Yes, the substantial interest of mine is the fact that politicians tell us we can have perpetual growth forever in our economic system when anyone with any brains knows this is impossible. We have to actually live in balance.
Of course any party with the name “Dick Smith” this will be the major issue. In other ways it will be very much middle-of-the-road as I am. However, if they are going to use my name I will make sure they have a damn good aviation policy including that of the Coalition two elections ago, viz
Australia will become a leader in the world in flight training and recreational aviation bringing tens of millions of dollars of overseas export income to Australia.
Of course, this would all be completely solved and I would not have to lend my name to a party if the Government did what it said it was going to do, but for some incredible reason I don’t see this happening.
To see the locked-up hangars at Bankstown storing junk and knowing that tens of thousands of jobs could be provided around Australia is nothing short of criminal as far as I am concerned.
The Philbys, Burgesses and Macleans may have deluded themselves into deriving some form of satisfaction but they have certainly been successful in undermining an otherwise viable industry.