PITTS
Please don't turn language designed to generate some passion turn into paranoia. Many colleagues took the route via self funding and are doing a damn good job. The problem is not the general concept of self funding but the functionality of it. ANY system that interacts with humans and that can be abused WILL BE abused, sometimes deliberately and sometimes because the pathway is not robust enough to ensure a uniformly high standard.
Just because the 'little guys' can't cope it doesn't mean that we have to accept that a lower standard is OK otherwise they won't survive. I don't believe that to be the case. There will always be pilots willing to work for less but that does not mean that they have to be trained by a system that is staffed by low timers. We are shooting ourselves in the foot and telling ourselves it's OK because......
When are we going to realise that by tolerating the current system we are creating a spiral of decline. Our industry has forever been cyclical and those that feed on the crumbs at the bottom of the market don't deserve hand-outs. If the customer can't afford the rate for the job then maybe a helicopter is not the tool for the job.
Imagine having this argument about the training of surgeons. If we don't have enough respect for our own industry then maybe we deserve to be treated like truck drivers or cattlemen but that's not what I see when pilots display amazing skill and knowledge in a complex modern helicopter. I spent a lot of years in the single engine charter world and I know how tough it is but we do ourselves no favours by exposing poorly trained (but potentially good pilot material) to the risks and difficulties they will encounter when they have been trained by a system that does not stand up to close examination. When I tell non aviators how it is at the moment they are dumbfounded that we could be so dumb.
By all means let's not throw the baby (self-funders) out with the bathwater but for heavens sake give them a chance to deliver a decent standard and give them an instructor corps worthy of the title.
G.