People ask what is the regulator doing? Too often they are not that knowledgeable about our job. They know all there paperwork stuff, but they are not always that experienced as jet pilots. They set minimum standards, very bare minimums, and hope the conscience of the airlines raises their own bar. Some hope. Some airlines think that increased training = increased quality. Not always so. More button pushing does not mean more understanding of the a/c nor more handling skills as a pilot. I find it disappointing that a company gives a few moments of manual handling in the recurrency sim every 3 years, but discourages the same on daily line ops. Lip service. Setting higher minimum standards in the basic TR might be a start.
I have a trainer friend in a national carrier. On their TR courses, be it new cadets or type conversion company pilots, they give the 1st 3 FFS sessions as basic flying. 1st session no automatics or FD's; 2nd session add in FD and some automatics; 3rd session look at all aspects of AFDS and some hiccups. Once that is all understood they then add in all the non-normals & emergencies.
In other operators, whose training is considered good, during the TR course the amount of FFS has been reduced and the amount of basic flying, outside of LST items, is about 30mins. The amount of CMD operating has been increased. It is an astonishing 'poles apart' difference in thinking. If you are a 150hr cadet in one of the latter what chance do you have to learn basic piloting skills, especially as line flying is primarily in CMD at all times.
If the XAA's insisted on FFS 1-3 being the basics of manual a/c control the airlines would have no choice. If command upgrade courses required a demonstration of basic skills to a high standard, the airlines would have no choice.
Leaving everything to the airlines will not create a common industry high standard. The basic LST is simply that; a very basic standard. We need a higher basic level.