I am sure Dick will also remember when it became evident that objecting to "User Pays" was going to be futile, convincing government that if the user pays then the "user says" caused much finger drumming and head scratching amongst the proponents of Bosch.
Paying for only what was wanted/actually used as opposed to paying for everything certainly reduced the cost burden to many GA sections. Cross subsidising RFF for those capital city primaries by purely GA airfields was one such "no use the no pay" item.
It seems as thought today, 30 years after Bosch, government are still finding new ways to collect our hard earned so the pollies can live high on the 'public' purse.
CC