Glen Buckley and Australian small business -V- CASA

[Squawk7700]

Which is why Glen needs to keep going and not give up. Eventually, it will become apparent that more political damage is likely than financial if they just admit they were wrong and adequately compensate Glen.

Adequate is up to Glen but if it were me, adequate would be nothing less than a) the apology; and b) compensation sufficient to restore Glen's life to what it was, e.g. house owned in similar price category to what he had, settlement of any payments Glen feels he should meet despite any legal obviation of same via bankruptcy and sufficient funds to REALLY satisfy the degree of pain, suffering and stress that has been caused by this whole affair.

In reality, it would be more that that. Pain suffering, hardship, loss of X etc. Millions to be honest. You’d be shooting for the stars, but perhaps not USA style.

[Shipwreck00]

Of course don't give up Glen, but from out here in the grandstand it does look like CASA is choosing to ignore you rather than act. I believe CASA disbanded the inspector teams approach and is now totally divided internally under a new system of even more silos, more heartache for us here in the industry. Getting a response now is hopeless, no one seems to know what is going on, where anything is at. They introduced something called guidance group, don't bother, they ignore your question and it take a ridiculous amount of time to get an answer anyway, little point at all. We need to see CASA inspectors on the ground, we need them out here working with us. I have always found the grass roots CASA guys great, they know their stuff and most are really helpful, its the no idea management they keep employing rather than using those who know how it really works. Glens experience and that of far too many must mean something to someone, surely CASA cant just continue to go off on its own and just ignore everything going on, nothing works, open your eye's CASA. Sort this mess with Glen, there may be errors on both side but at least take ownership for your own errors, fix it, everyone has had enough, none more than Glen himself.

[Arm out the window]

They introduced something called guidance group, don't bother, they ignore your question and it take a ridiculous amount of time to get an answer anyway, little point at all. The guidance centre is to my mind a smokescreen. They can answer straightforward questions but as soon as you want to dig deeper to confirm or challenge the intent of a rule (if indeed that intent can be pinned down at all, given the shaky basis of some regs) they're stuffed. They then refer to the so-called subject matter experts for a particular area, who will then come back with a pseudo-'ruling' as if they have a direct phone line to some higher power. Even worse is if they refer to the legal team - those people can turn what might on the surface to be a common sense situation into a fight about the meaning of words without a clue or care about the operational impact of their responses, which take on an authority they shouldn't really possess.

I liken it to the Wizard of Oz, where there's this big impressive facade, but the self-styled wizard turns out to be a pathetic egotist who is all talk! I think most inspectors try to do their best but they're probably just as much at the mercy of the above-mentioned dysfunctional system as anyone else.

[glenb]

I submitted the complaint to the ICC of CASA providing false and misleading information.
Within 24 hours he had contacted me by phone.
The ICC will come to Melbourne to meet with me in August at a date to be confirmed.
About to take the whining dogs for a walk but intend to post later today with my written response to the ICC.

Cheers. Glen

[Sandy Reith]

Glen, glad to hear that you have a response. We hope for consciousness and decency on the part of the CASA leadership, including the Board.

[glenb]

Sending this at 9am tomorrow.Allegation of false and misleading information being provided to the Senate, and request for CASA to correct that false and misleading information.



31/07/22



Dear Ms. Pip Spence, CEO of CASA.

For clarity, this correspondence relates to false and misleading information being provided to the Senate.

It is not related to my allegations of CASA providing false and misleading information to the Ombudsman which is the subject of the CASA Industry Complaint Commissioner investigation, and an entirely separate matter.

I have included my Local MP for the Electorate of Chisholm, as I anticipate seeking her assistance on these matters. I have provided her office with a copy of my previous allegations of false and misleading information provided to the Ombudsman Investigation, and I have also included this correspondence on the separate matter of false and misleading information being provided to the Senate.

As you are aware CASA closed my two businesses and subsequently directed my Employer that my” continuing employment was no longer tenable based on comments that I was making publicly”. These are the matters are currently being investigated by the Commonwealth Ombudsman’s Office.

In this correspondence I refer to the allegation made by the CASA CEO at the time, Mr. Shane Carmody.

Mr Carmody made the allegation that I had “stalked and assaulted CASA staff”. An allegation made to the Senators in Senate on 20/11/20.

Allegations that I absolutely refute, in fact the first time I had any awareness that I had stalked, and assaulted CASA staff was when Mr. Carmody raised it on that day, in that forum with the protection of Parliamentary Privilege.

You may well choose to listen to the Presentation in its entirety if you have not previously had the opportunity.

· My presentation commencing from the 12:40:30 mark to 13:21:00

· Mr. Carmody, CASA CEO presentation commencing from the 13:21:00 to 14:03:00 mark.

There are some particular excerpts in those presentations that I would draw your attention to, that are particularly salient to this matter

13:26:35 Mr. Carmody states that allegations that he has misled the Ombudsman Office are “offensive.”

13:26:50, Mr. Carmody the CASA CEO at the time then makes a second statement asserting his integrity where he makes the following statement, “I object strongly and personally to allegations that I have misled the committee. I have not and I stand by my record”

Mr. Carmody has now advised the Committee that he has not mislead the Commonwealth Ombudsman’s Inquiry, and then reaffirmed his integrity by advising that he has also not misled the Senate Committee.

Then at the 13; 28:30 mark, less than two minutes later after Mr. Carmody has given those assurances, he continues on and does exactly what he said he doesn’t do.

He knowingly misleads the Senate Committee and very clearly states to the Senate Committee that I have “stalked and assaulted CASA employees”.

The recordings can be accessed here:

Rural & Regional Affairs & Transport - 20/11/2020 08:49:59 - Parliament of Australia (aph.gov.au) (https://parlview.aph.gov.au/mediaPlayer.php?videoID=524701&operation_mode=parlview)

Whilst wanting to keep this correspondence as professional as practical, it truly is like a scene from Yes Minister. The Head of a Government Department states that he would not mislead the Committee, and then proceeds to go ahead and do exactly that i.e. mislead the Committee.

I cannot possibly present this in any other way, other than to call it a blatant lie presented to the Senate for the purposes of damaging my reputation under the protection of Parliamentary Privilege.

I need to be very clear on this.

The first time that I ever became aware of this allegation that I had stalked and assaulted CASA staff was on that day before Senate when Mr. Carmody raised those allegations.

As you will appreciate both stalking and assault are some of the more serious criminal offences that can be committed, with potential prison sentences.

For complete clarity, I never stalked or assaulted any individual in my entire life whether they be a CASA employee or not. Never.

I totally reject those allegations of assaulting and stalking CASA staff.

The purpose of this correspondence.

I acknowledge that there has been a change of CASA CEO, and that these false and misleading statements were made by the previous CEO, before Senate and are in no way attributed to you.

Had I assaulted or stalked CASA employees, as you would be fully aware, there would be some sort of supporting evidence by way of:

· CASA would have filed a police report.

· CASA would have supporting internal communications on the matter.

· The police would have most likely contacted me for a statement with a view to laying charges.

· CASA would have OHS documentation supporting those allegations.

· Witness statements, security surveillance.

· Some medical record of the person assaulted (assuming it was physical)

· Some correspondence on this matter from CASA advising me that I had assaulted and stalked CASA employees.

CASA has none of this supporting evidence, and I know that to be the case because I made a Freedom of Information request for any supporting information that CASA held. CASA was unable to provide anything at all in support of either the allegation of stalking or assault. I was not surprised by that outcome, because I knew it to be a false and misleading statement made to the Senate immediately Mr. Carmody made that statement.

That is not to say that I am not animated and passionate at times, and I do recall one occasion many years ago when I hit my fist on a desk harder than intended to the surprise of attendees, one of them a CASA employee.

This is something entirely different. This is an allegation that I stalked and assaulted CASA employees. These are serious criminal matters with potential terms of imprisonment.

Ms Spence, please understand that I am not seeking any compensation or claim about that false and misleading statement, and you have my word on that, and in writing.

I am simply asking that if you, in your role as the CASA CEO are aware that CASA has provided false and misleading information, it is incumbent upon you to publicly correct those false and misleading statements.

My expectation is that CASA will release a short statement to acknowledge the false and misleading nature of CASAs previous false assertion to the Senate, and very clearly identify that no CASA employee has ever been assaulted or stalked by Glen Buckley. Ever.

If CASA are not prepared to act truthfully on this matter, and CASA maintain that I stalked and assaulted CASA employees, I ask only that CASA advise me of the date. At this stage I have no requirement for any other information other than the dates of either the stalking or assault. Obviously, such serious offences would have occurred on a particular date or a number of different dates.

I have no intention to get into a discussion at this stage as to which offence occurred on what day, and to the nature or the severity of the offence. I can appreciate that CASA may be reluctant to go into that level of detail at this stage. I reiterate, I am only asking that CASA nominate the date/s of the alleged offences.

It does seem entirely reasonable that the person that the allegations were made against is at least made aware of the date that the alleged stalking and/or assaults of CASA employees occurred.

Thankyou for considering my request, and I look forward to your response against this matter only, and whether CASA is prepared to correct this wrong, or if it is a matter I need to seek assistance from my new Labor MP for Chisholm, Ms Carina Garland.

Yours respectfully



Glen Buckley

[Arm out the window]

Hi Glen, good to see you're making some progress. Not sure if it's relevant, but there's a few small typos in the above that you may want to fix to ensure they can't come back at you with allegations of incorrect statements or whatever:

- As you are aware CASA closed my two business businesses
- There are some particular excepts excerpts in those presentations that I would draw your attention to,
- 13:26:35 where Mr Carmody states that allegations that he has mislead misled the Ombudsman Office ... (a couple of other times after that where 'mislead' is used instead of 'misled', referring to the past tense of 'mislead').

Good luck.

[glenb]

AOTW, thanks for the pickups, cheers.The correspondence above has been sent, and the response will most likely be predictable, but at least its on record. Increasingly, i intend to involve Ms. Pip Spence in this to ensure that she is fully aware of all facts. After all, she is the accountable person.

[glenb]

01/08/22



Dear Mr Hanton,



Thank you for acknowledging receipt of my complaint of CASA providing false and misleading information to the Ombudsman’s office, and for the follow up telephone call. I appreciate your gesture that you will travel to Melbourne in August to discuss the complaints in further detail.



I would like to put a proposal to you.



We have a new Local MP in the electorate of Chisholm. Ms Garland maintains an office in my local electorate, which is slightly over 30 minutes from Melbourne Airport, and obviously an Office in Canberra. I have had the opportunity to meet briefly with Ms Garland on this matter, and she advised that she would be prepared to assist me on this matter, and she has had a discussion with Senator Glen Sterle on my matter.



At our meeting, am I permitted to bring a “support person” along, and could the support person that I nominate be my local Member, Ms Carina Garland? At this stage, I have not approached her with the request, but will do so shortly.



If Ms Garland is able to support me on this matter, I would ask that her office liaises directly with you to allocate a suitable day and time, at either her Canberra or Melbourne Office, as suits both you and her.



I could easily make myself available on any day at any location that you both decide most appropriate.



Thank you for your consideration,



Respectfully, Glen Buckley

[glenb]

Within three hours of sending that correspondence i received this response. I note the promptness of the response suggests good intent, and supports the integrity of the office. Anyway, here it is. I suggest that things are going to get a bit more political going forward, because I will wait as long as is required to have Ms Garland as my support person, even if extends the time lines.

I will hold of my response for 48 hours. im open to suggestions either on here or my email [email protected]

Hi Glen



Thanks for your email.



In response to your question and proposal, I can confirm that you are welcome to invite a support person. This can be whoever you would like to attend.



Reviewing your complaints, ahead of our meeting it would be helpful if you could provide the outcomes or conclusions of the Ombudsman reviews you say were informed by incorrect information provided by CASA.



Thanks



Jonathan

[aroa]

ICC Hanson, J has integrity and decency. You won’t get either of those out of Carmody and Aleck.
What they really are is unprintable here.
May your meeting go well.
And you. Cheers.

[glenb]

03/08/22

Dear Ms Carina Garland, MP for the Electorate of Chisholm.

My name is Glen Buckley, a 57-year resident of the Electorate.

You will have some familiarity with my matter, as we had the opportunity to meet briefly at Glen Waverley in the lead up to the election, and I was able to give you a brief overview of my situation. I was the person impacted by the decision of a single CASA employee that my business of more than a decade had now become “unlawful” and was forced into closure by that single CASA employee.

You may also be aware that I distributed almost 15,000 copies of this leaflet throughout the election by way of letterbox drops, distribution at railway stations, and attendance at polling stations on election day. Having been very active in the local community for over 50 years, I was able to gain overwhelming support from my fellow residents. The leaflet that I distributed can be accessed here and does provide a brief overview of the matter.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/kx11cmk1i3vfng3/Liu.docx?dl=0

On 11th November 2020 I also sent you an email the contents of that email can be accessed at Post # 1821 Glen Buckley and Australian small business -V- CASA - Page 92 - PPRuNe Forums (https://www.pprune.org/pacific-general-aviation-questions/620219-glen-buckley-australian-small-business-v-casa-92.html) This forum has had over 1,000,000 views and thousands of comments. It is a good source of information of this entire matter.

I have attached two pieces of correspondence. They are:


A complaint to the CASA CEO calling on her to retract clearly false allegations made by her predecessor before the Senate. That was an allegation that I had stalked and assaulted CASA employees, at some point after CASA closed my business. I absolutely refute those allegations. I believe they were made to harm my credibility and reputation. That correspondence can be found at Posts #2256 on page 113 Glen Buckley and Australian small business -V- CASA - Page 113 - PPRuNe Forums (https://www.pprune.org/pacific-general-aviation-questions/620219-glen-buckley-australian-small-business-v-casa-113.html)




The second complaint is to the CASA Industry Complaints Commissioner of CASA deliberately providing false and misleading information to the Commonwealth Ombudsman investigation. Into this matter. Similarly, that complaint can be accessed at the same forum via the following link on pages 112 and 113 Posts # 2235 through #2241

A third compliant will soon be submitted to the CASA Industry Complaints Commissioner, as follow up to my allegations made against CASA Executive Manager of Legal, International and Regulatory Affairs, Mr Jonathan Aleck. Mr Aleck is CASAs second most senior and longest serving Executive Manager.

Please be assured that CASA never put forward and supporting safety case, there were no regulatory breaches, there were no allegations against any quality outcomes at all. Mr Aleck just decided that my business was now unlawful. The Ombudsman’s Office later found it was not.

To the point of this correspondence.

The CASA Industry Complaints Commissioner has offered to meet with me in Melbourne or Canberra to discuss my allegations.

I have requested if I am able to bring a support person along, and if that person could in fact be my Local MP. The CASA Industry Complaints Commissioner promptly advised me that he would be comfortable with that, and that gesture speaks to this individuals integrity.

For that reason, may I respectfully make a request of you as my Local MP, to assist and support my family. Could I formally request that you participate in that meeting as my “support” person with the CASA Industry Complaints Commissioner, Mr Jonathan Hanton.

Mr Hanton has advised that he can meet at either your Melbourne or Canberra offices, whichever is most convenient for you.

I appreciate that your workload will perhaps only provide you with limited opportunities. I suggest the most efficient process, assuming you grant my request, would be that you liaise directly with Mr Jonathan Hanton by email, or phone and between your office and his, you agree on a suitable date and venue, and lock that date and venue in.

I can make myself fully available on any day, at any location with 7 days prior notification. I only need to be advised of those details, and I will make it happen.

Mr Hanton can be contacted on

[email protected] or phone 02-62171249

Ms Garland, I can make myself available prior to that date to meet with you or a nominee from your office, if you feel it would be of benefit.

I anticipate it would take me two hours to fully brief someone on this matter. I can meet with you, or your nominee at either your Canberra or Melbourne offices on any day that you nominate, provided I have 7 days notification.

If you provide me the opportunity to meet with you, may I respectfully suggest that you make a request of CASA prior. If the CASA CEO Ms Pip Spence could provide you with a short one- or two-page summary of the matter from Ms Spences perspective, and if CASA could also explain why the entire matter could not be satisfactorily resolved with a well-intentioned 4-hour meeting, rather than closing the businesses down.

I feel CASA has pursued what I call an alternating narrative, so if we could commence that discussion around CASAs explanation from the CEO, I feel that will help bring some clarity to the matter, and make our meeting more poroductive.

Ms Garland, on behalf of my family who has been significantly impacted by the conduct, actions, and decisions of Mr Aleck. I am someone who has lost my home, my two businesses, been forced out of the industry and left bankrupted and destitute. My wife and I seriously face homelessness because of this entire saga. Our total liquid assets and life savings amount to less than $6,000. There is almost no superannuation, that was tied up in my small business that Mr Aleck shut down. To say that I am anxious about the future of my wife, and I would be an understatement. I have endured a nervous breakdown because of this, two years ago I was on the cusp of suicide. I battle with depression every hour of my waking life, and I am exhausted by it. I recently had hospitalisation and 6 weeks off work due to a heart related condition, that I directly contribute to this matter.

Other businesses dependant on me were forced into closure, staff lost employment and entitlements, Suppliers have been impacted, as have customers.

The coverup of this matter that extends to the highest levels of CASA and to within the office of the Deputy PMs office of the previous Government, needs to be exposed, and with an introduction by a Labor government of an Integrity Commission, I believe that the more you learn about this matter, the more you will realise this matter deserves consideration for investigation by such a body.

While I make no assumptions on Senator Glenn Sterle’s character assessment of Mr Aleck, I would suggest you contact him, and I have included him in this email. Senator Sterle has had extensive dealings with Mr Aleck via Senate Committee, Inquiries etc. and would be a reliable and trustworthy source of information.

Thankyou sincerely in anticipation of your assistance.

Respectfully, Glen Buckley

[Sandy Reith]

With respect, and wholeheartedly supporting Glen and others wishing to pursue justice, fair dealing and commonsense from any Commonwealth or other government instrumentality, calling for some new type of ICAC or some such commission will only encourage yet more CASA type independent bodies that will become law unto themselves and for themselves.

The only way forward is through your MPs and the courts. We must expect our MPs to take responsibility. We vote them in and out. Glen’s involvement in the ousting of his former MP Gladys Liu is a great example of our democracy at work. Hopefully Glen’s new MP will take Glen’s case on and come to realise that by fixing one glaring wrongful deed by CASA this will provide an excellent example to the whole of the Commonwealth Public Sector, even that we might one day call it again the Public Service.

Then we have a legal system, the A-Gs Department and courts. We need to build on what has taken centuries to develop, however imperfect but heading off at a tangent with ill defined new and expensive taxpayer funded Commonwealth ‘justice’ bodies will create more problems. We spend $40 million pa on the Commonwealth Ombudsman who is supposed to do exactly what Glen deserves. What value there? Put that money into making the courts available and into MPs offices precisely to assist people up against bureaucratic intransigence.

[Paragraph377]

With respect, and wholeheartedly supporting Glen and others wishing to pursue justice, fair dealing and commonsense from any Commonwealth or other government instrumentality, calling for some new type of ICAC or some such commission will only encourage yet more CASA type independent bodies that will become law unto themselves and for themselves.

The only way forward is through your MPs and the courts. We must expect our MPs to take responsibility. We vote them in and out. Glen’s involvement in the ousting of his former MP Gladys Liu is a great example of our democracy at work. Hopefully Glen’s new MP will take Glen’s case on and come to realise that by fixing one glaring wrongful deed by CASA this will provide an excellent example to the whole of the Commonwealth Public Sector, even that we might one day call it again the Public Service.

Then we have a legal system, the A-Gs Department and courts. We need to build on what has taken centuries to develop, however imperfect but heading off at a tangent with ill defined new and expensive taxpayer funded Commonwealth ‘justice’ bodies will create more problems. We spend $40 million pa on the Commonwealth Ombudsman who is supposed to do exactly what Glen deserves. What value there? Put that money into making the courts available and into MPs offices precisely to assist people up against bureaucratic intransigence.

All the above is possible only in fantasia, a magical place in which dreams apparently come true. Sorry Sandy, I appreciate your ‘glass half full’ approach, but we are living in a ‘glass half empty’ environment. We require three things to take place to resolve the CASA issue, and there are not enough Independents or Teale’s to do it;
1. Disband CASA and rebuild it;
2. Rewrite the Act.
3. Adopt and implement the NZ regulatory suite.

CASA as a regulatory body is a disgrace. Where else could one little old man throw consecutive CEO’s under the bus so publicly, and where else could such a mishmash of poor C-suit executives work together to personally thwart and destroy any attempt at reform. These muppets can’t manage themselves, let alone contribute towards such a complex industry as aviation.

[Sandy Reith]

Para, thanks for your suggestions to fix CASA, real reforms for which I and others have been espousing for years.

But where’s the “fantasia” about our legal system? Nowhere have I made claim that we will achieve justice or political reforms because our system is ideal but few would disagree that our British system is as good or close to the best there is.

Point to me how do we get to your nirvana and why hasn’t the Ombudsman called out CASA? Perhaps because the notion of a quick and simplistic ‘umpire’ fix to complex legal and political problems was never going to succeed, just as Henry Bolte predicted. The reverse being true as time and money is diverted into wasteful dead ends like the Ombudsman who has no real power.

[Lead Balloon]

What needs first to be done is actually slowly happening: The percentage vote for the major parties is diminishing, with the current government having been elected on its worst primary vote ever. A couple of coronaries or defections and the House of Reps becomes interesting.

Giving the major parties and their camp followers alternating turns at pillaging the common wealth, having fine-tuned the senior bureaucracy to assist it to happen or sit mute and watch while it happens, is not in the national interest. (It is of course happening in the States, too, which are, after all, the breeding grounds for the major party 'talent' that 'rises' to Federal level.)

While ever we keep giving the major parties turns at pillaging the common wealth, they are not really 'accountable'. Sooner or later, a 'sacked' government and its camp followers come back or are taken care of, very nicely thank you very much, by a subsequent government of the same flavour. Corruption investigation bodies have demonstrably brought some of these people to account at a State level. So I say: bring it on at the Federal level. The more of these people having party meetings in gaol and the more people who truly represent the interests of their constituents in Parliament the better it will be for the common wealth, including for the health of general aviation.

[glenb]

Criminal Record History request- Victoria Police

To the relevant person,

My name is Glen Buckley of XXXX XXXXXXXXX Street Mount Waverley 3149, DOB 10/06/1965.

On 20/11/20, the Civil Aviation Safety Authority (CASA) CEO, Mr Shane Carmody made an allegation before a Senate Committee that I had stalked and assaulted CASA employees.

I absolutely refute that as a false allegation made before the Senators in Parliament to damage my reputation, although that is not the point of this correspondence.

The very first time I became aware of these allegations was when I was watching his presentation with my wife and family.

It is personally very important for me and my family that I refute these allegations. I have approached CASA previously, and CASA refuses to correct those false statements.

I have undergone a comprehensive police check as a requirement of my current employment and have a copy of my criminal record check.

Nothing is recorded on it, although it would not be expected to contain any allegations, which is what I am seeking

My question is;

Is it possible to request a report that states that no allegations of assault or stalking have ever been raised with Victoria Police by anyone, or words similar to that? The point being that I am not simply after a report of guilty offences, but also a report that includes any allegations being raised. I appreciate that this report would have a fee associated with it.

For your information, and if relevant the visual recording of those allegations by the CASA CEO can be found via the following link at the 13:28:30 mark

Rural & Regional Affairs & Transport - 20/11/2020 08:49:59 - Parliament of Australia (aph.gov.au) (https://parlview.aph.gov.au/mediaPlayer.php?videoID=524701&operation_mode=parlview)

Yours thankfully, Glen Buckley

[SRFred]

You should be able to seek any available information via a FOI request. You might also need to do the same with the AFP just in case.

[glenb]

Hi, I already made that and CASA could provide nothing at all to support Mr Carmodys comments. The fact that CASA could produce nothing, suggests to me that Mr Carmody was providing false and misleading information to the Senate. Surprise Surprise, we have all seen it.

This is merely a further step to highlight the level of deception and corruption, and force the new CASA CEO to show ;leadership.. I want to be able to absolutely refute Mr Carmodys allegations, and defend my reputation.

[Squawk7700]

I’ve been waiting for this to come up as it appeared to be a very loose and potentially damaging end that needs tying off.

I would expect that they will not be able to give you any information because it probably doesn’t exist, especially under the assumption that you were never interviewed by police regarding the allegation(s).

If you went to a local station to report an assault, the officer that took your enquiry would put it in their notebook, consult with a sergeant and discuss if they think that charges should be laid and a brief of evidence prepared. If a decision is made to not go ahead, it would end there. Have a think about how often this must happen with people dropping in about a tiff or punch at the local pub and nothing comes of it.

Another scenario is that Police were called and the call recorded on 000, meaning that there may be a record of the call, or there would definitely be a job put through which would be also recorded if police actually attended, even if nothing happened afterwards. The issue here being that your name may not even be linked to the call.

The big question here to be answered is…. Is it still assault and stalking if you haven’t been charged or the offence investigated?

Technically, the answer is yes. I can assault someone all day long and stalk them, however if the victim doesn’t make a complaint, no action will be taken and hence nothing recorded.

If there are no records logged, then the allegation becomes one of a civil nature and something to be refuted in court, along with witness testimonies. Of course any judge is going to ask why the alleged assault was not reported to Police and it will hold little to zero weight. In fact the director would be negligent in their job role to not report an assault under their obligations to provide a safe working environment for their reports.

In summary, it sounds like a dirty swipe that’s easy to allege and have potentially damaging impacts in the eyes of the public, but not illegal. Something for your legal team to use to discredit the witness.

[Lead Balloon]

If a member of CASA staff alleged they were assaulted or stalked in the course of their duties and the CASA CEO was aware of the allegations, there would at least be internal correspondence and records about the allegations, even if only for WHS purposes. Public sector employees have a habit of making large compensation claims for far less serious things.

If it happened, why would the victims have any interest in not doing anything about it and how did the CEO find out?

And any CEO of a Commonwealth statutory authority with even a malfunctioning 'cover my arse' gene would refer the allegations, in writing, to police (probably the AFP in this case).

So if there are no records in CASA relating to any of the assaults or stalking of CASA personnel alleged by Carmody against Glen, I call bull**** on the allegations.

[SRFred]

Hi, I already made that and CASA could provide nothing at all to support Mr Carmodys comments. .

Sorry, I was suggesting a FOI to the Police not CASA.

[Sandy Reith]

If a member of CASA staff alleged they were assaulted or stalked in the course of their duties and the CASA CEO was aware of the allegations, there would at least be internal correspondence and records about the allegations, even if only for WHS purposes. Public sector employees have a habit of making large compensation claims for far less serious things.

If it happened, why would the victims have any interest in not doing anything about it and how did the CEO find out?

And any CEO of a Commonwealth statutory authority with even a malfunctioning 'cover my arse' gene would refer the allegations, in writing, to police (probably the AFP in this case).

So if there are no records in CASA relating to any of the assaults or stalking of CASA personnel alleged by Carmody against Glen, I call bull**** on the allegations.

Well said couldn’t agree more.

This one example should stand as an exemplary showing of the past CASA modus operandi, stooping to lies and deceit to damage anyone who stands up to them.

[Paragraph377]

Hi, I already made that and CASA could provide nothing at all to support Mr Carmodys comments. The fact that CASA could produce nothing, suggests to me that Mr Carmody was providing false and misleading information to the Senate. Surprise Surprise, we have all seen it.

This is merely a further step to highlight the level of deception and corruption, and force the new CASA CEO to show ;leadership.. I want to be able to absolutely refute Mr Carmody's allegations, and defend my reputation.
And as a reward for Mr Carmody's ‘performance’ he received a nice fat retirement superannuation package in the millions, plus an AOM. Woohoo! What a champion he is.

[aroa]

Via la revolucion .! Bring it on.!
Bureaurats in the trough are destroying the country and its citizens.
Too many. Too highly paid. Accountable to none. Its a crock of...
Disgusting

[glenb]

My assumption is that the alleged stalking and assault must have happened after October 2018 when CASA advised that my business was now unalwful.

Had I have assaulted or stalked any CASA employee, they would have buried me even more than they did. I have no doubt that had this really occurred then CASA would have pursued me relentlessly.

[Squawk7700]

My assumption is that the alleged stalking and assault must have happened after October 2018 when CASA advised that my business was now unalwful.

Had I have assaulted or stalked any CASA employee, they would have buried me even more than they did. I have no doubt that had this really occurred then CASA would have pursued me relentlessly.

Perhaps if you got heated on the phone, made even a minor verbal threat, legitimate or not, visited their offices wanting to see someone, possibly more than once, called over and over trying to speak to certain people, asked for certain employees whereabouts, looked them up on LinkedIn, Facebook or otherwise…. Very very loosely, someone could refer to that in passing conversation as assault (verbal) and stalking.

Those behaviours are human nature in these types of situations, but it’s a long bow to draw to call them assault and stalking!

Aka, “I stalked that girl on linkedin to see where she worked as I wanted to ask her out.”

[mcoates]

It is easy to understand how the guy from CASA is so unliked. You only have to listen to 5 minutes of the video, hear him over-talking the senator and the general tone and demeanour that he presents and it is very easy to make an opinion of him yourself.

[Lead Balloon]

Perhaps if you got heated on the phone, made even a minor verbal threat, legitimate or not, visited their offices wanting to see someone, possibly more than once, called over and over trying to speak to certain people, asked for certain employees whereabouts, looked them up on LinkedIn, Facebook or otherwise…. Very very loosely, someone could refer to that in passing conversation as assault (verbal) and stalking.

Those behaviours are human nature in these types of situations, but it’s a long bow to draw to call them assault and stalking!

Aka, “I stalked that girl on linkedin to see where she worked as I wanted to ask her out.”Whatever the theoretical circumstances - 'long bow' or not, 'very loose' or not - 'something' must surely have been construed as constituting assault and stalking of Carmody's staff. But if there is no record at all in CASA of any circumstance that has been construed by a staff member as assault or stalking by Glen, I have great difficulty in concluding anything other than that Carmody just made it up.

[Paragraph377]

It is painfully and blatantly obvious that Carmody was telling a porkie. Sure, maybe one of his CASArites told him they fealt threatened by or thought they saw the ghost of Glen following them down a dark alley, but let’s be honest, it’s all bull****. It was a lie told while under privilege. If it were true, CASA would have reported it to the AFP (not the local cop shop). The AFP would have investigated the allegation and then reported back to Carmody at some stage. Carmody threw out a distraction to steer observing eyes away from CASA’s malfeasance. In other words he threw a handful of mud at Glen hoping some would stick. It was a despicable and low act, but not an act that is unusual when it comes to CASA.

It’s becoming more obvious monthly that Spence has been brought in to clean up the mess as numerous heads have already rolled. Whether she goes as far as compensating Glen is an entirely seperate matter.

[Arm out the window]

It’s becoming more obvious monthly that Spence has been brought in to clean up the mess as numerous heads have already rolled.

What's going to be less easy to do is shift the architects of the woeful and byzantine new regs out of their entrenched positions, though at least some action is better than none.

[glenb]

They were very specific allegations of stalking and assaulting.

Stalking and AssaultStalking Offences (Vic)Stalking is a serious offence in Victoria, which can attract significant periods of imprisonment. A person commits stalking if they engage in a couse of conduct intended to cause a victim harm or to put the victim in fear for their safety or the safety of someone else.

The stalking provision in the Crimes Act was amended in 2003 to encompass cyberstalking and to remove the requirement that the victim actually suffered harm. The offence was further amended in 2011 to cover threats and abusive conduct and to extend to acts intended to cause psychological harm.
Section 21ASection 21A of the Crimes Act 1958 (http://classic.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/vic/consol_act/ca195882/) makes it an offence to stalk a person. This is punishable by a maximum of 10 years imprisonment.

Stalking is defined as a course of conduct that includes doing any of the following with the intention of causing physical or mental harm to the victim, including self-harm or apprehension of fear for their safety:


Contacting the victim or another person;
Publishing material relating to the victim or another person;
Causing an unauthorised computer function;
Tracing the victim’s or another person’s use of the internet, email or other electronic communications;
Entering or loitering outside a place of residence or business frequented by the victim;
Interfering with property;
Making threats to the victim;
Using abusive or threatening words to or in front of the victim;
Performing abusive or offensive acts in the presence of the victim;
Directing abusive or offensive acts at the victim;
Giving offensive material to the victim;
Keeping the victim or another person under surveillance;
Acting in any other way that could reasonably cause harm to or arouse fear in the victim.

The provision does not apply to conduct engaged in for the purpose of enforcing the law, executing a warrant or protecting public revenue.
What must be proved?For a person to be found guilty (https://www.gotocourt.com.au/criminal-law/beyond-a-reasonable-doubt/) of stalking, three things must be proved.
1. The accused engaged in a course of conductA course of conduct is a pattern of behaviour that shows a continuity of purpose towards the victim. In order for there to be a continuity of purpose, the acts must have been premeditated.

The acts must have been committed on more than one occasion, or to have been protracted in nature. A course of conduct may be spread out over a period of years.
2. The course of conduct included conduct of the type described aboveThe course of conduct must have included at least one of the types of conduct described in Section 21A. The acts need not have been individually unlawful. It is the course of conduct and specific intent that amounts to a criminal offence.
3. The accused did the acts intentionallyThe accused must be proved to have had the intention to cause physical or mental harm to the victim, or to arouse fear in the victim for their own safety or the safety of another. Mental harm includes psychological harm and suicidal thought.

This element may be satisfied by proving that the victim:


Actually intended to cause such harm;
Knew that their actions were likely to cause such harm;
Should have known that their actions would be likely to cause such harm.

Where the accused was intoxicated and did not have the requisite intention, they may still be found guilty on the basis that they ought to have known their actions would be likely to cause harm.
DefenceIt is a defence to a charge (https://www.gotocourt.com.au/criminal-law/vic/defences/) of stalking if the course of conduct was engaged in without malice for one of the following purposes:


In the normal course of business, trade, profession or enterprise;
For the purpose of an industrial dispute;
For the purpose of engaging in political activities or communicating about public affairs.

The accused bears the burden of proof in establishing that they acted without malice.

If you require legal advice or representation in a criminal law matter or in any other legal matter, please contact Go To Court Lawyers. (https://www.gotocourt.com.au/contact-us/)




Regarding the allegation of assault, i am assuming that it is an allegation of unlawful assault, being the lowest. Had it of been one of the more serious assaults, it is more likely that I would have been aware of it. It may be that the allegation is one of the more serious levels, but for this post, I am assuming it is only unlawful assault.
UNLAWFUL ASSAULTIn Victoria, the maximum penalty for unlawful assault (which may also be referred to as ‘common assault’) is a fine of 15 penalty units (https://melbourne.armstronglegal.com.au/criminal-law/penalties/#penalty-units) or three months imprisonment. This offence is considered the least serious of the assault offences. Generally, individuals are charged with unlawful assault when a person assaults another person without causing injury.

Unlawful assaults can be complicated if there are aggravating factors. It is important to get legal advice at an early stage to ascertain precisely what the consequences of a conviction may be and whether you have a defence to the charge.
The Offence Of Unlawful AssaultThe offence of unlawful assault is contained in section 23 of the Summary Offences Act 1966 which states:
Any person who unlawfully assaults or beats another person shall be guilty of an offence.
What Actions Might Constitute Unlawful Assault?Whilst the slightest touch might constitute unlawful assault, usually police would not charge a person with unlawful assault unless there is a significant degree of force applied or there is evidence that threats of violence were made.

An unlawful assault may consit of:


Punching, hitting or kicking another person without causing bodily harm;
Spitting upon another person;
Threatening to hurt another person.

What The Police Must ProveTo convict a person of unlawful assault, the prosecution must prove each of the following elements beyond a reasonable doubt: (https://www.armstronglegal.com.au/criminal-law/evidence/what-does-beyond-a-reasonable-doubt-mean/)


They struck/touched/applied force to another person, or threatened another with immediate violence;
They did so intentionally or recklessly;
The actions were not consented to by the victim;
There is no other lawful justification or excuse.

Possible Defences For The Charge Of Unlawful AssaultPossible defences to a charge of unlawful assault include but are not limited to:


The accused has a lawful justification or excuse;
The accused acted in self-defence or in defence of another (https://www.armstronglegal.com.au/criminal-law/nsw/defences/defence-of-self-defence/)
The complainant consented to the assault
The assault was not intentional or foreseeable.

Which Court Will Hear Your Matter?Unlawful assault is a summary offence and will be heard at the Magistrates’ Court.

[glenb]

Not necessarily worth backtracking but in post 2262 i had a draft copy of correspondence for Ms. Carina Garland. I applied some very minor changes only and have now sent it. That final copy now sits at post 2262.
I eagerly await her response.

[AerialPerspective]

And as a reward for Mr Carmody's ‘performance’ he received a nice fat retirement superannuation package in the millions, plus an AOM. Woohoo! What a champion he is.
The OAM and the AM are now pretty much a sick joke.
Let's face it, when a certain ex QF exec gets one for leading the competitor airline to the point of bankruptcy, shortly after he left, what in the name of Ch--st about that deserves a naitonal 'award'??

[AerialPerspective]

Whatever the theoretical circumstances - 'long bow' or not, 'very loose' or not - 'something' must surely have been construed as constituting assault and stalking of Carmody's staff. But if there is no record at all in CASA of any circumstance that has been construed by a staff member as assault or stalking by Glen, I have great difficulty in concluding anything other than that Carmody just made it up.

If that's true LB, isn't that an offence?? Making a vexatious claim about someone without proof or evidence??
The fact it was done under the umbrella of Parliamentary Privilege is just gutless, if true.
I'm not holding my breath but I believe that the Senate or the House can waive privilege if they collectively believe the statement(s) don't fit with the purpose of it.

[A30_737_AEWC]

The OAM and the AM are now pretty much a sick joke.
Let's face it, when a certain ex QF exec gets one for leading the competitor airline to the point of bankruptcy, shortly after he left, what in the name of Ch--st about that deserves a naitonal 'award'??

For those who are not aware, ANYONE can nominate a person for an civilian honour or award under Australia's system of honours/awards.

I know of a cavalcade of senior military officers (who I've worked around or have direct knowledge of their work roles/activities) and their many non-combat/non-military action related honours/awards are based on individuals who basically turn up for work. How you can get a CSC for working in the procurement/sustainment arm of Defence is beyond a joke IMO. It's basically a mutual admiration society of the more senior retired officers nominating the up-and-coming seniors following in their foot steps.

There are many civilians working in many sectors of business and society whose 'herculean efforts' in public service and advocacy go unrecognised and unrewarded.

If any of you know anyone whose professional or volunteer activities warrant appropriate recognition in this way, please take it upon yourself to do the groundwork and submit a nomination for them. I'm considering doing this for 2 selfless individuals I am aware of.

https://www.gg.gov.au/australian-honours-and-awards/nominate-someone-award

[megan]

Anyone with the necessary word smithing skills able to make a persuasive argument to Four Corners for them to examine Glen's travesty of justice?

[Lead Balloon]

If that's true LB, isn't that an offence?? Making a vexatious claim about someone without proof or evidence??
The fact it was done under the umbrella of Parliamentary Privilege is just gutless, if true.
I'm not holding my breath but I believe that the Senate or the House can waive privilege if they collectively believe the statement(s) don't fit with the purpose of it.
In principle, the giving to a Senate Committee of any evidence that a witness knows to be false or misleading is a contempt (see Senate resolution 6 (https://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Chamber_documents/Senate_chamber_documents/standingorders/c00/c06)(12)).Offences by witnesses etc.

A witness before the Senate or a committee shall not:

(a) ..;

(b) ...; or

(c) give any evidence which the witness knows to be false or misleading in a material particular, or which the witness does not believe on reasonable grounds to be true or substantially true in every material particular.

But I can't recall any official being held in contempt of the Senate. It's not in the Laborials' interests to do so.

There are also some protections (https://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Chamber_documents/Senate_chamber_documents/standingorders/c00/c05) for people who get dumped on in the circumstances Carmody dumped on Glen:(1) Where a person who has been referred to by name, or in such a way as to be readily identified, in the Senate, makes a submission in writing to the President:

(a) claiming that the person has been adversely affected in reputation or in respect of dealings or associations with others, or injured in occupation, trade, office or financial credit, or that the person's privacy has been unreasonably invaded, by reason of that reference to the person; and

(b) requesting that the person be able to incorporate an appropriate response in the parliamentary record,

if the President is satisfied:

(c) that the subject of the submission is not so obviously trivial or the submission so frivolous, vexatious or offensive in character as to make it inappropriate that it be considered by the Committee of Privileges; and

(d) that it is practicable for the Committee of Privileges to consider the submission under this resolution,

the President shall refer the submission to that committee.

(2) The committee may decide not to consider a submission referred to it under this resolution if the committee considers that the subject of the submission is not sufficiently serious or the submission is frivolous, vexatious or offensive in character, and such a decision shall be reported to the Senate.

(3) If the committee decides to consider a submission under this resolution, the committee may confer with the person who made the submission and any senator who referred in the Senate to that person.

(4) In considering a submission under this resolution, the committee shall meet in private session.

(5) The committee shall not publish a submission referred to it under this resolution or its proceedings in relation to such a submission, but may present minutes of its proceedings and all or part of such submission to the Senate.
In considering a submission under this resolution and reporting to the Senate the committee shall not consider or judge the truth of any statements made in the Senate or of the submission.

(6) In its report to the Senate on a submission under this resolution, the committee may make either of the following recommendations:

(a) that no further action be taken by the Senate or by the committee in relation to the submission; or

(b) that a response by the person who made the submission, in terms specified in the report and agreed to by the person and the committee, be published by the Senate or incorporated in Hansard,

and shall not make any other recommendations.

A document presented to the Senate under paragraph (5) or (7):

(a) in the case of a response by a person who made a submission, shall be succinct and strictly relevant to the questions in issue and shall not contain anything offensive in character; and

(b) shall not contain any matter the publication of which would have the effect of:

(i) unreasonably adversely affecting or injuring a person, or unreasonably invading a person's privacy, in the manner referred to in paragraph (1); or

(ii) unreasonably adding to or aggravating any such adverse effect, injury or invasion of privacy suffered by a person.If I were Glen, I would be writing to the President of the Senate (but that's a matter for him and, for all I know, he may already have).

- Referred to by name - tick

- Adversely affected in reputation - I reckon public allegations that a person has assaulted and stalked public officials have adverse affects on the person's reputation (though perhaps there's an argument that nobody ever took Carmody seriously about anything).

- It would be a very big call to find that a submission to the President, to the effect that allegations of assault and stalking made by a Senate Committee witness against a named person are false, are "so obviously trivial or the submission so frivolous, vexatious or offensive in character as to make it inappropriate that it be considered by the Committee of Privileges".

- A statement by the Senate or incorporated in Hansard as to the Senate's position on the matter would go some (small) way to vindication.

But always remember: There's a reason it's called 'Cowards' Castle'.

[AerialPerspective]

For those who are not aware, ANYONE can nominate a person for an civilian honour or award under Australia's system of honours/awards.

I know of a cavalcade of senior military officers (who I've worked around or have direct knowledge of their work roles/activities) and their many non-combat/non-military action related honours/awards are based on individuals who basically turn up for work. How you can get a CSC for working in the procurement/sustainment arm of Defence is beyond a joke IMO. It's basically a mutual admiration society of the more senior retired officers nominating the up-and-coming seniors following in their foot steps.

There are many civilians working in many sectors of business and society whose 'herculean efforts' in public service and advocacy go unrecognised and unrewarded.

If any of you know anyone whose professional or volunteer activities warrant appropriate recognition in this way, please take it upon yourself to do the groundwork and submit a nomination for them. I'm considering doing this for 2 selfless individuals I am aware of.

https://www.gg.gov.au/australian-honours-and-awards/nominate-someone-award

That's good to know but still begs the question how the hell a bloke who took over a profitable airline then ran it into the ground to the point it went into Administration got nominated and by whom.......

[glenb]

11/08/22

Ombudsman Reference 2019-713834.

Dear Catherine

Thankyou for your time on the phone yesterday (10/08/22).

I think the approach of breaking the matter down into the three topics will assist in handling what is obviously a technically challenging matter.


The direction that my continuing employment was untenable.
The closure of MFT, my flying school of more than a decade.
The closure of APTA,

Today we covered topics one and two only and will talk again regarding topic three.

On topic one, I believe I have communicated the following.

The Head of Operations position requires a formal application to CASA, a CASA assessment and interview, and a CASA approval. Without that CASA approval, an individual is not able to operate in the role of Head of Operations. The position is dependent on that continuing CASA approval. If CASA deem the holder not to be a fit and proper person, CASA has procedures in their Enforcement Manual accessed via this link https://www.dropbox.com/s/e4g6j45mpviqont/CASA%20Enforcement%20Manual.pdf?dl=0

The manual in its entirety is a pertinent read, but I draw your attention to pages 6-33 in particular. It outlines the position of the Chief Pilot. That was the terminology prior to the legislative changes. That role is now the Head of Operations (HOO), being one of the three legislated positions in the legislation. Further details of that role can be accessed here Civil Aviation Safety Regulations 1998 (legislation.gov.au) (https://www.legislation.gov.au/Details/F2022C00697/Html/Volume_4#_Toc100066204) at CASR 142.185 and CASR 142.190.

Appendix Four of that same document addresses the “fit and proper person”

The ICC response to this matter is attached for your reference. https://www.dropbox.com/s/h1dwih4f30jb8hc/McHeyzer%20direction%20to%20APTA%20ICC%20response.pdf?dl=0

As you are aware I believe there was a breach of obligations under administrative law, CASA own procedures, natural justice and procedural fairness.

On 27th August 2019, the CASA Regional Manager sent an email stating that my continuing employment as the “HOO is no longer tenable with the comments that Mr Buckley is making publicly.”

I acknowledge that we had a discussion as to whether that direction equates to CASA declaring me not to be a fit and proper person and therefore not able to maintain the role of HOO.

As you are aware I am of the opinion that is a very clear direction from CASA to the Employer that my continuing employment in that role was no longer tenable. I cannot possibly imagine a clearer direction.

The mere fact that CASA Regional Manager, Mr Mc Heyzer chose to completely bypass CASA stipulated procedures in that determination, should not mean that the decision no longer becomes an accountable decision. I should still be entitled to procedural fairness, as though correct procedures had been followed.

I have attached the link to the “Jason McHeyzer” file for your reference. The entire document makes an interesting read. It is in chronological order, and emails regarding my employment can be found in the latter part of the document.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/qkzhwgp5esojnbz/JASON%20MC%20HEYZER%20%20%20%20%20%20%2010%20of%2018.pdf?dl= 0

I also raised my strong desire for CASA to identify the comments that I was making publicly. I believe that if CASA send a direction to my employer that my continuing employment is no longer tenable based on comments that I am making publicly, then it is fair and reasonable that CASA identify to me those comments that their determination was based on.

I point out that the Employer interpreted it the same way that I did as I was terminated on the spot. I advised you that in my opinion the subsequent communications after I was terminated were “back pedalling”

I did clarify the situation with regard to the Employer offering me alternative employment. I have clarified the nature of that “employment”. I was required to set up my own business with an ABN. The Employer offered me approximately 10 hours per week teaching theory classes on a casual contracting basis. Due to the low volume of students that employment continued for approximately 6 weeks, at which stage I left the industry.

Having had CASA remove me from the role of HOO, my options were non-existent.



On Topic Two

I explained to you the inexplicable nature of CASAs determination that my business MFT was now operating unlawfully. I refer you to the initial notification from CASA that can be accessed here.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/k3qn3qdgoa2uavx/App%20A%20initial%20notification.pdf?dl=0

I believe that I made it very clear that there were absolutely no changes to the way that MFT operated. The only change was a change of name of the parent company from MFT to APTA. The trading name MFT remain unchanged.

It is unlikely that anyone within my Organisation would have been aware of any change at all. I had no reason to discuss a name change only, of the parent company, with the pilots. It is likely that the office/admin staff would have been aware.

If CASA have closed my flying school of more than a decade down because there was some change, then it is fair and reasonable that CASA clearly identify exactly what changes there were, that made my school of more than a decade suddenly become an unauthorised operation.

I was suddenly in contravention of s29 of the Civil Aviation Act. Absurdly the correspondence states that the situation does not alter even if


I am the Owner and director
Using my own procedures.
I am paying myself a fee and
Using my own personnel.

Truly, this is absurd, and must be unlawful. Whilst I disagree with CASA on the wider issue of the “sister schools”, I absolutely have no understanding at all as to how my school of more than a decade suddenly became unlawful, and I think it is incumbent on CASA to provide me with an explanation.

This matter has resulted in a number of significant consequences. I currently have issues with the tax department, an upcoming case in the Supreme Court as a Defendant, and staff and suppliers rightfully chasing me for entitlements.

In order to explain my position to the Tax Office, Judges etc, I must have a clear explanation from CASA. In a recent appearance before VCAT, my inability to explain the rationale behind the CASA decision making was interpreted as deceit. That was a very sad moment for me personally and had quite an impact. I cannot put myself in that situation again.

An explanation from CASA is essential.

Thank you for your time on the phone, and I hope you don’t mind the follow up correspondence. I appreciate that you are dealing with a number of matters in addition to mine. I hope this correspondence and the links can assist you.

I look forward to the opportunity to discuss the third topic when we next chat.

Thankyou sincerely for your time and your ear.

Cheers. Glen.

[Lead Balloon]

As a matter of interest, why was your employer at the time of the McHeyzer correspondence so spineless? If I’d received the email as your employer, I would have - in slightly more diplomatic language - told McHeyzer to go and get f*cked.


On the section 29 issue, I’ll preface what I’m about to say with a statement I’ve made many times over decades of unravelling corporate pea and thimble tricks: Those who wish to enjoy the benefits of the corporate veil have to cop the pitfalls.

In relation to MFT, you keep saying “my” flying school. Given your reference to a ‘parent company’, I assume the AOC under which the MFT flying school was operating was issued to a corporate entity and not you personally. Is that assumption correct? If yes, the MFT flying school was, under the aviation law (at least) the corporate entity’s, not yours personally.

Let’s call that corporate entity ‘Person A’.

You then refer to a ‘change of name of the parent company’ of Person A. If it was in fact the parent company of Person A, the parent was a different entity to Person A.

Let’s call the parent corporate entity ‘Person B’. (I assume that’s APTA?)

We’ll call you ‘Person C’.

Note that there are 3 separate legal persons here, notwithstanding that they are ‘related’. Only one of them has been issued an AOC for the MFT flying school: Person A.

To put this another way, despite Person B and Person C having some control over Person A as a consequence of shareholding and officership, respectively, neither Person B nor Person C holds the MFT flying training AOC. And Person A cannot transfer its AOC to Person B or Person C. That would be like me saying I’ve ‘transferred’ my driver’s licence to my Mum or Dad.

Mere changes of trading names have no effect on any of this. It doesn’t matter whether ‘Person A’ or ‘Person B’ have the trading name Arthur, Martha or McGuirkinsquirter (just as it doesn’t matter whether you change your name to Arthur, Martha or McGuirkinsquirter). The legal person remains the same and has all of the same legal obligations and rights, despite what its name might be from time to time. Despite any and all mere changes of name by any of them, only Person A has authority under the aviation law for MFT flying training.

So here’s the fundamental problem as I see it, based on my understanding of the facts (which I may have wrong - please correct me).

You (Person C) made arrangements such that the business previously being done by the MFT entity (Person A) started being done by APTA (Person B). Fundamental problem: APTA didn’t have an AOC authorising MFT flying training.

I know that, as a matter of practicality, it was all the same humans doing the same things under the same procedures. But they were doing it for the APTA entity, not the MFT entity.

This all may seem extraordinarily silly and artificial but, them’s the pitfalls of the corporate entity benefits.

It’s like an individual who incorporates and is the sole director and shareholder of a company which buys an aircraft and hires it back to the individual at an ‘arm’s length’ rate. Great for limiting the liability of the individual and there may be tax benefits. But…

The company is the legal owner of the aircraft, not the individual. If it’s insured by the company (tax deductible premium), the insurance responds to the liability of the company, not the individual, and the proceeds of insurance are the company’s, not the individual’s (unless the individual is named as an insured along with the company). And there may be implications under the aviation law. For example, under proposed Part 43 as drafted, the aircraft is used ‘for hire’ and, therefore, 100 hourly inspections (along with annuals) would be required. The individual might claim that the aircraft is ‘really’ the individual’s and there’s no hire ‘really’ going on because the individual is in control of everything but - alas - that ain’t how the law sees it.

I hope that makes some sense and, for your sake, that my reading of the facts between the lines is mistaken.

[glenb]

On my way into work, and wanted to try and respond before i go off air until tonight.

I have read your post, on the side of the road here, and believe i get the gist of it.

Regarding the change of parent Company name.

This occurred a couple of years prior. My estimate is during 2016.

It was a minor administrative task which the accountancy firm managed. My recollection is that it was well under $500.

It was a change of name only. No change to directors, shares, bank accounts, how staff were paid, what account that came from.

No other changes at all that i am aware of.

It really was a small admin task that i paid a fee for only.

I understand your person a,b, c but there were no changes at all to that.

As i said in the correspondence, i doubt anybody outside of my office would have been aware. At the time it was so inconsequential that i wouldn’t even have mentioned it to my wife.

Cheers. Glen

[Lead Balloon]

The change of name issue seems to me to be a red herring. It’s not mentioned in the CASA corro, so far I can see.

So far as I can see, the CASA corro was prompted by the issue already discussed at length in this thread: Multiple corporate entities - i.e. separate legal persons - each with “complete control over” their own business, purportedly operating under the authority of just one AOC. That looked and smelt very much like multiple, separate flying schools rather than one flying school operating from multiple bases. Only the latter is permissible under the CA Act.

I’d like to focus on just one entity: MFT. When MFT started its flying training operations, what was the Australian Company Number written on the AOC authorising those operations?

Is that Australian Company Number the same Australian Company Number written on APTA’s AOC? If the answer to that question is ‘no’, that’s the heart of the problem.

I’m not interested in names. I’m just interested in the ACNs.

[glenb]

At work without access to the actual number. There was never any change to the ABN, ACN. It was the same one in 2006 and throughout.

[Lead Balloon]

Please don’t worry about responding quickly to any of this, Glen. I don’t want to add any pressure to you, and I may be boxing at shadows.

I realise than an ACN didn’t change. A company’s ACN can’t change. It’s like a human’s DNA. I’m trying to work out to which entity you’re referring and whether that entity held an AOC on 23 October 2018 (the date of CASA’s letter at the Dropbox link).

Are you saying that the MFT entity - whatever its ACN happened to be - was the holder of an AOC with that ACN written on it on 23 October 2018? That would be very surprising if correct, because CASA’s letter mentions MFT as one of the entities which CASA alleged was not operating under the authority of an AOC.

If the MFT entity - whatever its ACN happened to be - was not the holder of an AOC with that ACN written on it on 23 October 2018, was the MFT entity ever the holder of an AOC with that ACN written on it?

[BigPapi]

At work without access to the actual number. There was never any change to the ABN, ACN. It was the same one in 2006 and throughout.

So this is saying that APTA and MFT had the same ABN? Would you consider them to be the same company?

[Lead Balloon]

Like names, ABNs are a red herring. ACNs, on the other hand, reveal who’s who in the corporate zoo.

[Paragraph377]

LB is correct, the ACN contains the information of the key person. And under an ACN you can’t have more than one ABN. An entity can only have one ABN, but you can run multiple businesses under the same ABN. I have a couple of businesses that I run this way. So yes, multiple business names can be registered to a single ABN, but only one ABN can be tethered to an ACN.

[Lead Balloon]

Not quite. A company (and a natural person) can have more than one ABN. But a company can have only one ACN.

[Paragraph377]

Not quite. A company (and a natural person) can have more than one ABN. But a company can have only one ACN.
I stand corrected. Yes LB, you are correct..

[BigPapi]

What's the status of the corporate entity of APTA or MFT currently then? Was APTA and MFT the same corporate entity? As we know APTA today continues to operate, however have seemingly absolved themselves of all responsibilities involved with MFT.

[glenb]

Please let me preface this response with some background information.

I was a flying instructor of 25 years and not a businessman. I opened my school with my closest friend because we had a vision. I know that sounds naïve, but thats the truth. With my hand on my heart, I am really answering these questions to the very very best of my knowledge. I know you are not asserting anything else, but I just want to clarify that. I do consider myself an expert on the law related to the aviation sector, but not on business law.

I had an accountancy firm that stood behind me for far longer than any other firm in Australia would have. They knew I had no capacity to pay, and i have no doubt that they would offer what assistance they could to this day. Quite simply, I am just too embarrassed to contact them. It sounds ridiculous, but that thought is actually causing increased anxiety as I sit here typing away. There are so many people that stood beside me, and i let them, thinking that i would be able to resolve this matter and resolve it, to make good all the damage. To date, with no success.

This is a matter i am also having trouble conveying to the Ombudsman's office so guidance from anyone is appreciated..

I think its the absolute simplicity that makes it so confusing, but I am concerned that I am not conveying this.

My instructions to the accountant at the time were very clear.

The Registered Training Organization status, the AOC, the International Student Training approval CRICOS are all connected to this. It needs to be a change of name of the ACN only that name change is from Melbourne Flight Training PTY LTD to Australian Pilot Training Alliance Pty Ltd. There are no other changes at all. it is a change of name only to reflect an Australian Wide capability which I thought was potentially useful in our current and projected market. Particularly overseas.

This name change was a surprisingly cheap process, that alone suggests that it was as simple as I had intended.

PLEASE be patient with me if I'm missing something. I welcome anyone to do a Company search and post it on here, to confirm that what I say "stacks up".

Yes the MFT that CASA determined an unauthorized operation after 10 years, had no other changes. It did have an AOC at the time of the CASA notification, yet was listed as one of the unauthorized operations. That is in fact the exact point of one of the three topics. It makes absolutely no sense to me at all.

How could a flying school suddenly become an unauthorized operation, when the only change was to name change to the Company with the trading name unchanged. It makers no sense at all that my business of more than a decade that provides my family suddenly becomes an unauthorized operation. The name change had happened 2 years prior to the best of recollection.

I'm trying to put the onus back onto CASA. I simply cannot understand how CASA arrived at this determination. Im spending enormous amounts of mental capacity trying to resolve this with the Ombudsman. Its incumbent for CASA to identify what the changes were. Then i will understand what I'm addressing, but i simply cannot get CASA to address this. My hope is that after my recent conversation with the ombudsman's office that the Office will request CASA to clearly identify what they "thought" had changed and what made them "think" that, and if they had some confusion what did hey do to resolve it. I had engaged with and fully communicated with CASA throughout the process, and they were fully onboard.. My very best recollection is that a fee was paid to CASA with the certificates issued. No changes to any numbers at all on that certificate. There was a reflection of name change only. Melbourne Flight Training continued unchanged.

For complete clarity, I don't think CASA had any basis to shut down any of the schools, but with respect to MFT, they have well overstepped any lawful Authority. MFT was my "baby" if you like. That was my business, and where I derived my income. APTA was a method for me and 9 other schools to work collaboratively. It was not my "business" if you like.

I hope that makes sense, heading home to catch the tail end of the footy, cheers. Glen

[glenb]

Lead Balloon,

As time permits, and if you think it would bring the clarity that you require.

Could you give me a short question that succintly provides the answer that you are seeking. I will frame it in a question to both CASA, and gulp, one last time to my accountant.

Cheers. Glen

[Lead Balloon]

It may be the language you’re using to try to explain the structure that is causing the confusion. Or perhaps I’m confusing you (or myself). I apologise if I’m confusing you.


This confuses me: The only change was a change of name of the parent company from MFT to APTA. The trading name MFT remain unchanged.Why did you use the term “parent company” and, on your understanding, of what other company/ies was that company the “parent”?

On the ‘pure’ APTA ‘alliance member’ model, no member needed to be a related entity - parent or otherwise - to any of the others or APTA in a corporate law sense. That’s why I’m confused. (In any event and importantly, even if any of them was related to the other in the corporate law sense, they remained separate legal entities. That’s what gave CASA the vapours and resulted in the ultimate demand for evidence of effective control over non-employees etc.) It may be that you’re using the word “parent” as your layperson’s description of APTA’s ‘position’ in the ‘alliance’ ‘hierarchy’? That’s fine, so long as there’s clarity of what you mean.

In relation to the ‘parent’ company, are you saying that it started out being named MFT and then its name was changed to APTA trading as MFT, but with the same ACN throughout? CASA’s letter of 23 October 2018 clearly treats the APTA entity to which CASA wrote as being a separate legal person to e.g. the MFT entity mentioned in the letter. Either they were one and the same entity or they weren’t. It would be unusual even for CASA to make such a big stuff up, but I suppose almost anything is possible.

One of the published attractions of the APTA concept was that each ‘alliance’ ‘member’ - not APTA - would retain “complete control” of its “business” (and I’ve noted before why those words evidently caused APTA so many problems from CASA’s perspective). On 23 October 2018, who was in “complete control” of the “business” at the MFT ‘base’ in the sense APTA used the word “business” on its website?

When you opened “your” flying school, was the AOC authorising that operation issued to a natural person or a corporate entity? If it was issued to a corporate entity, can you remember whether the ACN of that entity was the same as the APTA entity on 23 October 2018?

I understand all this corporate stuff can be complicated and confusing, but if you’re not across the detail it’s going to be difficult for you to explain it to e.g. the Ombudsman. After all, it was your trainset. (I occasionally fear that you might’ve been the victim of a corporate pea and thimble trick yourself.)

[glenb]

I am very much of the opinion that CASA has erred, and had absolutely no legal basis to close down the flying school trdaing as MFT. I have attached two versions of the AOC prior to and after the name change. I think this will resolve your query. Cheers. Glen.


https://www.dropbox.com/t/TPuoRDkKcmPZuGUp

[Lead Balloon]

Thanks Glen.

Those copies of versions 6 and 7 of the AOC show that CASA was on notice that there was no change in the legal entity holding the AOC. The entity remained ACN 119 046 285. The name change from Melbourne Flight Training Pty Ltd to Australian Pilot Training Alliance Pty Ltd made no difference to the legal entity holding the AOC. Accordingly, unless there was some change to the annexes as between the two versions of the AOC, ACN 119 046 285 continued to be authorised under that AOC to conduct, in the name “Australian Pilot Training Alliance Pty Ltd”, exactly the same operations as it was authorised to conduct in the name “Melbourne Flight Training Pty Ltd”.

So the mystery remains as to why CASA alleged, in its 23 October 2018 letter, that “MFT” was not operating under the authority of an AOC. And this is why it continues to be very (very) important to get (crystal) clarity about who’s talking about whom when they say “MFT” and you talk about “my” flying school.

I’ll try this set of questions, first, to try to solve that mystery. They only require a ‘yes’ or ‘no’ answer.

When you originally started ‘your’ flying school, was that the flying school which became generally known as “Melbourne Flight Training” or “MFT”?

Was the AOC for ‘your’ original flying school issued to corporate person ACN 119 046 285? If the answer is ‘no’, was the AOC issued to you personally?

In the year up to 23 October 2018 (though the precise period does not matter) were any flying training activities being engaged in by instructors at the school generally known as “Melbourne Flight Training” or “MFT”? If the answer is ‘yes’, were those “MFT” flying school instructors employees of corporate person ACN 119 046 285? To be crystal clear: Did ACN 119 046 285 pay those instructors directly for the instructing work they did at “MFT”?

Please: Just a ‘yes’ or ‘no’ (or ‘don’t know’) in response to each.

[glenb]

Yes, to all questions.

Of the three topics:

The direction that my employment was" no longer tenable based on comments that I was making publicly."
The closure of APTA after CASA had approved that structure for all time and on every occasion.
The failure for CASA to explain how MFT became an unauthorized operation.

Regarding MFT becoming an unauthorised operation, these previous few posts are bringing a clarity that i have been unable to bring to this topic in the last four years.

Cheers to those both following and posting, Glen

[Lead Balloon]

If the answers you've given to my questions are correct as a matter of fact - and I don't doubt you consider them to be correct as a matter of fact - it inexorably follows in my view that even on CASA's view of the regulatory requirements MFT was the only flying school whose operations were actually authorised by the AOC held by ACN 119 046 285 in October 2018! So how CASA managed to include MFT on the list in the October 2018 letter is anyone's guess.

I still can't get my head around how a company you set up (and, I would have thought, controlled) managed to sack you as an employee. I'm assuming there was an internal change such that you weren't the CEO or somehow didn't make any of the employee hire/fire decisions? In any event, I hope by now you realise exactly what CASA will continue to argue:

McHeyzer didn't 'direct' anyone to do anything but, even if that's wrong, the 'direction' was given to APTA and McHeyzer was off on a frolic of his own. Your argument is therefore (according to CASA) with APTA and McHeyzer.

In relation to the "closure of APTA after CASA had approved that structure for all time and on every occasion" I note that, strictly speaking - which is how I reckon CASA will speak - CASA did not close APTA. CASA actually invited APTA to provide evidence as to the way in which APTA would exercise effective control over a bunch of activities being carried out at 'alliance' 'bases' by personnel of whom APTA had no legal control, using premises and facilities over which APTA had no legal control and using aircraft of which APTA was not the registered operator. That was the point of the White email regurgitating the LARP opinion in 2019. But that task was practically impossible for APTA to complete, given the time and cost constraints on APTA at the time - which constraints were and are not a bother to CASA.

The approval of additional 'alliance' 'bases' on every occasion is the elephant in the room. The problem for APTA and CASA is that two wrongs don't make a right. The related problem for APTA and you is that CASA never admits it makes mistakes.

The initial approvals by CASA of additional 'alliance' 'bases' without first having required the kinds of evidence which CASA subsequently required as described in the While email regurgitating LARP opinion in 2019 was, in my view, a massive f*ckup by CASA. That's because the initial approvals encouraged ATPA - and in my view reasonably - to believe that approvals of further 'alliance' 'bases' in like circumstances to previously approved 'alliance' 'bases' would be granted on the production of like evidence.

That's why, in my view, CASA's falling over backwards to try to convince the Ombudsman and others that CASA was not aware of the detail of the APTA 'structure' - i.e. the legal relationship between the APTA AOC holder and those with legal control over the people, premises and aircraft at the 'alliance' 'bases' - until 'later'. But even if it is true in fact that CASA did not become aware of those details until 'later', CASA was on constructive notice of them and its job was to find out about them before granting each variation covering each new 'base' from the start.

CASA should have made very clear to APTA, from the start of the 'alliance' 'base' concept, the time-consuming and costly requirements that were instead sprung on APTA years later. But having not done so from the start, CASA could not continue making the same mistake by continuing to grant variations to cover more and more people, premises and aircraft - and therefore operations - over which APTA had not established legal and effective control. But rather than admitting that and making amends by working with APTA to try to bridge the gap - which gap, as I've said, could have been bridged with some fairly simple deeds of agreement and some governance in APTA for securing compliance with the deeds - CASA must maintain the pretence that it never makes mistakes.

[glenb]

Wow. Thousands of pages of toing and froing and Ping-Pong over four years, and you have summarized this matter clearly and concisely. Are you comfortable if i were to write directly to the Ombudsman and draw their attention to the most recent posts. I am rescheduled to talk with the Office in a little over a week. I would like the office to review this prior. Cheers. Glen.

[Lead Balloon]

Do with the text whatever you like, Glen. It's a public post.

The facts will be whatever they happen to be. And if CASA's requirements set out in its email in March 19 were valid then and necessary to satisfy the criteria for approval of an 'alliance' 'base' to operate under the authority of APTA's AOC in 19, they were valid and necessary to satisfy the criteria for the approval of all 'alliance' 'bases' and, therefore, should have been imposed and explained by CASA from the outset. CASA can't have it both ways, but will of course try to have it both ways.

[BigPapi]

Would it be correct to say that APTA, as it currently exists today, is still the same company, same ACN as APTA and MFT that was operating prior to mid-2019?

APTA still exists today, albeit looking like a totally different company and structure than was originally in place.

[glenb]

Lead Balloon. By June 30th, VORTEX had taken over that Company. Vortex being a new APTA Member that was now faced with closure as a result of the CASA change of direction.

The CASA CEO had sent me correspondence that on June30th 2019, they would make a decision as to whether operations would continue. At that stage we were operating under a short term interim approval to operate.

Vortex would have been very dependent on CASA, for continuing operations. My recollection is that they were given another 3 month extension. The new owners had implemented some very significant cost cuts, including halving salaries, and halving the size of the safety department. The relationship between me and one of the two owners was less than ideal. I think that it may have suited the new owners. A bit more to it than that, but probably enough for the purposes of the response.

Big Papi, I believe you are correct. That Company, AOC, continue as a single school. in a very different format, and i believe the operating environment has been very challenging.

Cheers. Glen

[Lead Balloon]

No. No. Nooooooo. No. No. This is not helpful, Glen.

Please: Slow down and stop. Then take a deep breath.

“By June 30th” of what year did “Vortex” take over “that Company”?

Who was ”that company” precisely, which you say “Vortex” took over?

Who are ”the owners” to whom you refer, and of what were they “the owners”.

Sorry Glen, but this is really, really important ****, which I’m confident CASA already knows. It also reinforces my concern that you might have been the victim of a corporate pea and thimble trick.

[glenb]

I refer to it as Vortex, although it may have another Company Name.

I was a nervous wreck by now, it was June 30th of 2019, 8 months after this had begun, and i walked out the door, and gave that Company to them in return for paying all debt. I took nothing at all personally.

Unfortunately not all debt and entitlements were paid, and that is the motivating force behind the last 4 years.

[glenb]

From CASA ICC 01/08/22Hi Glen
Thanks for your email.. In response to your question and proposal, I can confirm that you are welcome to invite a support person. This can be whoever you would like to attend. Reviewing your complaints, ahead of our meeting it would be helpful if you could provide the outcomes or conclusions of the Ombudsman reviews you say were informed by incorrect information provided by CASA.

Thanks Jonathan

My response 16/08/22



Dear Mr. Hanton,

I am responding to your query from your correspondence of 01/08/22, where you requested the following.

“Reviewing your complaints, ahead of our meeting it would be helpful if you could provide the outcomes or conclusions of the Ombudsman reviews you say were informed by incorrect information provided by CASA.”

The Ombudsman’s Office stated to me that; “CASA has provided us with a reasonable explanation for its view that it was not fully aware of the specific nature of APTAs operations until just prior to issuing the notice in October 2018”.

Considering that the same Company, albeit with a name change only, from MFT Pty Ltd to APTA Pty Ltd had been delivering those exact operations for over a decade, in that identical structure with full and formal CASA approval, it is not truthful for CASA to assert that “CASA” was not aware until just prior to October 2018, as you, yourself have previously identified.

I am fully satisfied that CASA was fully aware of the specific nature of the operations for at least six years.

I think it’s reasonable that if CASA is being truthful, then CASA should be willing to nominate the date to both the Ombudsman’s office and I, that CASA claim they first became aware of the structure that I had adopted. CASA should have no reason to withhold such important and relevant information.

Similarly, the Ombudsman’s Office has formed the view that CASA never permitted the exact same structure that I adopted. I refer you to the initial notification of October 2018, where CASA advises that CASA is not able to approve such operations.

The truth is that CASA had always and, on every occasion, approved such operations and permitted the exact structure that I adopted and had done so throughout my 25 years in the industry. If the Ombudsman’s Office is of the opinion that this is not the case, then, the Ombudsman’s Office has been misled.

I am asking that CASA ensure that there is no doubt in the mind of the Ombudsman’s office that CASA had always permitted not only me, but many other Operators across Australia with that identical structure.

The final complaint was that the Ombudsman has formed the view that I perhaps failed to inform CASA or missed some procedure in informing CASA. As you are aware, I claim that I invested hundreds of thousands of dollars, worked with ten CASA personnel over a two-year period designing a significantly improved version the same structure that I had been utilising for many years. This was fully revalidated by CASA in April 2017 and audited 6 months later. If CASA is claiming to the Ombudsman that I did not communicate the exact structure, which I claim that I did, then CASA should be able to identify to both the Ombudsman’s Office and me, any omissions on my behalf that would have created the situation whereby CASA was “not aware until just prior to October 2018”.

I hope that clears the matter up, and adequately addresses my concerns. This is very much a matter of intent, and I feel confident that you understand the intent of the complaints. My hope is that the matters will be addressed with good intent, rather than putting effort into deflecting and avoiding.

Please be assured that comment is not directed towards your Office specifically, but rather more towards the office of the CASA CEO and my general experience with CASA on all aspects of this matter.

Respectfully, Glen Buckley

[glenb]

16/08/22





Dear Ms Pip Spence, CEO of CASA,



Please note that I have included the Board, and the Office of the Hon Catherine King MP as the Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development, and Local Government, in this correspondence.



I sent you correspondence on August 1st , requesting that you publicly correct what is clearly false and misleading information provided by Mr Carmody, your predecessor, to the Senate. For your reference, I have also included a copy of that correspondence below.



On August 4th, I sent a short follow up email that read;



“Dear Ms Spence,

My preference is to wait for a well-considered response, so please feel under no pressure to reply at this stage other than to confirm that you have received my email of Monday 01/08/22.

Respectfully Glen Buckley”.



Fourteen days have now passed. I am not seeking any answer to my request, I am simply seeking a confirmation that you have received my fair and reasonable request.



Respectfully, Glen Buckley.





A copy of the email sent to you on August 1st, although dated 31/07/22 is below.







Allegation of false and misleading information being provided to the Senate, and request for CASA to correct that false and misleading information.



31/07/22



Dear Ms. Pip Spence, CEO of CASA.

For clarity, this correspondence relates to false and misleading information being provided to the Senate.

It is not related to my allegations of CASA providing false and misleading information to the Ombudsman which is the subject of the CASA Industry Complaint Commissioner investigation, and an entirely separate matter.

I have included my Local MP for the Electorate of Chisholm, as I anticipate seeking her assistance on these matters. I have provided her office with a copy of my previous allegations of false and misleading information provided to the Ombudsman Investigation, and I have also included this correspondence on the separate matter of false and misleading information being provided to the Senate.

As you are aware CASA closed my two businesses and subsequently directed my Employer that my” continuing employment was no longer tenable based on comments that I was making publicly”. These are the matters are currently being investigated by the Commonwealth Ombudsman’s Office.

In this correspondence I refer to the allegation made by the CASA CEO at the time, Mr. Shane Carmody.

Mr Carmody made the allegation that I had “stalked and assaulted CASA staff”. An allegation made to the Senators in Senate on 20/11/20.

Allegations that I absolutely refute, in fact the first time I had any awareness that I had stalked, and assaulted CASA staff was when Mr. Carmody raised it on that day, in that forum with the protection of Parliamentary Privilege.

You may well choose to listen to the Presentation in its entirety if you have not previously had the opportunity.

· My presentation commencing from the 12:40:30 mark to 13:21:00

· Mr. Carmody, CASA CEO presentation commencing from the 13:21:00 to 14:03:00 mark.

There are some particular excerpts in those presentations that I would draw your attention to, that are particularly salient to this matter

13:26:35 Mr. Carmody states that allegations that he has misled the Ombudsman Office are “offensive.”

13:26:50, Mr. Carmody the CASA CEO at the time then makes a second statement asserting his integrity where he makes the following statement, “I object strongly and personally to allegations that I have misled the committee. I have not and I stand by my record”

Mr. Carmody has now advised the Committee that he has not mislead the Commonwealth Ombudsman’s Inquiry, and then reaffirmed his integrity by advising that he has also not misled the Senate Committee.

Then at the 13; 28:30 mark, less than two minutes later after Mr. Carmody has given those assurances, he continues on and does exactly what he said he doesn’t do.

He knowingly misleads the Senate Committee and very clearly states to the Senate Committee that I have “stalked and assaulted CASA employees”.

The recordings can be accessed here:

Rural & Regional Affairs & Transport - 20/11/2020 08:49:59 - Parliament of Australia (aph.gov.au) (https://parlview.aph.gov.au/mediaPlayer.php?videoID=524701&operation_mode=parlview)

Whilst wanting to keep this correspondence as professional as practical, it truly is like a scene from Yes Minister. The Head of a Government Department states that he would not mislead the Committee, and then proceeds to go ahead and do exactly that i.e. mislead the Committee.

I cannot possibly present this in any other way, other than to call it a blatant lie presented to the Senate for the purposes of damaging my reputation under the protection of Parliamentary Privilege.

I need to be very clear on this.

The first time that I ever became aware of this allegation that I had stalked and assaulted CASA staff was on that day before Senate when Mr. Carmody raised those allegations.

As you will appreciate both stalking and assault are some of the more serious criminal offences that can be committed, with potential prison sentences.

For complete clarity, I never stalked or assaulted any individual in my entire life whether they be a CASA employee or not. Never.

I totally reject those allegations of assaulting and stalking CASA staff.

The purpose of this correspondence.

I acknowledge that there has been a change of CASA CEO, and that these false and misleading statements were made by the previous CEO, before Senate and are in no way attributed to you.

Had I assaulted or stalked CASA employees, as you would be fully aware, there would be some sort of supporting evidence by way of:

· CASA would have filed a police report.

· CASA would have supporting internal communications on the matter.

· The police would have most likely contacted me for a statement with a view to laying charges.

· CASA would have OHS documentation supporting those allegations.

· Witness statements, security surveillance.

· Some medical record of the person assaulted (assuming it was physical)

· Some correspondence on this matter from CASA advising me that I had assaulted and stalked CASA employees.

CASA has none of this supporting evidence, and I know that to be the case because I made a Freedom of Information request for any supporting information that CASA held. CASA was unable to provide anything at all in support of either the allegation of stalking or assault. I was not surprised by that outcome, because I knew it to be a false and misleading statement made to the Senate immediately Mr. Carmody made that statement.

That is not to say that I am not animated and passionate at times, and I do recall one occasion many years ago when I hit my fist on a desk harder than intended to the surprise of attendees, one of them a CASA employee.

This is something entirely different. This is an allegation that I stalked and assaulted CASA employees. These are serious criminal matters with potential terms of imprisonment.

Ms Spence, please understand that I am not seeking any compensation or claim about that false and misleading statement, and you have my word on that, and in writing.

I am simply asking that if you, in your role as the CASA CEO are aware that CASA has provided false and misleading information, it is incumbent upon you to publicly correct those false and misleading statements.

My expectation is that CASA will release a short statement to acknowledge the false and misleading nature of CASAs previous false assertion to the Senate, and very clearly identify that no CASA employee has ever been assaulted or stalked by Glen Buckley. Ever.

If CASA are not prepared to act truthfully on this matter, and CASA maintain that I stalked and assaulted CASA employees, I ask only that CASA advise me of the date. At this stage I have no requirement for any other information other than the dates of either the stalking or assault. Obviously, such serious offences would have occurred on a particular date or a number of different dates.

I have no intention to get into a discussion at this stage as to which offence occurred on what day, and to the nature or the severity of the offence. I can appreciate that CASA may be reluctant to go into that level of detail at this stage. I reiterate, I am only asking that CASA nominate the date/s of the alleged offences.

It does seem entirely reasonable that the person that the allegations were made against is at least made aware of the date that the alleged stalking and/or assaults of CASA employees occurred.

Thankyou for considering my request, and I look forward to your response against this matter only, and whether CASA is prepared to correct this wrong, or if it is a matter I need to seek assistance from my new Labor MP for Chisholm, Ms Carina Garland.

Yours respectfully



Glen Buckley

[Lead Balloon]

What you went through was terrible, Glen, and I earnestly hope you get adequate compensation.

In relation to your post #2312, I interpret your answer to my questions at post #2313 as in effect being that in June 2019 an entity called Vortex took over control of company ACN 119 046 285, the latter by that time having the name Australian Pilot Training Alliance Pty Ltd. If that’s correct, it makes no difference to the circumstances that prevailed before, and led to, CASA’s October 2018 letter and March 2019 email.

How do things without brains ‘know’ stuff?

I hope you find this helpful, Glen, in trying to articulate why CASA ‘knew’ about the details of the APTA ‘alliance’ structure as soon as CASA considered the first application from entity ACN 119 046 285 (with the original name “Melbourne Flight Training Pty Ltd” which changed to “Australian Pilot Training Alliance Pty Ltd”) for a variation to its AOC to authorise operations at an additional ‘alliance’ ‘base’.

CASA is simply an artificial person created by a sentence in a piece of legislation. It has no brain or arms or legs. In those respects CASA is exactly the same as a corporations law company like ACN 119 046 285. How, then, can it be possible for CASA to ‘know’ stuff, like the details of the APTA ‘alliance’ structure?

The law deals with that, too. CASA gets to ‘know’ stuff as a consequence of, for example, what its human officers find out in their capacity as officers of CASA. And it is not necessary for every officer of CASA to know something before CASA, in law, knows that thing. That would be absurd. In law, the artificial person CASA can ‘know’ something after merely one officer of CASA becomes aware of that thing in their capacity as a CASA officer.

So when e.g. a CASA FOI receives an application from e.g. an AOC holder for e.g. a variation to an AOC, in law CASA ‘knows’ the application has been made and CASA has ‘received’ the application. The officers in ‘Head Office’ can claim, reasonably and truly, that they did not know that the application had been submitted, but that makes no difference to CASA’s obligations and the applicant’s rights in the circumstances.

Further, and I suspect more importantly in the APTA ‘alliance’ structure case, CASA can in law ‘know’ something even if not a single one of its officers is aware of that thing. One of those ways of ‘knowing’ is called “constructive knowledge”, which is stuff CASA ought to know in the circumstances.

Let’s now consider a company – let’s call it Generic Pty Ltd – which holds a flying training AOC issued by CASA and conducts flying training under the authority of that AOC at Kickatinalong aerodrome. Generic then applies to CASA for a variation of its AOC so as to authorise Generic to also conduct flying training at Kumbukta aerodrome.

Let’s also now pause to ask: What is the very purpose of the regulatory requirement for this application and variation process? The very purpose?

Its purpose is for CASA to find out whether Generic satisfies the criteria in section 28 of the Civil Aviation Act and other regulatory provisions in relation to the conduct of flying training at both Kickatinalong and Kumbukta. And that task, of its very essence, requires CASA to, among other things, find out whether Generic has effective control over the people and the premises and the aircraft whom and which will be used to deliver flying training at the proposed Kumbukta location.

The only way in which CASA can find out whether Generic has effective control over the people and the premises and the aircraft is to find out who employs the people, who controls the premises and who is the registered operator of the aircraft. Even if no CASA officer finds those things out – for whatever reason, including that every CASA officer has no clue as to the implications of those things – CASA ought to know them because they are at the essence of CASA’s regulatory task in the circumstances.

In short, on every occasion that APTA applied for a variation to its AOC so as to cover an additional ‘alliance’ ‘base’, CASA ought to have found out who employed the people, who controlled the premises and who was the registered operator of the aircraft whom and which would be engaged in flying training activities at the base. On every occasion. And CASA ought to have understood the implications of those people not being APTA employees, of APTA not being in control of the premises and of APTA not being the registered operator of the aircraft.

(And, as I’ve said before, the tragedy is that if CASA had done its job properly for the first additional ‘alliance’ ‘base’, the implications could have been dealt with then and APTA would have known what was necessary when proposing the addition of further ‘alliance’ ‘bases’. There is nothing in the aviation law that says, for example, that all instructors have to be the employees of the holder of the AOC under which the flying training is being conducted. The aviation law actually expressly accommodates arrangements in which instructors are not the employees of the certificate holder. However, the aviation law does require the AOC holder to have effective legal control over those instructors.)

What I suspect happened is that APTA was initially dealing with CASA officers who didn’t understand the implications of the ‘alliance’ structure. Maybe they just assumed that everyone was going to be employees of APTA, the premises would be under the control of APTA and APTA would be the owner or registered operator of the aircraft at all ‘bases’. Wrong assumption. Or maybe – and this is the one I’d bet folding money on - they assumed that the production of a bunch of shelfware in the form of things like a base-specific operations manual would magically confer on APTA legal power to (a) control people who weren’t APTA’s employees, (b) control premises of which APTA was not owner or lessee and (c) control aircraft of which APTA was not owner or registered operator. Another wrong assumption.

Irrespective of what individual CASA officers understood or assumed and when, CASA was at least on constructive notice of the APTA structure and its implications from a regulatory perspective from additional ‘alliance’ ‘base’ one. It was CASA’s job to find those things out. It was the very purpose of the variation application process. Any pretence by CASA (read individuals in damage control) otherwise would be disturbing, but disturbingly typical.

[MalcolmReynolds]

It is so sad what has happened to APTA and of course, personally to Glen. I was employed at APTA in 2017 as the Deputy HOO and I saw a committed bunch of people trying to make a great things happen despite the CASA part 61/141/142 debacle. I hope that Glen can eventually get some compensation from someone to make it right. Best of luck to you Glen. 👍

[glenb]

Cheers, I appreciate the sentiment. Over the last four years there have been many lovely gestures by way of goodwill messages, bottles of "CASA" wine, Vouchers, donations to Go Fund Me etc.

These gestures always seem to land at just the right time for me, as yours has.

Thankyou sincerely, cheers. Glen

[glenb]

In posts 2256 and 2316, I had asked Ms. Spence to retract what i claim to be false allegations of stalking and assault made by the previous CASA CEO, Mr Carmody.

I sent that on 01/08, and had not received an aknowledgement of receipt, so followed up on 04/08 (refer those posts).

At 3PM on 04/08 i sent this"Dear Ms Spence,
My preference is to wait for a well-considered response, so please feel under no pressure to reply at this stage other than to confirm that you have received my email of Monday 01/08/22.
Respectfully Glen Buckley."

At 8.45 AM on 16/08 I sent this follow up


16/08/22

Dear Ms Pip Spence, CEO of CASA,
Please note that I have included the Board, and the Office of the Hon Catherine King MP as the Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development, and Local Government, in this correspondence.

I sent you correspondence on August 1st , requesting that you publicly correct what is clearly false and misleading information provided by Mr Carmody, your predecessor, to the Senate. For your reference, I have also included a copy of that correspondence below.

“Dear Ms Spence,

My preference is to wait for a well-considered response, so please feel under no pressure to reply at this stage other than to confirm that you have received my email of Monday 01/08/22.

Respectfully Glen Buckley”.


Fourteen days have now passed. I am not seeking any answer to my request, I am simply seeking a confirmation that you have received my fair and reasonable request.

Respectfully, Glen Buckley.


Approximately 1 hour later i received this from Ms Spences Office



Dear Buckley

Thank you for your emails to CASA CEO Pip Spence.

We are looking into the matters you have raised and will come back to you as soon as possible.

Kind regards

Rosie

Then shortly afterwards i received this again

Dear Mr Buckley

My sincerest apologies for not addressing you correctly in my acknowledgement that we have received your emails to Ms Spence.

Kind regards

Rosie

My response



Hi Rosie,

You shouldn’t have said anything, I didn’t notice, but appreciate the gesture, cheers. Glen

My follow up sent to Ms Spence earlier today



17/08/22



Dear Ms Pip Spence, CEO of CASA,

I understand that you are in the process of considering my request for CASA to publicly retract the allegations of Stalking and Assault that I am alleged to have committed against CASA employees.

As you will appreciate this matter in its entirety, is about “intent,” and the nature of that intent i.e. well intentioned or not well intentioned.

It’s not really about any safety concerns, regultory breaches, degraded quality outcomes, nor any examples offered by CASA that are indicative of any lack of operational control.

If I am to be believed, it’s a matter of a single CASA employee engineering a process to bring harm to me personally, and as you are aware I am fully satisfied that process was engineered by Mr Aleck. Mr Alecks conduct was facilitated by Mr Shane Carmody, the CASA CEO at the time.

It is fact, Mr Carmody’s statements made to the Senators, that I am asking you to retract or substantiate.

Mr Carmody’s presentation was “littered” with information that was clearly false and misleading. It was what can only be described as a character assassination on me, made with Parliamentary Privilege.

As you know, my opinion is that, if you determine that I had in fact stalked and assaulted CASA employees, it was incumbent on CASA to take measures to protect those employees, and that would involve a complaint to the police. That would allow me procedural fairness, and for the allegations to be fully investigated, and resolved. As the nature of the allegations is so substantial, I insist on that process being initiated, if it has not been commenced previously, and CASA chooses not to retract that false and misleading statement.

These are all matters that you are aware of.

In Mr Carmody’s presentation I have noted that he has provided false and misleading information on nine other occasions apart from the false and misleading statement that I had “stalked and assaulted CASA employees”.

Rural & Regional Affairs & Transport - 20/11/2020 08:49:59 - Parliament of Australia (aph.gov.au) (https://parlview.aph.gov.au/mediaPlayer.php?videoID=524701&operation_mode=parlview)

I would like to draw your attention to one other false and/or misleading statement. At the 13:27:50 mark of the presentation Mr Carmody refers to me as me “describing the experience as a very pleasant journey over a number of years designing his future.”

Mr Carmody was obviously inferring a smooth journey, most likely initiated by me to secure my financial security.

The intent of his comments is obvious.

Mr Carmody chose to mislead the senators.

Mr Carmody failed to mention that the new regulations that applied to all of Australia’s 350 flight training organisations was the largest project ever undertaken by the flight training industry in Australia.

The new legislation presented me with three options.




Cease trading on September 1st 2017
Continue trading but my business would be unable to continue delivering its current courses. This would result in a reduction of revenue of over 90%, effectively making the business unviable.
Invest many hundreds of thousands of dollars upgrading all systems and procedures via a rigid CASA procedure to the far more burdensome legislative requirements in order to continue operating as the new category Part 142 School.


I chose option C, and began a two year process requiring an enormous investment of both time and money to be one of the very small minority of flight schools that was ready for the deadline of September 1st 2017.

After assurances from CASA that the legislation was proceeding, as planned on September 1st 2017, I activated my new Part 141/142 compliant multi base structure that I had been using for many years, in April 2017, approximately 6 months before the deadline.

Weeks after I activated that structure fully compliant to the new regulations, CASA reversed their decision, and postponed the introduction of the legislation. This reversal by CASA cost me several hundred thousand dollars.

The truth is that it was path I was forced down by CASAs legislative changes, that required an enormous investment.

Mr Carmody’s comments about me describing the experience as “pleasant” are not only insulting to me personally, but I am sure they would be insulting to the highly professional CASA employees that had put so much of their time into the very substantial project.

Ms. Spence, please appreciate that this is not about the semantics. It is about a very carefully engineered process by a small number of current and past CASA employees.

It is about the “intent”. The intent of Mr Carmody’s presentation was not well intentioned. It was false and it was presented to mislead the Senators.

As I have advised, I am not seeking a prompt response from you. I am seeking a well-intentioned, and well considered response.

If you feel there would be some benefit in me addressing all 10 false and/or misleading statements prior to CASAs formal response, please advise and I will respond within 48 hours with that completed document.

I thank you in anticipation of your well-intentioned response,

Glen Buckley.

P.S. Whilst I am not apologising, I do acknowledge that you are relatively new to the position, and were not involved in the “problem”, although the burden of the “solution” has become yours.

[Sunfish]

Glen, Pip Spence can’t say anything about any of these matters without advice from CASA and the Board because the moment she opens her mouth she is making an admission of one sort or another by CASA.

The current “no comment” response is exactly the same as an individual “no comment” response to a policeman - it does not signify guilt or innocence.

I am afraid you have to wait.

On the matter of ACN’s and corporate name “pass the parcel” rules, in my opinion, CASA is still required to deal with you in good faith and with fairness, equity and natural justice. In other words, if there was some defect then they should have immediately told you and worked with you to correct what might be essentially a minor matter.

[aroa]

Aah, but Sunny, that is not CAsAs style. “Safety”, that mysterious, mythical thing they espouse..is all.
Any errors, discrepancicies, reg breaches, wording defects all mean that person, persons, business must be obliterated and denied being involved in aviation.
Its zealotry at its most disgusting.

[Paragraph377]

Ms Spence has taken so long to reply to Glen due to her very busy work schedule. There are coffee’s to be consumed, women in leadership forums to promote, diversity policies to write, Ministers Lilly-white asses to kiss, and glossy meaningless statements to author. Trivial matters such as Glen’s are really not high on her priority list. It is very time consuming being a Bureaucrat and tethering yourself to the Ministers desk. But apart from the skinned knees and elbows one gets, the CASA Director gets to mix company with politicians and even ICAO, so she must set her priorities right.

[glenb]

Lead Balloon, or indeed anybody who feels they have some input.



I would like to explore your concerns of a flying school maintaining control over a fleet of aircraft with different Registered Operators. I’m assuming you put that forward as a likely CASA approach. My initial thoughts on this matter.

Flying Schools have always operated with a number of aircraft of which they are not the Owners of, or the Registered Operators of. Probably every flying school, with the exception of the large foreign owned businesses, operates in that manner. It allows schools access to aircraft without lease repayments, provides flexibility, maintains customer interest, addresses seasonal demands etc. It really is a very normal way of schools operating and that was very much my experience during 25 years in the industry at a number of schools.

Its standard industry practice for flying schools to operate aircraft that they are not the Registered Operator, or the Owner of. The CASA approach was that the Owner, and the person paying for that aircrafts maintenance should be the Registered Operator.

A typical example would be an aircraft owner who flies 100 hours per annum in his own aircraft. He enters into an agreement with a flying school to utlise his aircraft 400 hours per annum, to offset his costs.

The legislation does permit for that Aircraft Owner/Payer of Maintenance/ Registered Operator to enter into such an agreement with an AOC Holder to utilise that aircraft for flight training.

The legislation permits the Registered Operator to perform the required and specified functions OR contract someone to do so on their behalf, as they did with APTA.

To do this we had an agreement.

Regarding the agreement that we utilised. There was a very significant amount of time spent with CASA personnel on this very topic. Many months in fact, working side by side with CASA personnel to come up with an aircraft agreement that was fit for purpose for exactly what we intended to do. i.e. utilise aircraft with different registered operators. During this process of working with CASA we came up with a number of versions.

One of the major topic of those agreements was trying to bring clarity to the differences between the “Operator” and the “Registered Operator.

I have located an early version of an early document which I have attached below. When a number of the bases joined APTA, they had previously had operated with no agreement at all.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/n82i0sg675nw904/FORM%206-004%20AIRCRAFT%20HIRE%20AGREEMENT%20-%2015SEP17.pdf?dl=0

So my "position" with CASA would be that there is no legislation that prevents an AOC Holder using aircraft from different Registered Operators, and it is in fact and always has been standard industry practice.

I would also argue that the APTA model provided a greater level of operational control. Because we were not paying the maintenance bills, we had less commercial pressure to influence sub optimal decision making.

All aircraft were fully inducted into the one FSM system, with maintenance more rigidly controlled than had been the Members previous experience.

Thanks for the continuing interest, and look forward to any thoughts. Cheers. Glen

[aroa]

Para377....No miniscule oversees CAsA. Its "run " sic, very, by a Bored, the 'DAS' and the Iron Ring because it is a free ranging and feral 'corporation' and can behave as it does. Is Oz fcuked ??
Just found out that the corporatised Mareeba Shire Council ie Local Government (sic, very) has a American ABN # and corporatised in the USA. !! WTF. And NO rights under the Oz constitution to levy rates fees and taxes.!
This is the same council that failed in their use of bs, fraudulent and invalid paperwork for an eviction to make the lease and hangar (mine !) available for someone else.
We definitely need a revolution !

[Lead Balloon]

So my "position" with CASA would be that there is no legislation that prevents an AOC Holder using aircraft from different Registered Operators, and it is in fact and always has been standard industry practice.I agree. An aircraft either has a valid MR for aerial work (flying training) or it doesn’t. Same goes with IFR etc. The aircraft doesn’t ‘know’ whether it’s being flown by the registered operator or by an employee of the registered operator or by a private hirer or by an instructor employed by someone unrelated to the registered operator or by an unqualified hijacker.

I would also argue that the APTA model provided a greater level of operational control. Because we were not paying the maintenance bills, we had less commercial pressure to influence sub optimal decision making.I don’t understand that logic.

Operational control, in the sense I’m using it in APTA’s context, is about how APTA would be able, legally and practicably, to control access to and the use of aircraft, monitor compliance with the rules around daily inspections, recording of TIS, endorsement of defects and the consequences of endorsed defects etc etc, when APTA is not the registered operator and the aircraft is being flown by people who aren’t APTA employees, and no APTA employee is within cooee of where all the flying activities are happening. (I won’t rehash all the rogue instructor or entire ‘base’ stuff, but that’s the scenario for which APTA had to have a legal and practical answer.)

All aircraft were fully inducted into the one FSM system, with maintenance more rigidly controlled than had been the Members previous experience. And what would APTA do, legally and practicably, if it found out that, for example, one of these “fully inducted” aircraft was being operated such that only half of the TIS hours were being recorded in the MR by the ‘base’ instructors, and the adult in charge of that ‘base’ told APTA: “I have complete control of my business. Mind your own business.” How does APTA enter the correct TIS after each flight of that aircraft? Remember: On each occasion on which the correct TIS is not entered, APTA breaches a condition of its AOC, and that’s an offence by APTA.

[glenb]

The Flight School Manager program that was specifically designed for us, tracked all aircraft hours which needed to be entered in with the Instructors pin number. The hours for each sequence with an appropriate margin was built into the system. An instructor would be unable to log out if.

Flight and duties were potentially going to be breached.
Any qualifications were expired that were relevant to the flight ( VFR v IFR)
The required previous lessons had not been completed.
There were any outstanding maintenance issues etc.

Regarding the commercial pressure that i suggested. As the owner of the aircraft, there could be a tendency to push an aircraft out with a faulty fuel gauges on one tank, knowing that its a local training area flight and that you have visually checked the contents. Most likely safe but most definitely illegal. With the FSM, that flight could not depart.. Without that protection, an operator may be tempted to try and send that aircraft out "under the radar" so to speak. to derive revenue from that aircraft.

As the APTA model did not depend on revenue from the aircraft, there was no pressure on us to compromise safety.

Without any doubt, if you asked any APTA Member what was the biggest change to their operation , it would have been the absolute no compromise to the legislation.regarding maintenance and airworthiness. We were diligent, and without saying too much, we did suspend an operation on one occasion over maintenance concerns.

[Lead Balloon]

I’ll preface this with the observation that the whole flying training regulatory structure in Australia, as with so many aviation matters, is complete overreach. But at this point we have to deal with the regulatory quagmire that prevails.

During a training flight at ‘alliance’ ‘base’ X, the aircraft being utilised has nosewheel shimmy during the landing roll. The person running the ‘business’ at ‘alliance’ ‘base’ X tells the instructor and the student that nosewheel shimmy on landing on that aircraft is perfectly normal. What happens next in the APTA FSM? If APTA finds out about the nosewheel shimmy and forms the view that it could be a problem, what actually happens next?

A different aircraft being operated at ‘alliance’ ‘base’ X has no gizmo to record the aircraft’s TIS. What does APTA actually do to make sure that recorded TIS is actual TIS, noting that the instructor’s and student’s ‘flight time’ are not the same as the aircraft’s TIS.

At ‘alliance’ ‘base’ X, the aircraft used for retractible undercarriage training lands and the instructor enters in the MR: “Left Mainwheel undercarriage downlight unserviceable”. Does APTA know about that entry, as soon as it’s entered in the MR and, if yes, what does APTA actually do about it?

[glenb]

During a training flight at ‘alliance’ ‘base’ X, the aircraft being utilised has nosewheel shimmy during the landing roll. The person running the ‘business’ at ‘alliance’ ‘base’ X tells the instructor and the student that nosewheel shimmy on landing on that aircraft is perfectly normal. What happens next in the APTA FSM? If APTA finds out about the nosewheel shimmy and forms the view that it could be a problem, what actually happens next?

The pilot would enter it onto the maintenance release.

On returning and signing in, he would also enter that detail onto the FSM, which would render the aircraft unavailable for further bookings until assessed.

An email would also be automatically sent to the Maintenance Administration Officer, who would take on the responsibility of managing that situation and ensuring the aircraft was airworthy.

Once satisfied that the problem had been rectified, either the MAO, HAAMC, GSM, GHOO, could reactivate that aircraft into the FSM system, allowing that aircraft to be despatched. Bookings could be made during the unserviceability, although the aircraft could not be despatched.

I assume the “person running the business” would be a Member of the Aero Club Committee.

The Committee had most likely joined APTA because.

· They did not have an AOC

· Were unwilling or unable to obtain an AOC.

If someone held there own AOC, it is unlikely that they would have joined APTA. My experience was that in fact the Committee specifically did not want operational control, had little knowledge of how to run a flight training operation, and I never experienced any of that “interference” that you suggest.

Quite simply, the APTA determination was the only determination, because at any time, any base, any instructor, or any aircraft could be immediately locked out of the system, and completely unable to be despatched.

An option not available to flying schools reliant on a paper based, manual sign out system.



A different aircraft being operated at ‘alliance’ ‘base’ X has no gizmo to record the aircraft’s TIS. What does APTA actually do to make sure that recorded TIS is actual TIS, noting that the instructor’s and student’s ‘flight time’ are not the same as the aircraft’s TIS.

All aircraft were required to have time monitored by either

· VDO

· Tacho

· Flight switch

There was a requirement for any two of these methods to be entered into FSM. Generally, this was the VDO and flight switch.

The flight switch times populated into the maintenance section of the FSM system, whereas the VDO time populated immediately through to the Staff members flight and duty times, and through to the Students Logbook.

On occasions where an aircraft owner did not have a flight switch, we would require the Owner to install one, and that did happen on one occasion. The owner was very much on board, as previously he had been doing his maintenance from the VDO. My recollection was that the cost was approximately $700.

I hope that addresses that query adequately.



At ‘alliance’ ‘base’ X, the aircraft used for retractible undercarriage training lands and the instructor enters in the MR: “Left Mainwheel undercarriage downlight unserviceable”. Does APTA know about that entry, as soon as it’s entered in the MR and, if yes, what does APTA actually do about it?

The response to this would be the same procedure as in Step One.

I would add that we had daily meetings with each base, and fortnightly we would have a Group Safety Meeting and a Group Management meeting. One of the topics was maintenance. These issues would all have been bought up at the meeting, as all maintenance issues were addressed and discussed.

If an opportunity for improvement resulted, a Continuous Improvement Process would be initiated with a notification to CASA via our Continuous improvement process and that may result in a change to procedures which would be communicated through the system requiring a pilot acknowledgement via the FSM system, before being able to sign out.

Cheers. Glen.

About to head into a run of thirteen-hour shifts, so if I don’t respond for a few days, please understand that its not me having a “dummy spit”.

Any available time I have will be focussed on my formal allegation of misfeasance in public office against two senior CASA execs. Another substantial document coming to finalisation. I know all the doomsayers will say it’s a waste of time, and it may well be, but at least I can say that I went down swinging. The same philosophy i use in my day job now.

The Flight School system as mentioned was a very comprehensive system designed by the Developer especially for our system. A link to the product can be found here. CASA personnel attended the training sessions in the Melbourne CBD with the APTA member bases. This occurred approximately 2 years before Mr. Aleck "first became aware of the structure in October 2018 Smart (smartaviation.net) (https://smartaviation.net/#features)

I would also add that in an industry first, CASA was given full access to the system, and every aspect of the operation two years before CASA "first became aware" of the APTA structure. CASA could at any time and in real time check flight and duty, aircraft maintenance and unserviceability's, safety information, pilot recency, training records, etc etc etc etc

[glenb]

I have posted this before but it makes me laugh every time. Listen to his words. No wonder I accused him of misfeasnace in public office

CASA Safety Video - Outcome based regulation - YouTube

[Paragraph377]

I have posted this before but it makes me laugh every time. Listen to his words. No wonder I accused him of misfeasnace in public office

CASA Safety Video - Outcome based regulation - YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6QPjoBXDuUk)

The Loyola bull**** artist J.A. Glen, what you created within your business was a good example of outcome based regulation, a way to safely operate and manage a business without abiding by prescriptive methodology. However the loopy lawyer didn’t subscribe to your methodology did he? Anyway, he is a wordsmith and full of ****, and this softly softly nice guy video is not a true picture of what the bearded weasel is really like. He has thrown a number of CASA DAS’s under the bus, and the way he did it so publicly to Spence in the Senate is a prime example of how this two-faced maggot operates.

[Lead Balloon]

I apologise for not explaining the key point in a way that you are comprehending, Glen.

I know the ‘alliance’ ‘members’ didn’t have their own AOC. The fundamental advantage of the APTA structure was of course that the ‘members’ were operating under the authority of APTA’s AOC.

You don’t need to rush or get stressed about the following. But I do urge you to take the time, when you can and your head is in the right place, to get your head around what I’m saying.

That’s because I’m trying to help you to understand what’s at the heart of the regulatory issue that resulted in CASA doing a complete backflip after encouraging you to believe, through CASA’s approval of variations to cover additional ‘bases’, – and you reasonably believed – that the manuals and procedures and personnel and other arrangements put in place by APTA were sufficient for a structure including the ‘alliance’ ‘member’ concept to comply with the applicable aviation safety regulatory requirements (noting, as I’ve said before, CASA was at least on constructive notice of all the implications of the structure from the point at which CASA considered the application by APTA for a variation to cover the first ‘alliance’ ‘member’ ‘base’).

(And I can only try to imagine how much of your blood, sweat and tears (and treasure) went into building all that. It’s appalling that it ended up where it has.)

The pilot would enter it onto the maintenance release.APTA didn’t know that the pilot did do what the pilot should have done. APTA didn’t know whether an instructor – who wasn’t an employee of APTA and was operating at a ‘base’ 100nms away where APTA had no continuous employee presence - was complying with his or her obligations to enter defects in an aircraft’s maintenance release (or in APTA’s FSM system).

[A]ny aircraft could be immediately locked out of the system, and completely unable to be despatched.APTA should patent that system, because it is the first one on the planet which is, apparently, capable of preventing the magnetos in an aircraft’s engine generating a spark, the propellor from generating thrust and the wings from generating lift. (My sincere apologies for the tone of that, but I’ve seen too many garbage in/garbage out aircraft maintenance management software systems in my time. And no piece of software in a computer sitting on someone’s desk has ever rendered a 1975 Cessna 172’s engine incapable of starting and its wings incapable of generating lift.)

There was a requirement for any two of these methods [VDO; Tacho; Flight switch] to be entered into FSM.APTA did not know whether that requirement was always being complied with by people who weren’t APTA employees and were operating at a ‘base’ 100nms away where APTA had no continuous employee presence.

I chose the examples for a reason. I am aware, from long, first-hand knowledge, of how often defects (like a nosewheel shimmy – “it always does that”) are not entered in GA aircraft maintenance releases; of how often GA aircraft are flown with an open defect in the maintenance release, with which defect the aircraft should not have been flown (like an undercarriage indicator light – “I didn’t check the endorsements section of the MR before I went flying” or “I didn’t know it was unlawful to fly with that undercarriage indicator light blown; it’s just a light bulb” said by 6 different pilots about 6 different flights); and of how often accurate TIS is not recorded in the MR of GA aircraft. All of which happens – sometimes inadvertently through haste or incompetence and sometimes knowingly – quite frequently.

If you have never come across any of those kinds of circumstances in your time in GA, you are – I would suggest – unique. Ditto if you’ve never become aware of circumstances in which the owner of or registered operator of or a business using an aircraft to make money – like an APTA ‘alliance member’ - gives pilots ‘gentle hints’ about the ‘inconvenience’ that would occur if some ‘trivial’ problem was entered in the aircraft’s MR (and the FSM system). Indeed, I’m aware of a pilot who is the subject of an ongoing vendetta as a consequence of pissing off an aircraft operator by entering defects in the aircraft’s maintenance release. (And I have to pull you up on one issue: You put the word “interference” in quotation marks. I didn’t use that word.)

All of the circumstances to which I referred would constitute offences by the individuals involved. But in the APTA structure, they would also constitute offences by APTA. That is because first, it would be happening in the course of training activities being conducted by the individuals under the authority of APTA’s certificate, secondly, APTA’s certificate was (still is) subject to conditions including that “each of the operator’s personnel must comply with each provision of civil aviation legislation that applies to the operator’s authorised Part 141 flight training”, thirdly, the inclusive (not exhaustive) definition of “personnel” extends beyond employees of APTA (which is why the stuff about 141 “contemplating” the use only of “employees who are in all respect agents of the operator” in the CASA email of March 19 is bollocks) and finally, failure to comply with a condition is – of course – a strict liability offence.

This is the key point you have to get your head around: The answer: “It was a requirement of our system” or “it was a requirement of all of the base-specific operations manuals” or “we had a computer program that stops this happening” or whatever is not a sufficient answer to these kinds of questions:

How would APTA know if – let’s take an example – all damage and defects in aircraft utilised for flying training at an ‘alliance’ ‘base’ are always being recorded in the maintenance release?

What would APTA do when it finds out that an instructor at an ‘alliance’ ‘base’ has been failing to enter defects in the maintenance release of an aircraft used at that ‘base’? [Note the question is “when” not “if”. The answer: “It never happens”, is a wrong answer. So is: “Our manuals and computer system don’t allow this, and our key personnel would be pissed off about the situation”.]

What would APTA do if, in response to the action APTA takes, the instructor tells APTA: “Get stuffed. I’m in complete control of this business, and my business has hired and has control of the use of this aircraft”?

How would APTA know that ‘base’ aircraft with open defects in the maintenance release are only ever used in the operations (if any) which may lawfully be conducted with those defects?

What would APTA do if it finds out that an instructor at an ‘alliance’ ‘base’ has been flying an aircraft with an open defect in the maintenance release, with which defect the flights should not have been conducted?

What would APTA do if, in response to the action APTA takes, the instructor tells APTA: “Get stuffed. I’m in complete control of this business and my business has hired and has control of the use of this aircraft”?

The law already requires aircraft damage and defects to be endorsed in the aircraft’s maintenance release. It’s a criminal offence not to. The law already sets out the circumstances in which an aircraft may be flown with open defects, and flights in other circumstances are an offence.

These requirements can be ‘enshrined’ in an operator’s operations manual and there can be detailed procedures about how personnel are to achieve compliance with the requirements. The law already requires personnel to comply with the operations manual. It’s an offence not to.

If being a requirement in the law or some manual or computer system was enough to achieve compliance with the requirement in the real world, there would be no certification system.

The point of the certification system is to ascertain how the certificate holder will legally and effectively get all the wandering cats that are going to be doing stuff, under the authority of the certificate, to comply in fact with requirements in laws which already exist. That’s because, in the real world, simply imposing a requirement is not, of itself, sufficient to achieve compliance. And in the APTA structure, there were many more wandering cats, in the form of ‘alliance’ ‘members’ and their people and premises and aircraft, compared with a ‘traditional’ flying school.

All of the kinds of questions I’ve set out above should have been asked by CASA and – more importantly – the answers should have been analysed by someone with half a clue about their implications, from the start of the regulatory interactions between CASA and APTA during the establishment of the ‘alliance’ structure. CASA didn’t ask those questions until the March 19 email, after the October 2018 letter in which CASA effectively pretended it didn’t know that the structure included people who weren’t APTA employees, utilising premises and aircraft over which APTA had no legal and effective control (which, I reiterate, could have been fixed, which was another of the points of the March 19 email, but by then it was too late for you as a matter of practicality, because CASA had driven you spare and broke).

[Sunfish]

LB, your question is rhetorical. “how would APTA know? the answer is the same as that of the local flying school. APTA relies on trust - exactly the same way as the local school.

Short of a full blown telemetry system (eg ACARS) all operators rely on their staff to tell the truth in a timely manner and follow the procedures. If they can’t be trusted then there is no way in hell that ANY system can generate an accurate outcome.

‘’By definition, APTA surveillance can only ensure by audit that (a) Members know how to use the systems. and (b) Members are trustworthy.

CASA is entitled to ask APTA about matter (a) - which involves training. Item (b) is satisfied by the application of the fit and proper person test.

To put that another way; a mate was until recently a training and checking Captain on a very, very major international airline. The assessment of a pilot by him is still a matter of trustworthiness- and he has at least one story about this subject.

It is not possible to guarantee that humans will always behave and CASA has no business requiring APTA to do the impossible.

[Lead Balloon]

It is not possible to guarantee that humans will always behave and CASA has no business requiring APTA to do the impossible.True.

But I’ll guarantee that humans make mistakes and, occasionally, even deliberately break rules. I used the example of GA aircraft defects and GA aircraft maintenance releases for the reasons I explained.

It's not about 'guaranteeing' that each and every contravention will be detected.

The answer “we trust everybody” is not, in itself, enough for any kind of complex system involving humans. I’ve yet to see a fraud control policy in any big organisation that is one sentence: “We just trust everybody.” (One of the ways in which auditors detect fraud in organisations: Their books are perfect and nobody’s ever made a mistake with the organisation’s money.)

I think “trust but verify” is the cliché required approach, with practical actions available when contraventions are inevitably detected.

The question: “What is APTA going to do when it finds out a 'base' instructor has not been recording defects?”, is a perfectly reasonable one and does not set the standard at impossible perfection. The question assumes a contravention has occurred. But there has to be some way of detecting some contraventions, then finding out whether they’re a mistake or deliberate or whatever, then doing something practicable about it.

We’ve been through the comparison with a ‘standard’ local flying school before and you, too, need to get your head around the key difference between a ‘standard’ flying school and the ATPA structure before it collapsed. The AOC holder at the ‘standard’ local flying school has direct legal control over most of the wandering cats that can cause problems. An officer of the AOC holder, or the AOC holder him or herself, are usually physically there during much of the activity. (How many instructors do you reckon instruct at a ‘standard’ local flying school without having any relationship as employee of or contractor to the AOC holder (unless, of course, that instructor is him or herself the AOC holder)? That AOC holder has legal and effective options at his, her or its disposal to detect and deal with detected contraventions in the course of flying training under that AOC. You listed those options earlier in this thread!

But APTA didn’t have those options because APTA didn’t have enforceable agreements between it and most of the wandering cats at the ‘alliance’ ‘member’ ‘bases’. And I’m not talking about an agreement with a single individual or a corporate entity at the ‘base’. There were other cats wandering around at those bases, with no binding legal relationship with ATPA. I’ve said it before: It’s a tragedy that this gap was not picked up and filled early in the development of the APTA structure and CASA should have picked it up during the consideration of the first application for a variation to APTA’s AOC to cover an additional ‘alliance’ ‘member’ ‘base’.

And I’ve also said before: The certification system for flying training in Australia is regulatory overreach. But I can’t change that. While the system is what it is, I’m trying to help Glen understand the arguments he’s up against, because I’ll bet my bottom dollar that CASA will have made and will continue to make this kind of argument (among others). It is what was in and between the lines of CASA's March 19 email, so I'm not revealing anything surprising.

[sagesau]

Regardless of the detail and/or legality of what happened, at the very least CASA have demonstrated that they are incapable of administrating civil aviation in Australia. By working with industry (in this case Glen and APTA/MFT, aunt gertrude, george, many other countless aviation organizations shafted by CASA or whoever you want to call them) for an extended period of time (in this case a couple of years) to then pull the pin at the last minute with no previous demonstrated concerns shows incompetence. They either don't have processes in place to know what they are doing, they aren't following their own processes or some combination of that. The slightest measure of management would have had multiple opportunities to alter the process Glenn was following and/or provided the specific guidance/direction necessary to ensure a workable outcome.
Bottom line CASA didn't. They led Glen (and countless others) down the garden path where they proceeded to introduce them to the CASA long pointy object. QED

[Lead Balloon]

Yep. CASA in effect encouraged APTA down a path that ultimately led to … a CASA trap. The left hand didn’t know what the right hand was doing.

The second sleaziest aspect of the process (so far) is CASA’s current pretence that it did not know the details of the APTA structure and the relationship between APTA and the people, premises and aircraft utilised by ‘alliance’ ‘members’ to deliver flying training. (The sleaziest being Mr Carmody’s allegations against Glen, under parliamentary privilege, of assault and stalking.)

[Sandy Reith]

On the other hand LB’s comprehensive explanations are valuable and do point to CASA’s view of the world. A world of beautiful symmetry of regularity that is, unfortunately, unreal, unworkable in practicality, given the complexities and costly procedures that it imposes. In this case by force on a demoralised and shrinking training environment for the VH registered segment of General Aviation(GA). GA provides the most important training ground for various areas that are directly of value to the community at large. For example the various emergency areas of police work, firefighting, air ambulance. In addition charter for business and government and the crucial work of the aerial application industry. Therefore the Australian community suffers.

Certification, just what value does it confer to the community? It does create a colossal amount of work for the monopoly provider CASA, and generates a considerable amount of fees that it extracts from those flying businesses that cannot operate without certain certifications. In the USA one can teach flying without holding a flying school certification. According to John King of King’s Schools about 70% of USA pilots are taught by independent instructors. John King was contracted for advice by CASA some years ago, a highly regarded GA operator. The fact that the USA trains more GA pilots by far than any other country and has a vigorous GA sector demonstrates that our extreme preoccupation with certification in this area is not justified, a costly aberration against the National interest.



.

[glenb]

I just want to make clear a few points at this stage if I may.

If you refer to the initial notification.

There was, and never has been an allegation by CASA that we did not have full operational control that I am aware of. It was only ever an argument that the structure was unlawful. Once the Ombudsman found that it was not illegal, CASAs stance changed somewhat.

It became "CASA has to satisfy itself that an Operator has operational control". I agree 100%. An AOC Holder must have operational control. Of course they must.

CASA having to satisfy themselves that we have operational control is very different from CASAs determination that we did not have operational control (an allegation never made).

In order to determine that we did not have operational control would require some evidence, anything at all. That could be training records not full up to date, pilot recency not fully up to date, unairworthy aircraft being dispatched on flights, not fully and strictly adhering to our CASA approved procedures specified in the Exposition ( Operations manual). Something, absolutely anything to support the decision to reverse an approval that CASA had previously approved.

You will note that CASA has never said that we did not have full operational control, and i challenge them to do so. Remember, this business was fully CASA approved, disregard the name change of the Company only, that same Company had been doing the same thing for a decade. That is delivering multi base, multi entity training. It grew rapidly with the approach of the new legislation, as I knew it would.

In order to prepare for the legislation I invested hundreds of thousands of dollars, and worked with 10 CASA employees developing and massively improving all systems to be ready for the new regulations, as I was.

I appreciate that the recent comments are based very much around operational control.

I had been flying since 1982, and employed in the industry since the mid 90s. I was a Grade One, MEIFR instructor for many years. I operated in that multi base, multi entity structure for many years. Over the years that model improved substantially and the increases in technology made that task far more effective than it had been a decade earlier.

Lets look at one topic only and address "operational control"

Flight and duty Times.

In order to do this I want to make a comparison.

CASA have led the Ombudsman to believe that CASA had never permitted such a structure. There is no doubt that is blatantly false and misleading.

Lets consider Aero Club "A" that wanted to join APTA. Aero Club A had been operating under the AOC of another AOC Holder the day before with full CASA knowledge and approval.

When we considered any new member there was an extensive CASA approved preliminary inspection in our procedures. That procedure highlighted a significant deficiency with flight and duty times. The CASA accepted system to date had been manually entered and written, flight and duty times. They were many weeks behind schedule, and appeared to have some discrepancies. Significantly, there was no way to check the impacts of the past flight and duty times prior to departing on a flight. If there was a breach it would most likely only be picked up well after the breach occurred. As the acceptable method was a written method, and instructor would have little difficulty in adjusting those times, to ensure the breach disappeared. CASA would check those flight and duty times annually during an audit.

Under APTA, those flight and duties were promptly bought up to date and all historical information transferred into the APTA flight and duties, of which every pilot at every base was incorporated into the one system. The system automatically populated the times and would prevent an instructor signing out. The system also had a predictive capability, where all lessons had lesson times with buffers. It would alert the instructor if there was trend towards a breach.. There could be no fudging of flight and duties because the instructor had no control over times, dates, duration etc. In effect, a breach could not happen and in fact i don't believe that we had any breaches in the last 20,000 hours of flying. Consider also that CASA checked Aero Club As flight and duties annually. Under our system, CASA was provided full access, so CASA personnel could simply log in and check all flight and duties in real time, as well as all maintenance issues, training records, overdue flights, pilot qualifications etc etc etc.

The point being, I maintain that i had operational control, and that it is incumbent on CASA to determine that we did not have operational control, and to provide any evidence at all to support such a substantive determination

Cheers. Glen

I am still awaiting CASAS release under FOI of my request for our submitted request for our applications for both AVIA and LTF. Mr Aleck claims that CASA first became aware in October 2018.

[Lead Balloon]

Again, Glen, I’ll just predict what I reckon CASA will say, and why.

CASA does not need to make any “allegation” about anything when considering whether or not to grant an authorisation. One of the main points of the 13 March 2019 email was that CASA was not then satisfied that APTA did have operational control over all of the ‘alliance’ ‘members’’ activities. Part of that email said:As a matter of operational control, and integral to the very object of the authorisation[s] involved, CASA must be satisfied that all these considerations have been, and will continue to be, satisfied by the authorisation holder.

To the extent aspects of an authorisation holder’s [read APTA] safety-related functions under the civil aviation legislation might be conducted, for and on behalf of the authorisation holder, by and through separate and independent legal entities [read ‘alliance’ ‘members’], contractually engaged by the authorisation holder for those purposes, CASA would need to be fully satisfied that:

[…blah blah blah…]

In assessing this contract [these contracts], CASA will have regard to the way in which the specific operational activities for which APTA will be accountable, as the authorisation holder, can and will be carried out by the contracted entity, and the bases on which full operational control can and will be maintained by APTA under those arrangements.

…It was up to APTA to satisfy CASA that APTA had full operational control, not CASA to show that APTA didn’t. Again from the 13 March 2019 email: “[D]emonstrate to CASA’s satisfaction that a particular shortcoming or deficiency does not exist.”

Having visibility into a computer database does not confer authority to operationally control as a matter of law or practicality. And I reiterate that a computer database depends fundamentally on the stuff manually input to it.

I’m sure that you and I and a bunch of like-minded people could set up a flying school tomorrow and, as a matter of objective fact, the flying training activities would be conducted safely and the pilots trained to the requisite level of competence. But herein lies the rub: It would all be in breach of regulatory requirements. And I say again: I’m not defending those requirements; I can’t change them. I’m just trying to prepare you for what I reckon will be the arguments made and the flaws in them.

If I had to bet my bottom dollar, I’d say that this is just the usual right hand not knowing what the left was doing in CASA. One part of CASA was busily authorising the variation of AOCs - not just APTA's - to cover flying training at different locations, without having a proper understanding of the implications for legal and effective control when some of the people, premises and aircraft involved were not the AOC holder’s. Another part of CASA had a holy sh*t moment. That other part contained the bulk of adults actually in charge.

CASA’s ‘Plan A’ was to claim that the APTA structure is simply impermissible under the civil aviation legislation. That plan crashed and burned when someone competent and with integrity apparently read what the legislation actually says. The civil aviation legislation does not prohibit an AOC holder from utilising personnel who are not employees of the AOC holder, or premises of which the AOC holder is not owner or lessee, or aircraft of which the AOC holder is not the owner or registered operator, in the conduct of operations under the AOC. (But those arrangements raise the legal and effective control issue…)

So CASA’s ‘Plan B’ was effectively as described in CASA’s 13 March 2019 email. That email imposed a task that could have gone on forever with unlimited costs. That drove you to despair and broke.

But the elephant in the room remained (and remains) that variations to APTA’s AOC had previously been granted to authorise these kinds of arrangements, without CASA having made ATPA go through the process imposed by the 13 March 2019 email. Thus CASA wants to keep up the pretence that it did not become aware of the details of the APTA structure until late 2018 and that the structure was novel. (The 13 March 2019 email uses the language: “the novelty of the approach APTA proposes”.) The truth is in my view that CASA was at least on constructive notice of the details, from – at the latest – the point at which CASA considered the first variation application to cover an additional ‘base’. That’s the process during which the gist of the 13 March 2019 email should have been explained to APTA. And it should have been explained to any other AOC holder who ever wanted to conduct activities utilising personnel who are not employees of the AOC holder, or premises of which the AOC holder is not owner or lessee, or aircraft of which the AOC holder is not the owner or registered operator – all which activities occur, frequently. But CASA doesn’t have the corporate integrity to admit the earlier mistakes.

[AerialPerspective]

The Loyola bull**** artist J.A. Glen, what you created within your business was a good example of outcome based regulation, a way to safely operate and manage a business without abiding by prescriptive methodology. However the loopy lawyer didn’t subscribe to your methodology did he? Anyway, he is a wordsmith and full of ****, and this softly softly nice guy video is not a true picture of what the bearded weasel is really like. He has thrown a number of CASA DAS’s under the bus, and the way he did it so publicly to Spence in the Senate is a prime example of how this two-faced maggot operates.

What makes me laugh is CASA use the word 'outcome' in everything. I may be too simplistic, but what was wrong with the word 'result'. To my mind, a result is something that you can state as being what you expect. An outcome is something that is not known until it happens - e.g. "This is the result I wanted but the outcome was something different".

To me, this just feeds into this BS in management-speak these days that twists the buggery out of the language and invents versions of words that don't exist so they can be used as adjectives or verbs, etc. when they're not.

If I hear one more MORON state that "there are learnings from this" I'll vomit. WTF was wrong with 'lessons'??

Like business, CASA too is, as my 80+ year old airline veteran father would say "is, like society, drowning in a sea of bullsh*t".

[AerialPerspective]

The Loyola bull**** artist J.A. Glen, what you created within your business was a good example of outcome based regulation, a way to safely operate and manage a business without abiding by prescriptive methodology. However the loopy lawyer didn’t subscribe to your methodology did he? Anyway, he is a wordsmith and full of ****, and this softly softly nice guy video is not a true picture of what the bearded weasel is really like. He has thrown a number of CASA DAS’s under the bus, and the way he did it so publicly to Spence in the Senate is a prime example of how this two-faced maggot operates.

Haha, I just watched the intro to the video - what an utter pile of festering crap. Basically, abrogation of any responsibility - you can do what you want as long as this happens. I have to ask if American Airlines' 'inventive' way of achieving the 'outcome' of an engine change on DC-10s using a fork-lift instead of the recommended procedure was something that CASA wants - no one at the FAA balked at their process because it appeared to achieve 'the same outcome' but then engines started falling off aeroplanes.

[glenb]

To ensure that after 4 years, I have given CASA every opportunity to initiate an investigation into the conduct of Mr Aleck, I will shortly submit a formal allegation of misfeasance in public office. If my allegations were proven correct, it would have the potential to impact on the safety of aviation, so I am publishing it hear in its draft form to solicit any feedback, as i feel this matter is in the public interest. My email is [email protected] or post any feedback on here as you feel appropriate.

I will make 19 posts as each component is completed. The next post will be Post One. In that post you will see the index to each of the components.

Hope that makes sense, cheers. Glen

[glenb]

Complaint of professional misconduct by a CASA Employee. Specifically, an allegation of “Misfeasance in Public Office against Mr Jonathan Aleck, Executive Manager Legal, International and Regulatory Affairs.”



My name is Glen Buckley.

I am submitting an allegation of Misfeasance in Public Office against an employee of CASA. This document is divided into the following components, in support of that allegation of misfeasance.



1. Introduction/The allegation

2. Misfeasance in Public Office

3. First Element-Holder of Public Office

4. Second Element-Exercising a Public Power that was an incident of that Office

5. Must the Public Officer owe the plaintiff a duty with respect to the exercise of power.

6. Third Element- The Exercise of Authority must be invalid or otherwise lacking lawful authority.

7. Fourth Element- The “Bad Faith” mental Element

8. Can the Commonwealth be vicariously liable for the misfeasance of its employees?

9. Commonwealth liability for ministerial misfeasance?

10. Importance of an early and vigorous assessment of an allegation of misfeasance.

11. Damages

12. Assisting Commonwealth Officers, other than Ministers

13. Assisting Commonwealth Ministers

14. Reducing the risk of misfeasance claims

15. The need to report misfeasance issues as significant claims

16. Preference for CASA to investigate this allegation.

17. Considerations of Mr Aleck remaining in the role.

18. Why would Mr Aleck target Glen Buckley

19. Summary/conclusion





















1. Introduction and the allegation

In submitting this allegation, I am submitting it as the person most affected by the conduct, actions, and decisions of CASA employee, Mr Jonathan Aleck, although I am not the only individual or entity affected by Mr Alecks deliberate and considered conduct, actions, and decisions.

This is not an allegation of oversight, innocent error, or negligence. This is an allegation of misfeasance in public office made directly against Mr Aleck, Executive Manager of Legal, International and Regulatory Affairs with the Civil Aviation Safety Authority (CASA). The CASA organisational chart can be accessed here. About CASA | Civil Aviation Safety Authority (https://www.casa.gov.au/about-us/who-we-are/about-casa)

Mr Aleck has been with CASA since 1993 and served as the Head of the Legal Department of CASA for over two decades. He is the longest serving, and second most senior CASA Executive within CASA.

I respect that an allegation of misfeasance in public office is difficult to prove because of the burden to demonstrate that a person was making decisions not only unlawfully, but also in bad faith.

Not only is an allegation of misfeasance in public office difficult to prove, I respect that statistically it is highly unlikely to occur.

CASA has approximately 1000 employees, almost without exception, every single one of those employees walk into the workplace each day and act professionally and with good intent.

It is feasible and must be considered that just one of those 1000 employees may choose, not to enter the workplace and act professionally and with good intent on every occasion.

It is feasible that the same employee, may act professionally and with good intent on most occasions, but on selective occasions, and towards certain people, he may choose not to.

If that same Employee holds significant power, combined with ill intent, there is the potential to bring significant harm.

Any allegation should be robustly investigated, particularly in cases where so much harm has been caused, and the decision maker is the sole decision maker, and has no supporting safety case to justify his decision making.

That is my allegation. An allegation of Misfeasance in Public Office, targeted malice

I am aware of that high threshold, but I am fully satisfied that may be a highly unlikely scenario to an outsider, although the possibility must be considered, and especially if the decision makers decisions are not open to scrutiny within the organisation, and the individual wields enormous power, including the power to close businesses down as he did with mine.

Any action taken by any single Government employee alone that has such impact must be open to the highest levels of scrutiny.

[glenb]

1. Misfeasance in Public Office

The purpose of this correspondence is to formally submit allegations of Misfeasance in Public Office in support of my presentation to the Senate Estimates Committee on November 20th, 2020. A link to that presentation can be accessed here on AOPAs website Senate RRAT General Aviation Inquiry Commences – AOPA Australia (https://aopa.com.au/senate-rrat-general-aviation-inquiry/)

In submitting an allegation of misfeasance in Public Office, I have carefully considered this matter, and I am fully satisfied that my complaint is valid.

My understanding of misfeasance is drawn from significant research on the topic, and legal guidance, but perhaps the most pertinent document at this stage, is information from the Australian Government Central Legal Services (AGS) website Briefing 115 accessed via here. Legal briefing No. 115 | AGS (https://www.ags.gov.au/legal-briefing-no-115)

That Government document identifies the elements to an allegation of misfeasance in Public Office.

That document also draws from determinations made in the High Court, where Justice Deane determined that misfeasance in public office requires an intentional but 'invalid or unauthorised act' to be committed 'by a public officer in the purported discharge' of their public duties which causes loss to a person.

It requires that the person committing the act, did so deliberately.

In making this formal allegation I understand that the following criteria identified by Justice Deane and the AGS Document are essential in making that allegation. I am fully satisfied that the stipulated criteria have been met, and shortly I will address these criteria in detail, they are:

· The defendant must be the holder of a Public Office.

· The defendant must have purportedly exercised a power that was an incident of that office.

· The defendant's exercise of power must have been invalid/unlawful.

· A Duty of care is owed with respect to exercise of the power.

· The exercise of power must have been accompanied by one or other of the following forms of 'bad faith':




The defendant must have exercised the power knowing that he or she was acting in excess of power AND with the intention to cause harm to the plaintiff (sometimes referred to as targeted malice)
The defendant must have been recklessly indifferent to whether the act was beyond power AND recklessly indifferent to the likelihood of harm being caused to the plaintiff
The defendant must have acted with reckless indifference to whether the act was beyond power AND there must have been, objectively, a foreseeable risk of harm to the plaintiff. This third form of bad faith is very controversial.
The exercise of power must have been productive of loss.




I will attend to each of the elements identified in that AGS Briefing, in submission of this document.

I will not include every piece of relevant information. This document is intended to provide you, or the relevant person, sufficient information to conduct an initial assessment as to the validity of the complaint and assist in a determination as to whether this complaint warrants further investigation, and a requirement for me to supply further evidence, ideally initially, by way of a face-to-face meeting.

I fully appreciate the substantive nature of these allegations. I also fully accept that if my allegations were found to be vindictive or vexatious, or without substance, I would be held fully liable, as I should be.

In considering whether to submit this complaint, I have considered the following, and the potential to impact the safety of aviation if the allegations that I and others have made, were investigated and found to be substantiated.

· Employees of CASA, like all Government employees occupy positions of trust. They are entrusted by the Government and the community to undertake important aviation safety work on the community’s behalf. With this trust comes a high level of responsibility which should be matched by the highest standards of ethical behaviour from every employee of CASA. If the standards of ethical behaviour are compromised, there is the potential to negatively impact on the safety of aviation.
.

· These obligations placed on every employee of CASA by way of administrative law, criminal law, legislation, and CASAs own procedures, are intended to provide the public and industry with confidence in the way CASA employees behave, including in the exercise of authority when meeting the responsible Ministers objectives. A strict adherence to these obligations will ensure CASA has a safe, well intentioned, and effective organisational culture, and ensure that its employees act lawfully, which will optimise aviation safety. If a CASA employee deliberately chooses to bypass these obligations, there is the potential to negatively impact on the safety of aviation.

The obligations placed on every CASA employee are found across several documents but not limited to the following. In a situation where an employee chooses to ignore these obligations, there is the potential for the safety of aviation to be impacted.

1. CASAs own Regulatory Philosophy. Our regulatory philosophy | Civil Aviation Safety Authority (casa.gov.au) (https://www.casa.gov.au/about-us/who-we-are/our-regulatory-philosophy)

2. The Public Governance, Performance and Accountability Act 2013. This in particular is one area where a direct link exists between specific legislative obligations and the Code. The PGPA Act provides, through the duties of officials, a set of expected behaviours necessary for high standards of governance, performance and accountability. Public Governance, Performance and Accountability Act 2013 (legislation.gov.au) (https://www.legislation.gov.au/Details/C2013A00123)

3. CASAs Enforcement Manual which attends in significant detail to the principle as well as the procedures of CASAs enforcement processes. Enforcement Manual (casa.gov.au) (https://www.casa.gov.au/sites/default/files/2021-09/enforcement-manual.pdf)

4. CASAs Enforcement Policy. Enforcement action | Civil Aviation Safety Authority (casa.gov.au) (https://www.casa.gov.au/rules/compliance-and-enforcement/enforcement-action)

5. The APS Code of Conduct

In November 2013, the Deputy Prime Minister at the time announced an independent review of aviation safety regulation. One of the recommendations of that Review was that “CASA adopts the Code of Conduct and values that apply to the Australian Public Service”.

CASA agreed to this in principle and advised; “The Governments new Statement of Expectations to the CASA Board will reaffirm the requirement that CASA Staff adhere to a Code of Conduct and set of values consistent with those that apply to the APS.”

In the Implementation Report dated 31st July 2017, CASA advised that this matter was “Completed: The latest update to the SOE issued to the CASA Board in March 2017 continues to require CASA to have a code of conduct and values consistent with those of the Australian Public Service. CASAs Code of Conduct was amended in late 2014 and aligns with the APS Code of Conduct and Values.”

If by some “technicality” CASA claim that they are not obligated to act in accordance with the APS Code of Conduct and Values, the reasonable community expectation is that the nations aviation safety authority would operate to standards that are at least the equivalent of those standards for other Government departments, and perhaps even to a higher expectation.
6. Administrative Law, Natural Justice Procedural Fairness, and the Rule of Law

[glenb]

3 .First Element-Holder of Public Office



· This element will not be in contention. Mr Aleck is CASAs second most senior, and longest serving member of the senior management. He is the CASA Executive Manager of Legal, International, and Regulatory Affairs.

· Mr Aleck was the sole decision maker in my matter.

· These facts most likely would not be disputed by CASA. If they are disputed, could I ask that the CASA CEO Ms Pip Spence clearly identify that to me.



4. Second Element-Exercising a Public Power that was an incident of that Office

· This element requires that Mr Aleck was exercising a public power.

· Mr Aleck was exercising his “public power” repeatedly throughout the eight months as the CASA Executive Manager of Legal International and Regulatory Affairs.

· These facts would not be disputed by the CASA CEO, Ms Pip Spence.





5. Must the Public Officer owe the plaintiff a duty with respect to the exercise of power.

· Mr Aleck in his role has a public law obligation to act in the public interest. He has a duty of care not to abuse his powers.

· Mr Aleck has a Statutory Duty to exercise CASAs statutory powers lawfully, reasonably, and in good faith for the purposes for which those powers were given, and for a proper purpose.

· Mr Aleck has a common law duty to take reasonable care in the exercise of CASAs statutory powers.

· Mr Aleck has a common law duty not to exercise CASAs statutory powers in such a way as unlawfully and intentionally to interfere with trade or business.

· Mr Aleck had a common law duty not to act beyond power, intending to cause harm.

· Mr Aleck cannot improperly use his position to cause detriment to another.

· These obligations placed upon CASA would not be disputed by the CASA CEO, Ms Pip Spence.

[Paragraph377]

Haha, I just watched the intro to the video - what an utter pile of festering crap. Basically, abrogation of any responsibility - you can do what you want as long as this happens. I have to ask if American Airlines' 'inventive' way of achieving the 'outcome' of an engine change on DC-10s using a fork-lift instead of the recommended procedure was something that CASA wants - no one at the FAA balked at their process because it appeared to achieve 'the same outcome' but then engines started falling off aeroplanes.
Aagh, yes, a horrific accident that could have been avoided had the ‘CASA methodology’ been used in the USA - ban DC-10’s, aircraft engines, forklifts, engineers and pilots from operating airside altogether!

[Lead Balloon]

Mr Aleck was the sole decision maker in my matter.

I predict that Dr A will argue that he made no decisions about APTA, other than on the content of the text which was copied and pasted by White into his email to APTA of March 19. I predict that Dr A will argue that it was up to Mr White to make the operational decision whether to accept the implications of what was sent to him.

The fact that White copied and pasted that text and stated that he “agreed with” Dr A suggests to me that White was confused about who was advising whom and deciding what. When someone is given legal advice and a suggested strategy, it’s not up to the recipient to “agree” or “disagree” with the advice. It’s up to the recipient of the advice to decide whether to accept its implications and then decide what action to take as a consequence.

If White points at Dr A and says: “The content of the March 19 email was all your idea”, I predict Dr A’s response will be: “No. It was up to you to decide what, if anything, to do about what was sent to you.” Dr A is rarely silly enough to make operational decisions.

In any event, the gist of the requirements set out in the March 19 email have not been found to be unlawful. There was some bollocks in the verbose language, but the gist was a requirement for APTA to demonstrate the means by which APTA would exercise legal and effective control over all of the wandering cats at the ‘alliance’ ‘bases’.

APTA was led up the garden path by the earlier decisions to approve variations to APTA’s AOC to cover the addition of ‘alliance’ ‘bases’ without APTA having to satisfy the requirement set out in the March 19 email. I’ll bet leftie that Dr A had nothing to do with those earlier decisions.

Another aspect is that the word “decision” means many things to different people. If you’re going to allege Dr A was the “sole decision maker” in “your” matter and the decision/s was/were motivated by malice, you have to state what the decision/s was/were. For example, I’ll bet leftie that Dr A never made any decision to refuse something for which APTA applied. The March 19 email imposed a requirement for more information. It was not a refusal. And one of CASA’s standard tricks is to avoid making a decision, for which the decision-maker would be accountable, by requiring more information in the course of the process. In APTA’s case, as a matter of practicality the requirement drove you to despair and broke but CASA will say the requirement it imposed was lawful and, at the point you were driven to despair and broke, CASA had not made a final decision.

So I’d suggest you state, precisely, the “decisions” you reckon Dr A made that were motivated by malice. And “Dr A decided to shut me down” or “target me” is not a decision which, of itself, would have any effect on APTA’s or your interests.

“Dr A decided to refuse APTA’s application for….

“Dr A decided to give deliberately misleading advice, to the effect that [….] to […].

“Dr A decided to give deliberately misleading information, in the form of […], to […].

“Dr A decided to make a voodoo doll in my image and stick pins in it.”

Or whatever.

And I think you have to confront the implications of an issue I raised earlier: APTA was the entity with the AOC, not you. I suggest you try to make very clear whether you’re alleging a duty was owed to you, personally, or to APTA or to both. Remember: You and APTA are different people, APTA still exists and is still (from what I can tell) a functioning business.

(You might have already dealt with these issues in later parts of your draft material?)

(If you’re on the AGS website again for any reason, search for “negligent misstatement” and “government authority”. Just sayin’….)

[glenb]

I sink I lub You

[Sandy Reith]

Glen, hopefully LB’s comprehensive and detailed advice, obviously with depth of legal knowledge, will help in the quest for fairness and recompense.

Your exemplary persistence is inspiring and I think you have full support from virtually all GA people who know what has happened to you.

[glenb]

6. Third Element- The Exercise of Authority must be invalid or otherwise lacking lawful authority.

Fundamental to this entire matter is that Mr Alecks decision making is not supported by any legislation, CASA precedent, or external and independent legal advice. It is the application of his opinion only. Was his decision making, invalid and lacking in lawful authority? I am fully satisfied as the person most impacted, that it was, and that it was not well intentioned.

Mr Aleck holds significant power within CASA. We work in a complicated and often confusing regulatory environment. In such an environment there is the possibility for those rules and regulations to be manipulated in order to achieve a desired outcome, such as the closure of a controversial business owners business.

He was the sole decision maker as to the legality of my operation.

I am fully satisfied that Mr Alecks actions, decisions and his application of opinion was unfair, unjust, and ill intentioned, but even more than that, it was also invalid and lacking in proper lawful authority.

I emphasise here that this entire matter was a matter of the legality or not, as to the structure that CASA had permitted me to operate with for a decade, and now Mr Aleck determined to be unlawful.

It was not a matter of the organisation being deficient in any way against any identified quality outcomes at all. That in fact what makes the proportionality of this matter so inexplicable.

CASA can close a business because it is either unlawful or unsafe. In my case, there was no safety case, or any concerns ever raised by CASA. CASA closed my business down because Mr Aleck declared it unlawful. That initial notification includes terminology such as “contravention of”, “subject to enforcement action”, “operations not approved ”etc. As the Owner of the Business, I had no idea the notification was coming. No concerns had ever been raised throughout the last 10 years. was shocked and concerned. I immediately had concerns about “intent”.

In the initial notification and in subsequent face-to-face meetings, CASA identified to me that the structure that I had adopted for the last decade since I commenced operations in 2006 was now in October 2018, overnight determined to be unlawful against three regulatory criteria. One from the year 1988, being almost two decades before I even commenced operations, the other from 2006, being the year, I commenced operations and the third was against a regulation that was introduced only two months prior to CASA determining that my operation was unauthorised.

Mr Aleck applied his new interpretation of the legislation to my two businesses. One being APTA, the other being my flying school of 10 years, Melbourne Flight Training. Both were impacted significantly and immediately. I will deal with these matters in detail in the section titled ‘Damages”.

That initial notification was very clear and identified three regulatory breaches that I referred to earlier. CASA used those regulations to place restrictions on my businesses ability to trade.

CASA had clearly advised me that the “structure was not permitted. maybe some time in the future but that time is not now”.

Those alleged regulatory breaches as outlined in that initial notification of October 2018 were.

· CASR 141.050

· The Aviation Ruling and

· CAA s29.

A copy of that initial notification can be accessed here

https://www.dropbox.com/s/k3qn3qdgoa2uavx/App%20A%20initial%20notification.pdf?dl=0

I will attend to those breaches in that order, and the reasons why I believe that Mr Alecks actions and decisions were not valid, and they were unlawful.

Please understand I am not a lawyer, and I am not presently taking legal advice on this. I am an individual significantly impacted by Mr Alecks actions and decisions, I have limited resources. I am doing my best to convey these matters as clearly and concisely as I can.

With the passage of time, I am confident that Mr Aleck is now aware that his action was unlawful.

The decision that Mr Aleck made was that the structure I, and many others had operated with for over a decade had now become unlawful. I was the first person in Australia to have, what was a previously authorised CASA structure determined unlawful by CASA, and specifically, Mr Jonathan Aleck.

That structure that CASA had always accepted was:

· There was only one CASA Authorisation Holder, operating a Flying School and holding the required CASA Authorisation referred to as an Air Operator Certificate (AOC). Referred to as “Entity A”

· Typically, a regional aero club, “Entity B”, may wish to operate a flying school to deliver flight training. The aero club is run by a volunteer committee, who each have fulltime employment outside of aviation. They have no expertise at all in the complicated regulatory environment of running a flying school.

· Entity B would approach Entity A and ask that Entity A operate a flying school on behalf of Entity B. Entity A being the one and only holder of the CASA Approval to operate a flying school. That being the single AOC.

· This required formal CASA approval by way of an application process. From my experience of 25 years in the industry, this was always formally approved by CASA to every operator on every occasion, as it was with mine throughout its decade of operation. That was, until CASA determined that I was operating unlawfully in October 2018. That is despite CASA fully revalidating my entire structure only 18 months prior.



CASR 141.050 Civil Aviation Safety Regulations 1998 (legislation.gov.au) (https://www.legislation.gov.au/Details/F2022C00697/Html/Volume_4#_Toc100066105)

This regulation is from the new suite of regulations introduced on September 1st, 2018. CASR 141.050 advises that “a person commits an offence if they conduct flight training and do not have the Certificate or approval to do so”.

My response is very clear on this matter. “No person ever conducted flight training that they did not have the certificate or approval to do. None. Ever.

If CASA believe that is the case, they should be able to nominate the person, date, time, or some other supporting piece of evidence to suggest that ever happened or justify any concerns that it was a possibility to happen.

For CASA to use CASR 141.050 as the basis to place immediate restrictions on my businesses ability to trade, in my opinion, had no basis in law, and was unlawful, and particularly so CASA as have at no stage been able to identify what led them to make that allegation.

In your investigation, could you respond specifically to CASR 141.050 and advise if CASA still claims that I breached this regulation, now that Mr Aleck has had four years to consider this matter.

I maintain that CASA had no valid basis to raise this alleged breach. It was a new regulation being only introduced two months prior, however I was the first person in Australia to have allegedly breached this regulation.

An explanation of CASAs interpretation is a fair and reasonable request. It isa new regulation, it appears to be applied in a very confusing manner, and potentially not as intended. Considering that this was used as a regulation to close by business, the wider industry is also entitled to CASAs interpretation. It has the potential to have significant implications.



The Aviation Ruling

An Aviation Ruling, in its simplest form, is a recommendation from CASA. It does not have a “Head of Power” and is advisory in nature.

The Aviation Rulings were a very discrete document that was not widely known about. In fact, many CASA personnel were not even aware of them. Most of my peers in the flight training industry advised they also were not aware of them. They were very rarely published and were quite industry specific. There had never been an Aviation Ruling that was directed at the flight training industry, therefore the document was not widely known of. In fact Aviation Rulings weren’t addressed in the Air Law syllabus that CASA published, and required to be taught.

Fortunately, the CASA employee that I was dealing with at the time of its release in 2006 bought it to my attention and suggested very early on that I consider the document as I was operating in a multi entity structure under my AOC at the time of its introduction, and some considerations may be relevant to the flight training sector.

They were, and they were attended to by my CASA approved procedures in 2006, and again in April 2017 when my entire structure was redesigned and approved by CASA to meet the new upcoming regulatory requirements of September 1st, 2017 (later postponed 12 months by CASA)

A fuller CASA explanation of what an Aviation Ruling is can be found via the following link. This link also contains a copy of the specific Aviation Ruling that CASA used as the basis to close my business down, and some correspondence from me to CASA questioning its applicability to the Flight Training Industry.

Before proceeding, it is important to understand that there are two very separate and distinct categories of the General Aviation Industry. One being Charter (carriage of passengers and freight), and the other being Flight Training.

They are obviously and understandably, very different categories of the aviation industry.

The Flight Training sector obviously delivers flight training. In our case we were a Registered Training Organisation #22508, delivering a Diploma in Aviation. We are effectively “the school” and like all schools utilise teachers to deliver a syllabus of training, leading up to a flight test, as a prerequisite for entry into the workplace.

The Charter industry is “the workplace”. This is after the flying school once the student has graduated and left. It will most likely be the pilots first job after graduating. They will be earning an income and working as a commercial pilot flying passengers and freight.

These industries are as different as chalk and cheese, albeit that they both utilise aircraft. One environment delivers training to students, and the other is the workplace.

Of course, there is some regulatory overlap, however CASA very clearly identifies and regulates these two industries to significantly different criteria, as would be expected.

The point of this being that the nature of the different industries brings up completely different challenges, and each operates to a completely different regulatory structure. The “school” is fundamentally different to the “workplace”, just as in all industries, and CASA responds to those industries differently, as they should.

It is not reasonable that CASA would use an Aviation Ruling designed for one sector of the industry i.e., Charter to be applied to the other i.e., Flight Training.

The Aviation Ruling was introduced to attend to the Charter industry and not the Flight Training industry. That is the advice that CASA provided to the Flight Training industry, and me personally in 2006 when CASA released the Aviation Ruling.

The fact that Mr Aleck had chosen to use the Aviation Ruling intended for the Charter Industry as the initial basis of the action against me in the Flight Training industry was both surprising and concerning for me. I had immediate concerns about “intent”. It was not a valid document to be using.

After approximately 7 weeks of trading restrictions in place, CASA did concur that it was the inappropriate document to be using and it was “taken off the table”, although the trading restrictions remained in place, despite my protestations, presumably because CASA put such significant weight on the other two pieces of legislation that they used, being CASR 141.050 which I have already attended to, and CAA s29 which I will attend to shortly.

Nevertheless, the trading restrictions stayed in place, and were not lifted.

The background to the Aviation ruling was that a Charter Company, not a Flight Training Company, operating out of Essendon Airport many years ago had its CASA Air Operator Certificate (AOC) suspended by CASA due to questionable maintenance practices. Overnight that Company approached another Operator and continued operating under the other Operators AOC, probably I assume in order to continue operations, and avoid the CASA restrictions.

CASA introduced the Aviation Ruling as a response to that practice in the Charter industry. As to the appropriateness of that response, I have no experience in the Charter industry, so would not be qualified to comment.

The introduction of the Aviation Ruling in 2006, did create initial concern from the Flight Training industry as we sought clarification on the applicability of it, and that is the recollection of my peers in the industry. As a number of Operators including myself were operating in the multi base, multi entity structure, clarification of this from CASA was essential for continued operations.

Whereas two or more operators the Charter Industry may have operated under the one AOC to circumvent obligations, the flight training industry used the structure with full and formal CASA approval for very different reasons.

Often a rural aero club may have facilities, refuelling, aircraft, maintenance, and even have a local junior flight instructor eager to start their career teaching at the local aero club. Unfortunately, due to the Aero Club committees lack of expertise in flight training, they are unable to deliver flight training, they don’t have an AOC, and have difficulty attracting the required Key personnel, who are in short supply, and most especially in rural areas.

More significantly, the Aero Club Committee are not willing or able to hold a CASA issued AOC to deliver flight training. They have no legal ability to deliver flight training. They have no operational control over anything, other than the aero club bar. That voluntary committee does not want to run a flying school, they want to pull beers and run a social aero club.

The Aero club would approach an established flying school who hold the approval and have the expertise, and enter into an arrangement with the flying school, being the sole AOC Holder to deliver operations at the aero club, on their behalf. This was a formal process requiring CASA consent and formal approval. It was commonplace practice.

When operators in the flight training industry entered such arrangements, CASA would have absolutely no involvement or requirements as to the nature of the commercial arrangement between the entities. This requirement placed on me was an industry first. I have absolutely no objection to it, although it was an unusual level of involvement for CASA to become involved in commercial contracts.

CASA would however be heavily involved, and rightfully so, in aspects of safety, regulatory compliance, operational control etc before formally approving that arrangement to proceed.

In such arrangements where a Flying School such as mine did operate a flying school on behalf of an aero club, the Flying School, being the one and only AOC Holder with the one and only group of Key personnel, would take on all responsibility as is specified in the legislation.

In such situations CASA would have negligible engagement with the aero club committee, as they were not mentioned in the legislation. They are effectively a voluntary committee for the running of the aero club as a whole.

All communication with CASA would be with the sole AOC Holder, who was taking on responsibility, and not the aero club committee who are not “Key Personnel”.

This entailed the one and only flying school holding the only AOC, and that AOC Holders Key Personnel, to operate a flying school utilising the Aero Clubs existing infrastructure and resources i.e. junior instructor, buildings and facilities, maintenance facilities, aircraft etc.

Obviously with the one and only AOC Holder being accountable for all operations at all bases conducted under the AOC.

This existing practice in the Flight Training Industry, was permitted to continue uninterrupted after the introduction of the Aviation Ruling in 2006.

The CASA explanation of this matter, and why the Aviation Ruling, did not apply to the flight training industry was:

At the time, the practice of more than one flying school operating under a single AOC in the flight training industry was accepted and formally approved by CASA. CASA deemed that the significant differences between the Charter Industry and the Flight training industry meant that the Aviation Ruling applied to the Charter Industry only, and not to the Flight Training industry. The industry differences were significant enough that it did not apply.

That is evidenced by the fact that many Flight Training operators continued operating in that way, as I did, from its issue in 2006 right through until October 2018, when my structure of more than a decade was deemed unlawful, in part against that 2006 document.

CASA further advised that to clarify that distinction between Charter and the Flight Training Industry, CASA intended to remove Flight Training from the definition of “commercial purposes” in the legislation, although the Charter Industry would remain as a “commercial” operation in the legislation. That would clarify the confusion about the Aviation Ruling and its applicability to the Flight Training sector.

That proposed regulatory change was impacted by the multiple postponements of that legislation by CASA. it was originally scheduled for completion in 2006, although the legislation finally came through in September 2014. The pre and post, 2014 pieces of legislation can be accessed here. https://www.dropbox.com/s/x5td8psqx4uoz1w/Appendix%20C%20CAR%20206%20operations.pdf?dl=0

Although the legislation may not have finally been introduced until 2014, CASAs intent was very clear, and CASA made that clear at the time in 2006, that the Aviation Ruling did not apply to the Flight Training Industry.

Irrespective of its applicability or not, I did not breach anything on the Aviation Ruling anyway.

Note that shortly after CASA used it against my business, interestingly, it was repealed by CASA, so can no longer be accessed on their website.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/lewmcp0nas2bsrp/applicability%20of%20aviation%20ruling.pdf?dl=0

In the initial notification of October 23rd 2018, Mr Aleck quotes a specific written phrase from the Aviation Ruling, “The AOC Holder at all times remains responsible for the actions of another person conducting operations under the AOC.”

However, Mr Aleck interprets that very clear and concise statement, that I agree 100% with, completely manipulates it and interprets it and applies it to my business in that initial notification as “The Ruling does not permit an AOC Holder to authorise a third-party body corporate to conduct operations under its AOC.

I really don’t know how to respond to this. other than to say. No, it doesn’t. I’m no lawyer, but how on earth can I as the owner of a business be expected to interpret.

“The AOC Holder at all times remains responsible for the actions of another person conducting operations under the AOC.”

as

“The Ruling does not permit an AOC Holder to authorise a third-party body corporate to conduct operations under its AOC.”

The Aviation Ruling does not state that an AOC Holder is not permitted to authorise a third party to conduct operations under its AOC.

In fact, if it did state that then I suggest that the entire aviation industry would grind to a halt. Consider QANTAS or the RAAF, they would regularly have third parties conducting operations under the CASA approval referred to as an AOC. It is a normal way of doing business in the aviation industry.

Therefore, you understand that I question the lawfulness, validity, and intent of Mr Alecks interpretation.

The Aviation Ruling was not the valid document to be using to take such substantive action and close a business. The Aviation Ruling:



· Does not have a “Head of Power”.


Was written in 2006 for an entirely different regulatory environment. i.e., was written for the CAR 5 regulatory environment that was discontinued on September 1st, 2014, and replaced by the CASR regulatory structure after that date, being over 4 years before CASA closed my businesses
Was written for the Charter Industry, or what is referred to as Civil Aviation Regulation 206 (CAR206) operation for commercial purposes. CASA themselves determined that flying training was not a CAR 206 operation in September of 2014 and removed it.
The terminology refers to personnel positions that are in CAR 206 operations, and do not exist in Flying Training organisations.
On its release the flying schools were advised that in fact it did not apply to them, and that is the recollection of peers in the industry.



The Commonwealth Ombudsman in the Phase One Report advised “Conceptually, I accept CASA's view that the Ruling may reflect broader policy considerations. Nevertheless, in my concluded view there was an administrative deficiency due to an absence of a direct relationship between the activity being regulated and the policy said to regulate it. This gave rise to ambiguity and uncertainty with the potential to cause detriment to those relying on the accuracy of the regime or, conversely, prevent detriment from occurring.

Significant detriment did obviously occur, and that is why I believe that an investigation should be conducted into Mr Alecks conduct.

Of note. In the Ombudsman’s Report of 25th June 2020, the Ombudsman Office also directs a comment towards CASA and states:

“Thank you for your advice that CASA will amend the Aviation Ruling to confirm the intent of the breadth of its application.”

Over two years after CASA gave that commitment to the Ombudsman’s office in June 2020, as at the time of writing in September 2022, CASA has still not amended the Aviation Ruling as they assured the Ombudsman’s office that they would over two years ago.

What CASA has done instead, is withdraw the Aviation Ruling, and not amended any other legislation to counter that removal.

That action alone suggests to me that CASA recognise that they have erred in using the Aviation Ruling as a document in support of the decision that I was operating unlawfully.

I am fully satisfied in my own mind and always was fully satisfied that the Aviation Ruling was not a valid and appropriate document to be using as the basis for closing down my business. The Ombudsman’s findings support my contention, and the fact that has since been repealed by CASA must surely raise concerns as to the validity of using that document. It was very much used as the cornerstone of CASA approach towards me during the first seven weeks, until it was “off the table”.

[glenb]

The Use of CAA S27(8) of the Civil Aviation Act

Civil Aviation Act 1988 (legislation.gov.au) (https://www.legislation.gov.au/Details/C2016C01097)

The third piece of legislation that CASA used to close down the business was Part III Division Two, S27(8) of the Civil aviation act that states.

“An AOC is not transferrable”

CASAs own interpretation of this legislation had always been that an Air Operator Certificate (AOC), can be issued to a Person or a Company, but the AOC cannot ever be “transferred” to a different Person or Company. That is to say, that the AOC and Company it was issued to, can be sold/transferred together, but an AOC cannot be sold on its own. It is not transferable between Companies.

That has always been CASAs interpretation of that legislation. CASA always applied it in that manner.

Mr Aleck took this legislation and manipulated it in a way that he could use it to close down my Business.

I need to be very clear on this. There was only ever one AOC, and that was the AOC issued to my Company in 2006. There was never any attempt by me to sell or transfer my Company or my AOC.

I did not attempt to transfer my AOC. Ever.

Regarding the allegation that I breached CAA s27 (2B) (8). “An AOC is not transferrable”. I absolutely refute that, and CASA has never satisfactorily explained this alleged breach. I do not believe that CASA will stand by that allegation of a breach of the Civil Aviation Act.



The Ombudsman’s Report

Phase One of the Ombudsman’s report was issued on June 25th, 2020.

This was 18 months after CASA initiated the action, and one year after CASA had forced all customers to leave APTA, including my own flying school, and the Business had been dismantled by CASA. The harm had already been done.

For complete clarity, all Members of APTA that had been previously formally approved by CASA had those approvals retracted, and all members including my own flying school of a decade were forced to leave, despite our preference to remain in APTA, as we should have been permitted to do.

October 23rd, 2018, CASA advised that my businesses of more than a decade were operating unlawfully, and that I was subject to prosecution by CASA. By mid-2019, CASA had completed that process of closing the businesses, that they commenced 8 months prior.

There was, and never has been any CASA identified deficiency in any of our quality outcomes. There were no breaches of any of our procedures. No concerns have been ever raised by CASA.

The CASA case was always, and only that I was operating unlawfully and that is repeated by CASA in the recording that was provided to the Ombudsman Office previously. That recording is 6 months after this matter commenced.

June 25th 2020, one year after CASA closed the businesses, the Ombudsman Phase One report was released and the report found that:

· As of October 2016, no Australian legislation prohibited 'franchising' of an AOC, subject only to the exclusivity of the AOC holder’s operational control, and that remained the case as of 25 March 2020.



· There would be no legal or regulatory impediment to Mr Buckley or APTA selling or licencing intellectual property in the form of its AOC exposition to other FTO. And there would be no legal or regulatory impediment to CASA issuing part 142 Permissions on submission of those expositions by other FTO.

Based on those findings by the Commonwealth Ombudsman Office, I am fully satisfied that that Mr Alecks decision making was unlawful and invalid.

For complete clarity. I am fully satisfied that Mr Aleck had no legal basis on which to close my business down. His actions and decisions were unlawful.

That Phase One Report by the Ombudsman can be accessed here:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/0nyon53qllhuvyh/Phase%201%20report.pdf?dl=0



CASAs own independent external legal advice

Not only does the Ombudsman’s report state that CASA had no legal basis, CASAs own external, independent legal advice also found that there was no regulatory breach, and therefore it must be assumed, Mr Alecks actions, decisions, and opinions were not lawful ones.

Mr Aleck initially sought no external and independent legal advice. Mr Aleck was the sole decision maker in applying crippling trading restrictions.

Months later, after Mr Aleck had acted and placed trading restrictions on the business, and his conduct was called into question, only then did CASA then seek independent and external legal advice. That advice also confirmed that Mr Alecks application of opinion had no legal basis.

As the CASA Industry Complaints Commissioner, you will have access to that advice that CASA received, and I ask that you review that advice in arriving at your determination as to the lawfulness or not of Mr Alecks decision making.

I do not believe that there was a valid reason, or a lawful one.

Mr Aleck did not act in accordance with precedent set by CASA.

Since the commencement of Australia forming an aviation safety body, and throughout my own 40 years industry experience CASA had always and on every occasion permitted the identical structure that I had adopted.

CASA permitted me to adopt that structure for over a decade, until Mr Aleck suddenly determined that it was my businesses that became unlawful in October 2018.

The truth of the matter is that possibly Mr Aleck the CASA Executive Manager of Legal, International and Regulatory Affairs personally only became aware of the structure just prior to October 2018 when he declared that it was unlawful.

It was, however, his own Department that had been approving it for many years prior and formally approving bases etc

“CASA” and its other personnel were fully and formally aware of the structure that I had adopted for approximately one decade. It is ludicrous for Mr Aleck representing the agency CASA to assert to the Ombudsman that CASA had never permitted this structure, and only found out that I had adopted it in October 2018.

If Mr Aleck confirms that CASA was aware, but in fact, he wasn’t personally aware, that would go some way to explaining why I was permitted to operate in that structure for so many years.

The deficiency in communication is very clearly within CASA. There were no deficiencies in my communication with CASA. All forms were completed, all fees paid, and CASA had formally approved bases for many years prior. There were many thousands of pages of documentation between CASA and I over the many years.



Administrative Law, Procedural Fairness, Natural Justice

Consider that throughout this entire process from commencement in October 2018 through until the CASA induced cessation of operations, I did not ever have any right of appeal or review.

Mr Aleck has been the CASA Executive Manager of the CASA legal department for two decades he is responsible for CASAs procedures. He is fully aware and is a Subject Matter Expert (SME) on all matters of legislation and administrative law, in fact he wrote most of those procedures.

If my rights under procedural fairness, natural justice, and administrative law have been bypassed, it is not feasible that it is an error or mistake. It is more likely that it is a considered decision.

I was completely unable to protect myself against Mr Alecks conduct, because CASA was “thinking” about the wording for the contracts for the entire eight months but refusing to make a decision, despite me calling on them to do so.

I did approach the AAT seeking consideration but as “no decision had been made”, that avenue of appeal was not open to me.

CASA have breached Administrative Law obligations specified in CASAs own Enforcement manual particularly with regards to procedures for cancelling, suspending, or varying an Air Operator Certificate (AOC) that can be found in CASAs Enforcement Manual. It is most likely that CASA will try and justify their actions by claiming that it was not a cancellation, variation, or suspension of an AOC. To all intents and purposes, it clearly was. CASA placed a 7 day certainty of operations on the AOC.

Enforcement manual | Civil Aviation Safety Authority (casa.gov.au) (https://www.casa.gov.au/publications-and-resources/publication/enforcement-manual)

It is important to understand that CASA had formally approved bases to operate under APTA over many years. CASA placed a restriction on the AOC that gave it only 7 days certainty of operations. This notification applied to all bases, including my own that had been operating for over a decade. It too, was given only 7 days certainty of operations.

CASA placed a restriction of 7 days certainty of operations on all of the operations under the AOC. That included bases that had been preapproved by CASA for over 10 years.


Clarification around the Temporary Locations

The specific procedure that I used to facilitate continuing operations for flying schools under an interim approval while CASA processed the application to join APTA was referred to as the Temporary Locations procedure.



The initial notification refers to the Temporary Locations procedure, and that I was using it not vas intended, and that I may be subject to prosecution.



This is absurd. This is the exact procedure that CASA suggested to me and formally approved to do exactly what I used it for and had been doing so for many years.



Initially, this was not my intended procedure.



This was a procedure that CASA suggested to me, worked with me to design to CASAs full satisfaction. CASA then formally approved it, applied it, and audited it.



Surely it must be unlawful, and certainly invalid, if CASA recommend a procedure to be used, I accept their advice, CASA then approve it, and years later they tell me that it is unlawful. To put it mildly, that would have to be considered “being led up the garden path.”



Flying Schools have always been able to use a "temporary locations" procedure.

This was a standard operating procedure for most flying schools. This facilitated flying schools running operations from a different location than their main base, for short term use. All operations were fully embedded into the Company Exposition (previously referred to as Operations Manual). Some examples would be:


A school usually operates from a busy airport but has a group of foreign pilots are coming for training. Those students are not native English speakers. That Temporary location could be at a less congested base, in order to optimize learning outcomes.
A Temporary location could be activated as an additional base during periods when the main base is affected by poor weather i.e., Winter.
Bushfires or another emergency may require a secondary base to be established.
A Temporary location could be established to access maintenance facilities, buildings etc. and ensure continuity of training etc. etc.


During the APTA design stage I worked with a CASA team referred to as CMT 2. These personnel were well intentioned and had a good grasp of APTA and CASA material.



The project of redesigning every aspect of APTA to both improve it, and ensure it met the new regulatory requirements was an enormous project.



When it came to the discussion around inducting new members to APTA the conversation went something very similar to this, and I have confirmed this with my Technical Writer and other management who were present at the meetings with CASA.



APTA "Once we put in an application for a new base to join us, how long do you anticipate it would take CASA to process the application so that we can activate the base"

CASA "Approximately 6 to 8 weeks, but in the interim you could activate them through a " Temporary locations procedure, while CASA makes their assessment. That will facilitate continuing operations. Besides many of these schools are existing flying schools wanting to operate under APTA, so if they already meet the standard, there is no reason they would not continue to meet the standard, and ideally improve in the future"

APTA; "Can we do that, would you be satisfied with that?

CASA: of course, you already have that procedure in your manuals. The Temporary Locations Procedure!

Note: Our original APTA plan was to have the new member base inactive until fully approved by CASA. In many cases this would have involved fully operating flying schools shutting down for a protracted period, while CASA assessed the application. This option that CASA alerted us to was the ideal solution. It also potentially improved safety as it gave CASA the opportunity to base their ongoing approval on inspecting a fully operational APTA base. My expectation was that this CASA inspection would occur shortly after commencing operations. In fact it took many months for CASA to get around to the inspections and approvals. My expectation was that process would take approximately 6 to 8 weeks. The third base to be approved by CASA actually took CASA almost 12 months to assess and approve. It was fortunate that i had opted for the advice that CASA gave me, in adopting the Temporary Locations procedure, or that business would have been lying idle for 12 months.

So in the design stage we adopted the recommended CASA procedure initially which is extracted from CASAs own guidance material and please make note of that fact, as it will become more pertinent later in this post. We placed that into our manuals and adopted that procedure. Under CASAs very own procedure, that we adopted in our manuals they approved bases under that procedure, so I reasonably felt that CASAs own procedure was acceptable. In November 2017, we underwent a Level 1 CASA audit, being the highest-level audit, and that audit included the bases and no concerns were raised at all by CASA at that time, after all, I was using the CASA recommended procedure.



Surely it cannot be lawful or valid to threaten regulatory action against a procedure that is used as intended, on advice from CASA, which CASA then approve.

[Piston_Broke]

Commenting late re this thread.

Just curious - who do you intend sending this 19 part document to?

Having once been on the receiving end of outside corro as the first point of internal distribution, something lengthy went to the bottom of the "To Do" folder for looking at later - sometimes much later.

The same result I'm sure with the ultimate recipients. Human nature: short attention span.

[AerialPerspective]

Aagh, yes, a horrific accident that could have been avoided had the ‘CASA methodology’ been used in the USA - ban DC-10’s, aircraft engines, forklifts, engineers and pilots from operating airside altogether!

I think you've read me the wrong way. I'm saying, it's that sort of crap (that CASA is peddling) that led to the engine falling off the DC-10, instead of proper oversight.

[glenb]

1. Introduction/The allegation

2. Misfeasance in Public Office

3. First Element-Holder of Public Office

4. Second Element-Exercising a Public Power that was an incident of that Office

5. Must the Public Officer owe the plaintiff a duty with respect to the exercise of power.

6. Third Element- The Exercise of Authority must be invalid or otherwise lacking lawful authority.

7. Fourth Element- The “Bad Faith” mental Element

8. Can the Commonwealth be vicariously liable for the misfeasance of its employees?

9. Commonwealth liability for ministerial misfeasance?

10. Importance of an early and vigorous assessment of an allegation of misfeasance.

11. Damages

12. Assisting Commonwealth Officers, other than Ministers

13. Assisting Commonwealth Ministers

14. Reducing the risk of misfeasance claims

15. The need to report misfeasance issues as significant claims

16. Preference for CASA to investigate this allegation.

17. Considerations of Mr Aleck remaining in the role.

18. Summary/conclusion


This component may extend over a few posts. I am posting as I complete it. Cheers. Glen.





6. Fourth Element- The “Bad Faith” mental Element



The Fourth Element to an allegation of misfeasance in public office requires that the exercise of power must have been accompanied by one, or other of the following forms of 'bad faith':




The defendant must have exercised the power knowing that he or she was acting in excess of power AND with the intention to cause harm to the plaintiff (sometimes referred to as targeted malice)
The defendant must have been recklessly indifferent to whether the act was beyond power AND recklessly indifferent to the likelihood of harm being caused to the plaintiff
the defendant must have acted with reckless indifference to whether the act was beyond power AND there must have been, objectively, a foreseeable risk of harm to the plaintiff.




I am alleging that Mr Aleck exercised his power knowing that he or she was acting in excess of power AND with the intention to cause harm to me personally. From my own experience, and as the person most affected, I am fully satisfied that Mr Aleck was demonstrating targeted malice, and for complete clarity that is my allegation. I understand that a knowingly invalid and harmful exercise of power is required for me to demonstrate “targeted malice”.

I respect that to prove targeted malice it may require more than the single issue to be the basis of the allegation. To support my allegation of targeted malice, I am alleging that Mr Aleck demonstrated a pattern of behaviour that caused harm, over an entirely unnecessarily protracted period. Mr Aleck has no supporting safety case to support his decision making, and this harm was not actuated by a desire to advance a public interest i.e., safety.

Throughout the eight months with restrictions on the businesses ability to operate, Mr Aleck was fully aware throughout that time of the reputational harm being caused, the commercial harm being caused, and the trauma that would result from his decision making. To ensure that he was fully aware, CASA was notified in writing on multiple occasions by me, the first occasion, as soon as 24 hours after the trading restrictions were first put in place in October 2018.

In support of my allegation as to the bad faith element. It is important to understand a brief background.

For the decade prior to the introduction of the proposed Part 141/142/61 regultory overhaul, I had taken an industry lead on raising concerns. These concerns were raised at various CASA conferences and meetings, and I did obtain some media coverage. In forums where I made comment I put my name to those comments rather than use an “alias”.

Industry peers had warned me that CASA may try to bring harm to me because of comments that I was making publicly. With hindsight, I naively believed that the principles of administrative law, natural justice, procedural fairness, CASAs Regulatory Philosophy, the Ministers Statement of Expectations and other protections would prevent an act of misfeasance. With hindsight, I was clearly wrong.

Ironically, and not directly related to this correspondence, after CASA closed my two businesses, and I obtained employment in the industry as a CASA approved Head of Operations, CASA soon wrote to my Employer, withdrawing their approval for my continuing employment, and advising my employer that my “continuing employment was no longer tenable based on comments that Mr Buckley is making publicly”. Ironically my industry peers had been correct.

Mr Aleck due to his senior role in the legal department and based in Canberra would usually not have any awareness as to the owner and CEO of a flying school. In my previous 25 years in the industry, I had never met Mr Aleck.

Mr Aleck would only have become aware of me, as a result of me raising concerns both through direct correspondence with CASA, and the media attention that I had obtained in the print media including the newspaper, “The Australian”.

My feedback was always well intentioned, well considered, and in accordance with my own philosophy within my own organisation, “if you come to me with a problem, also come with a proposed solution. It doesn’t mean I will adopt it, but we will have considered it”. The point being that my concerns were well intentioned and intended for the betterment of the industry.

Whilst this entire matter will need far more information than I can provide in this document, the industry concerns that I had raised publicly with CASA had centred around the following dot points.



1. The failure of CASA to achieve “clear and concise aviation safety standards” as one of its core functions identified in the Civil Aviation Act. Ironically, it is exactly that failure to achieve clear and concise aviation standards, combined with bad intent that has led to my entire matter. https://www.dropbox.com/s/m1xbgvioy7thuxx/Civil%20Aviation%20Act.docx?dl=0



2. CASAs Regulation Impact Statement (RIS) regarding the impact on industry. The passage of time had demonstrated that CASA had grossly miscalculated the impact on industry. The RIS was grossly inaccurate, and the industry in its entirety would concur with that. I was of the opinion that any future RIS should be signed off by a senior CASA Executive to ensure accountability and ensure that this did not happen again.



3. The impact of the proposed regulatory structure on the industry, and particularly on those smaller aero clubs and flying schools in rural areas. The passage of time has validated the concerns that I raised, with most of them now having ceased operations because of the increasing burden of the new regulations.



I had also raised concerns about the foreign ownership of much of Australia’s flight training, with foreign owned companies, predominantly Chinese owned, delivering over 60% of flight training in Australia. A staggering increase, which I attributed to the increasingly burdensome requirements more suited to large foreign owned Companies rather than small to medium Australian owned businesses.

It is possible that some in CASA could have taken umbrage at me taking an industry lead on raising concerns, meeting with the Deputy PM at the time, and the associated media coverage and public attention that I obtained. That is what I believe.

The concerns that I raised were never intended as a criticism of Mr Aleck personally, although with the wisdom of hindsight, I can see that some personality types may have taken that feedback personally, and it is feasible that those prejudices could have impacted on decision making by Mr Aleck, as I believe they did.

The very success of the APTA business model was in fact because of the deficiencies in the regulatory program, and the increasing difficulty for a single school operating alone to meet the costs of operating, and the increasing difficulty in the flight training industry attracting the required Key Personnel.

There is no doubt that soon after the introduction of the new regulations, APTA was to experience a period of significant growth, as we did, and as we had planned for. The very reason for the expansion of the same structure that I had adopted for many years, was the deficiencies in the proposed legislation.

It is feasible that the CASA employee responsible for that proposed legislation may take umbrage to my business model. i.e. entities working collaboratively under one Approval, with one set of Operations manuals and one set of CASA required Key personnel, to address the challenges of increasingly burdensome requirements, and the difficulty of attracting required Key personnel, while being able to increase safety and compliance by pooling expertise and experience.



MR ALECK HAS NOT EVER BEEN ABLE TO PROVIDE ANY EVIDENCE OF ANY EVIDENCE BASED SAFETY CONCERNS

Mr Alecks closed down my business, with absolutely no supporting safety case. At no stage did CASA ever or has ever identified any safety concerns. Nothing would cause Mr Aleck to have any safety concerns about my business. It is entirely unreasonable that a person’s livelihood is destroyed by the actions and decisions of a single individual, and most particularly when that individual has no evidence at all to support his decision making. This is not an “application that CASA rejected”. This is a reversal. My business had been operating in that same structure with full CASA approval for over a decade. If CASA close that business down with no prior warning, the owner of that business should be entitled to some evidence to support that decision making.

You may or may not be awre of the I Cook scandal in Victoria where a business owners livelihood was ddestroyed, like mine. In Mr Cooks case he alledges that a slug was planted in order to justify Councils actions. It’s a tragic story, and Im pleased to see that Mr cook now plans to run on anti corruption platform against Mr Daniel Andrews in Mr Andrews own seat. I Cook boss takes on Premier | Dandenong Star Journal (starcommunity.com.au) (https://dandenong.starcommunity.com.au/news/2022-08-29/i-cook-boss-takes-on-premier/)

The reason that I mention it is, at least Mr Cook was dealing with some “evidence” irrespective of how tenuous it was.

Basically, Mr Hanton, “I want my slug” CASA should surely be able to provide one piece of “evidence” to support Mr Alecks decision making.





THE MATTER IN ITS ENTIRETY, INCLUDING ALL THE HARM CAUSED, COULD HAVE BEEN COMPLETELY AVOIDED AT ANY TIME BEFORE THE NOTIFICATION WAS SENT, AND AT ANY TIME AFTER WITHIN FOUR HOURS.

Consider all of the harm caused to so many. It is obscene that this matter in its entirety could have so easily been completely avoided. That could have happened at any time, and even before CASA sent that initial notification, and imposed the trading restrictions.

During the first two months of this matter, the entire matter was only to the lawfulness or not, as to my structure that I had adopted since we commenced operations in 2006. CASA had advised me in the presence of witnesses, and a Stat Dec can be provided by witnesses, that we were going to be closed by CASA.

I strongly objected to CASAS actions for the reasons that I have outlined above in the previous section relating to the legality or not. After 7 weeks it was very apparent to me that CASA realised, they had erred, when they advised that they were now “taking the Aviation Ruling off the table.”

The matter then changed very much to the topic of Temporary Locations, which CASA soon realised they had erred on, and it finally settled on the topic of “contracts”.

The trading restrictions would now remain in place until the terminology in the commercial contracts was finalised to Mr Alecks personal satisfaction. It was the inability to resolve the wording in the contracts to Mr Alecks personal satisfaction over a period of 8 months that resulted in all of the harm done. The trading restrictions remained in place throughout the six months, until Mr aleck stood by his initial determination that the entire structure was unlawful.

It is important that I demonstrate how easy this could have been fully resolved at any time within 4 hours, and potentially less.

I was completely compliant and willing to put whatever CASA required in the commercial contracts. There is no reason that this matter could not be immediately resolved.

A well intentioned meeting prior to CASA even sending that notice in October 2018, or in fact at any time after could have gone something like this….

CASA: ‘Hey Glen, while we like what you are doing and have been doing for more than 6 years, as far back as your Darwin operation in 2012 and 2013, we would like to add some additional wording to your agreements that you provided us with two years ago. We are not asking for any other changes to any of your systems or procedures, or how you operate, its as simple as some wording in your commercial contract.

Glen: ‘Sure, let me grab the Head of Operations, Technical Writer, and the Internal Co-ordinator and we will do it right now and to your full satisfaction. I just want to confirm that you not asking for any changes to how we operate, and you have no concerns at all about quality outcomes, our systems, procedures, personnel, reporting lines, safety, regulatory breaches etc. Its simply an issue of wording in our commercial agreements to clarify safety and supervisory responsibility?

CASA: Correct, we are fully satisfied with all your operational procedures, the structure etc, we only require changes to your commercial agreements. We have no concerns about operational control, if we did have concerns about those matters we would be requesting changes in your Operations manual/Exposition.

Glen: Ok, that’s a bit unusual, CASA wanting to be involved in the commercial contracts as the location to specify safety and supervisory responsibility. Shouldn’t your requirements be specified in the Exposition?

CASA: No we now want to put safety and supervisory requirements in the commercial contracts, as well as in your Exposition. This is an industry first. We aren’t prepared to become a signatory to the contracts, but we do have some new requirements for you to put in those contracts.

Glen: That’s highly unconventional but no problems. I will offer no resistance; I am open to anything CASA require to be fully satisfied. I have the approval from all Members to finalise this matter here today.

I’m going to need some help with this. As you will appreciate this is a completely new requirement. My Exposition already attends to all legislative requirements, is CASA approved, and fully attends to matters of Safety and Supervisory responsibility, as does CASAs own legislation, and has been fully approved for many years, I’m going to need some clear and concise guidance on this, but I can see no reason we can’t fully resolve this new CASA requirement right here and now and have you on your way by lunchtime fully satisfied.

You have deemed my existing contracts deficient, what is your concern, what would you like to see? To say that something is wrong, you need to have a concept of right. So, what would you like to add? I’m open to absolutely anything. It’s obviously not something already outlined in our Exposition, which meets all Regulatory, Safety and Supervisory requirements. So, I need you to let me know what you need.

I will need your guidance because all of the legislative requirements are already attended to, and I need to take care that anything I write doesn’t contradict the extensive legislation that already stipulates all of this.

Less than 5 minutes later, I would have had the staff assembled in the Conference Room, ready to go, and finalise the matter.

Glen: “Ok what additional suggestions would you like to see in my commercial contracts”.

The point of the above conversation is to highlight how easily this entire matter could have been avoided, and indeed should have been avoided. CASA did not need to put trading restrictions on the business for 8 months, leading to its closure and all of the associated damage.



Surely one would have to question why Mr Aleck chose an approach that caused trauma, when the option of a well intentioned discussion with an immediate resolution was available.

For clarity, the entire matter could have been resolved in well under half a day and resolved in its entirety. It could have been that simple. He did not have to close down several businesses, and he did not need to drag this matter out over 8 months. It was unnecessary, and it is the restrictions being on the business for such a protracted period that caused so much harm. The truth is that CASA Executive Manager, Mr Jonathan Aleck decided that the matter would drag on for the 8 months, until starved of income the business was destined to close. Had me and my parents had access to more funds, it is likely that even greater harm would have been caused.

Quite simply, the ONLY reason that this matter was not resolved is because Mr Aleck decided that it would not be resolved.





THE COMPARATIVE ASSESSMENT OF MR ALECKS DECSIONS i.e. APTA V SOAR

Mr Alecks decision making was focussed on me, and my organisation, potentially to the detriment of the safety of aviation.

This requires a comparative analysis of two organisations located on the same airport a couple of hundred metres from each other, both delivering multi base operations. One of those businesses is mine, and the other is SOAR aviation.

It clearly supports my assertion that I was being targeted by Mr Aleck.

SOAR was a well-known operation delivering high volumes of training. It was very much a price driven business model designed to maximise profits, with large foreign backing.

It was a company with a questionable safety record, and questionable quality outcomes.

For many years concerns were raised with CASA about this operator. Those concerns were formally raised by other Operators, the Airport, Students, Employees, and customers with CASA.

The Organisation had a disproportionate amount of aircraft accidents, incidents, injuries, and at least one fatality. CASA had access to evidence and statistics that suggested this operator was less safe than other Operators but refused to act.

Ironically, this business continued to operate until it was the Australian Skills and Qualifications Authority (ASQA) driven by student concerns that shut them down not CASA.

The matter received significant media attention, and I believe it is a matter before the Ombudsman’s Office now with extensive legal action being initiated by the students.

At the same time that CASA is permitting SOAR to operate unfettered, Mr Aleck is diverting significant CASA resources to shutting down my business that according to CASA has consistently delivered “industry leading standards of safety and compliance”.

I can attend to this matter in significant detail, but the point being that I feel that I was being personally targetted by Mr Aleck.

[Squawk7700]

I don’t think you can include the Soar example as you don’t know what casa were planning for them. It just may not have eventuated yet.

As it’s written it sounds like sour grapes against Soar, particularly given that the director / owner of Soar was an ex-employee of yours.

[Sandy Reith]

I don’t think you can include the Soar example as you don’t know what casa were planning for them. It just may not have eventuated yet.

As it’s written it sounds like sour grapes against Soar, particularly given that the director / owner of Soar was an ex-employee of yours.

With respect I think the Soar example is valid in that the whole split system, RAAUS and VH registered, goes to the heart of the CASA induced disaster that is GA training in Australia. Also the then Minister Michael McCormack made great media play, including a photo op sitting in one of their trainers, of the ‘success’ of Soar.

Keep on Glen you are doing every Australian a favour, let alone all of us aviators.

[aroa]

Glen and Sandy.. Like symbols !

[glenb]

Typing on my phone on a brief break at work.

SOAR did also provide Part 141 training in VH aircraft.

The SOAR comparative analysis is intended to highlight that i was “targetted” for reasons other than safety.

Regarding Sour grapes. Not at all. i shared many a ciggie with the SOAR owner after i exited him from our organisation.

We had two very opposing business models. He was very keen to embed those philosophies into our business, i thought it best he embed his own philosophies into his own business.

I have absolutely no animosity towards him at all,

He would be much further up my Christmas card list than Aleck.

[Squawk7700]

Well maybe then find another successful 141 organisation that didn’t go down in a ball of flames that’s still running happily with multiple entities.

Your analogy feels like you’re comparing your CASA grounded airship with the Hindenberg.

[Lead Balloon]

But CASA should have treated both the same, and didn’t. SOAR was, by all accounts I’ve read, an organisation with a poor safety record from the get go to the let go. Not so APTA.

SOAR clearly had the ear of the then Deputy Prime Minister. Anyone who thinks that that had absolutely no consequence for the regulatory treatment of SOAR haven’t been paying attention to how the coalition government actually worked. Hopefully a properly constituted and resourced federal corruption commission will be able to examine and shed some light on these kinds of matters.

[Squawk7700]

It was only a matter of time for them based on my personal opinion.

A friend of mine was at Colac one day and saw a guy strangely taking photos of aircraft from a nearby oval. He went over and asked him what he was doing as he was drawing attention to himself. He was from CASA and he said he was surveilling a certain colour of aircraft. Again, it was only a matter of time.

[Lead Balloon]

If that’s true - and I’m not suggesting you’re making it up - that would suggest to me that the person “from CASA” was either bull****ting or incompetent. It’s so hard to make confident predictions on these matters these days.

[Squawk7700]

It was approximately around the time of the crash at Stawell.

I digress, but maintain it was a ticking timebomb and there would be better case studies out there.

[glenb]

I hear what you say about the SOAR analogy.

However, i feel that it has some value for the following reason.

I have an expert knowledge of that Company, having had a lot to do with its CEO and personnel. The Companies manuals were surprisingly similar with the exception of name changes to the manuals that I was using at the time, and to be honest, it is more likely to be an "Achilles heel" for CASA, because it does provide a good comparative analysis. The very same CASA personnel out of the same office treating two organisations so differently. Both matters before the Ombudsmans Office

You are correct that it was already a ticking time bomb, but it did go on for two years with no CASA action. Mine happened overnight with no warning, and no allegations of any safety concerns at all. As pointed out the LNP Deputy PM popped down to visit them and do a photo op.

At some stage, I am convinced that this entire matter will get some media coverage, and that is what I am working towards. I think the SOAR analogy could be "topical".

I appreciate you letting me know your concerns, I really do, but at this stage i think it warrants a couple of paragraphs in my rather substantial allegation of misfeasance. Hope to get a couple more posts up today, one being a very direct letter to Ms Spence, which i look forward to any feedback.
Cheers. Glen. Heading off to "Fat Daddys breakfast club", back later, cheers. Glen

[PiperCameron]

Did anyone view any of the aircraft for sale at Bankstown when the Soar liquidation took place? I'd expect it would have been the same at Moorabbin? The damage history was, uh-hum, interesting. I'd also heard that multiple damaged aircraft were hidden around the bases having not been reported to CASA or RAAus.

Well.. I do know that a few of the Soar Vixxens at Moorabbin are now operating out of Lilydale FS and are a popular option to their Jabiru fleet. Of the ones that didn't leave immediately, most of the remainder of the Soar fleet were parked behind the hangar in First Street for a while and slowly drifted off to new owners over time.. farmers, other flying schools, etc. Even their Bristells which I wouldn't take even if someone gave me one! None were damaged AFAIK and there are none left now. There hasn't been a yellow aircraft in the circuit at Moorabbin for a long time (thank goodness).

[glenb]

A proposed letter to Ms Spence,

slightly rushed. on side of road again with dying laptop battery, so publishing for feedback, cheers. Glen. [email protected]

13/09/22 Ombudsman Investigation ref 2019-713834-R



Dear Ms Pip Spence, CEO of the Civil Aviation Safety Authority (CASA), and other included recipients.



As you are aware in you role as the CASA CEO, I have alleged that CASA has deliberately provided false and misleading information to the current Commonwealth Ombudsman’s Office investigation into the closure of my business by CASA.

The false and misleading information has been provided by CASA on multiple occasions, over a protracted period, and on several different but each very significant issues.

The person providing that information would be fully aware, that the information that was being provided to the Commonwealth Ombudsman was both false, and misleading. For complete clarity, there were multiple considered and deliberate decision to provide substantively false and misleading information.

The substantively false and misleading information was provided by CASA to pervert the outcome of the inquiry.

The person responsible for providing that false and misleading information to the Commonwealth Ombudsman investigation was, the CASA Executive Manager of Legal, International and Regulatory Affairs, Mr Jonathan Aleck.

It is essential that I ascertain if Mr Aleck is acting alone in his decision making to mislead the Ombudsman’s investigation or is this in fact a broader, “CASA” decision.

Therefore, I am seeking clarity on the position of “CASA” on this single matter,of many, whereby CASA has clearly provided substantially false and misleading information.

Mr Aleck has deceptively led the Ombudsman to be of the view that, “CASA was not fully aware of the specific nature of APTA’s operations until just prior to issuing the notice in October 2018,”

For Mr Aleck to lead the Ombudsman’s to believe that CASA was not fully aware of the specific nature of APTAs operations until just prior to October 2018, is clearly false and misleading, and grossly so.

Importantly, it is easily proven to be false, and misleading.

The irrefutable truth is that CASA was fully aware of the specific nature of APTAs operations for over 10 years, with no changes to the “nature” of the operations over those 10 years.

Recall the CASA position that they have represented to the Ombudsman investigation.

“CASA was not fully aware of the specific nature of APTAs operations until just prior to October 2018,”

There is so much irrefutable evidence to demonstrate the level of deception being perpetrated by CASA on multiple topics, but for pure simplicity, let me just attend to this one single topic of when CASA first became aware of the specific nature of APTAs operations.







Consideration One

This magazine article was released at the end of 2017, being the January/ February edition of the Australian Flying Magazine article. This article is an essential read as it leaves the reader in no doubt as to the exact structure. I was approached by the magazine in mid-2017 requesting to do an article.

It would be fair to say that if the aviation media was aware and approached me in mid-2017, it would be highly likely that CASA were aware. If not at the time the media were approaching me, most certainly CASA would have been aware by early 2018, on release of the article to the general public, being 10 months prior.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/1akmm9gxrashpfy/APTA%20BEFORE%20CASA%20ACTION.pdf?dl=0



Consideration Two



Recall that Mr Aleck asserts that CASA first became aware of the nature of the operations just prior to October 2018.

Under FOI I obtained our application for what was our last base to be formally approved by CASA, before CASA reversed their position and declared my business unlawful and unauthorised.

These applications were submitted over twelve months prior to the date that Mr Aleck/CASA claims that CASA first became aware of the specific nature of my operation. If you review those documents, and particularly the attached risk assessment, it is obvious as to the exact nature of the operation, in fact the risk assessment deals exactly with the considerations of incorporating another entity to operate under our AOC.

This Freedom of Information request cost over $300, so I have made a request for the most recent base only. I will invest further money in other applications if this single application alone is not enough to bring honesty and integrity to the process, and I will go as far back as the AV8 base over 6 years prior if that becomes necessary.

There can be no doubt that CASA was fully aware of the specific nature of our operation, at least twelve months earlier than CASA would lead the Ombudsman’s office to believe. I claim that CASA was fully aware for many years.

Accesses via this link is the application for these bases, and risk assessment.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/4frisc0ufdv9eik/Documents%20in%20scope%20-%201-23%20-%20UNREDACTED.PDF?dl=0

https://www.dropbox.com/s/nqgytj8xjrzj2fo/Documents%20in%20scope%20-%2024-28%20-%20UNREDACTED.PDF?dl=0



Consider that multiple applications of bases were made to CASA over many years, and approved by CASA over many years. This was the last base approved by CASA and then reversed by CASA in October 2018.



Consideration Three

CASAs own Industry Complaints Commissioner (ICC) on 12/04/19 found that

“I don’t consider CASA treated APTA fairly when its approach changed on 23 October. That’s because collectively as an organisation, CASA had an awareness of the APTA business model for a significant period of time prior to its compliance with regulation being called into question. In changing its position so drastically, the circumstances were such that CASA’s actions weren’t fair, given APTA’s likely to have relied on CASA’s failure to highlight any concerns when conducting its operations and planning.

So CASAs own Industry Complaints Commissioner finds that CASA knew for a “significant time prior” to 23rd October 2018, yet later Mr Aleck leads the Ombudsman to be of the view that CASA became aware “just prior”.

Whilst the ICC did not specify what a “significant period of time” is, one would assume it is at least six years.

Consideration Four

CASA formally approved our first remote base at Darwin via the AV8 business in Darwin 6 years before CASA claims that they first became aware “just prior to October 2018”. There were no changes to the “structure” from that first base six years prior, to the last base CASA approved in mid-2018, until they declared that it was now unlawful, once they first became aware in October 2018.

Consideration Five

Emails with CASA in mid 2016, clearly discussing the expansion. This is over two years before CASA “first became aware of the specific nature”.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/e2kcuci2ik4oo68/APPENDIX%20SIX-%20Emails%20with%20CASA%20two%20and%20ahalf%20years%20before %20CASA%20claim%20they%20became%20awre.pdf?dl=0

Consideration Six

After the discussion and encouragement from CASA as a result of those discussions in mid 2016, two and a half years before CASA claim they first became aware, I invested many hundreds of thousands of dollars in systems and procedures, IT, and personnel and I worked side by side with 10 CASA personnel redesigning every single aspect of everything we did to be ready for the new regulatory environment, with a vastly improved product with industry leading levels of operational control. CASA formally revalidated this exact structure designed from the ground up to do exactly what it did.

The checklist that CASA used to revalidate the entire business was obtained under FOI and is attached.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/xy5etr9253bk7ej/APPENDIX%20FOUR-%20CASA%20ASESSMENT%20WORKSHEET.pdf?dl=0

CASA revalidated this exact structure in April 2017, being 18 months before CASA claim that they first became aware. It is ludicrous to suggest that CASA were not fully aware, they just revalidated us in that multi base structure, as one of Australias first Part 141/142 organisations.

Ms, Spence, I could go on and on and on, but there is enough information here, and you have enough historical knowledge to know that CASAs position is untenable.

If there is any doubt in your mind, I have previously provided you with the name of a current employee of CASA. I have spoken to him, and I am fully satisfied that he will be truthful on this matter. He was my CASA allocated primary contact and was heavily involved in every aspect of my business throughout the entire decade that I operated until CASA closed me down.

You have easy access to the truth if the above considerations leave you in any doubt.

Phase One of the Commonwealth Ombudsman investigation found that CASA had erred, and in fact I had not broken any regultory requirements, and as a result of that failure by CASA detriment may have been caused.

Understandably CASA was then placed in a difficult situation. There is no doubt after the release of the Ombudsman’s report that Mr Alecks decision now had no basis in either safety or law, and it may have caused detriment.

Once Mr Aleck realised that he had erred, and had no valid basis to take the action that he had, It would be expected that CASA may try to position themselves as “not being fully aware of the specific nature of my operation until just prior to October 2018.”

Consider how much more likely that is to happen if the single CASA employee responsible for providing information to the Ombudsman is the very same person that made the decision that the business was unlawful. There would be an increased tendency to provide disinformation, and that is why your role in this is so important.

There is an overwhelming body of irrefutable evidence to support how preposterous Mr Alecks and/or your position on this matter as to when CASA first became aware of the nature of my operations.

The purpose of this correspondence is to seek a formal response from your office clearly indicating if CASA maintain that they only first became aware of the specific nature of my operations just prior to October 2018, when they issued the notification and put trading restrictions in place.

The truth of this matter is that CASA was fully aware of the exact and specific nature of my operations throughout more than a decade that I operated, and CASA formally approved multiple bases to operate under my Authorization for many years.

What has really happened here is that Mr Aleck in his role was not aware, and the deficiency is entirely within CASA. It is not fair and reasonable that I can operate a business for a decade, and eventually when Mr Aleck does become aware, he reverses that approval of a decade, closes the business down.

The point being that “CASA” knew for many many years. Mr Aleck only found out just prior to October 2018.

In my position that I operate within it was not required or expected that I would have any dealings at all with Mr Aleck. It was not my job to let Mr Aleck know everything about my flying school. It was my job to ensure that CASA is provided with all of the information, as stipulated by CASA, in order for Mr Aleck to be able to find out the specific nature of my operation. I have a reasonable expectation that if I do something on multiple occasions over many years with formal CASA approval that CASA “knows” about it, as they obviously did.


On each and every one of those applications to add an entity under our Air Operator Certificate, over the decade that I operated, a fee was paid to CASA. It was a fee for service, requiring CASA personnel attendance on site at each of those proposed bases. CASA also conducted a desk top assessment. In addition, consider that in the entire lead up to this process would have been discussed with the CASA team attached to my Organisation referred to at the time as a CMT or Certificate Management Team.

The CASA personnel that I was dealing with, were each highly experienced in the flight training background, and had many years’ experience within CASA. They had been professional, well intentioned, and we had a relationship of trust and confidence. I had the same CASA team allocated to my business for over 10 years. I spoke to them at met with them at least weekly throughout that 10 years.



CASA knew about my structure as soon as CASA considered my first application for a variation to my Air Operator Certificate over 6 years prior. That was the application for a variation to my AOC to authorise operations at our first alliance base, being AV8 in Darwin.







CASA gets to know stuff as a consequence of experience, and that is through that frequent and formal communication with the team of CASA personnel allocated to my organisation, as well as extensive application, review, auditing and approval processes.




CASA gets to ‘know’ stuff as a consequence of what its human officers find out in their capacity as officers of CASA. And it is not necessary for every officer of CASA to know something before CASA, in law, knows that thing. That would be absurd. In law, the artificial person CASA can ‘know’ something after merely one officer of CASA becomes aware of that thing in their capacity as a CASA officer.

So when e.g. a CASA FOI receives an application from e.g. an AOC holder for e.g. a variation to an AOC, in law CASA ‘knows’ the application has been made and CASA has ‘received’ the application. The officers in ‘Head Office’ can claim, reasonably and truly, that they did not know that the application had been submitted, but that makes no difference to CASA’s obligations and my rights in the circumstances.

Furthermore, CASA can in law ‘know’ something even if not a single one of its officers is aware of that thing. One of those ways of ‘knowing’ is called “constructive knowledge”, which is stuff CASA ought to know in the circumstances.

Let’s now consider my application to add our second base. My own base Melbourne Flight Training (MFT) had been operating for many years and which holds a flying training AOC issued by CASA and conducts flying training under the authority of that AOC at Moorabbin Airport. I then applies to CASA for a variation of my AOC so as to authorise MFT to also conduct flying training at Darwin aerodrome on behalf of AV8 a Freight operator in Darwin.

What is the very purpose of the regulatory requirement for this application and variation process? The very purpose?

Its purpose is for CASA to find out whether MFT satisfies the criteria in section 28 of the Civil Aviation Act and other regulatory provisions in relation to the conduct of flying training at both Moorabbin and Darwin. And that task, of its very essence, requires CASA to, among other things, find out whether MFT has effective control over the people and the premises and the aircraft whom and which will be used to deliver flying training at the proposed Darwin location.

The only way in which CASA can find out whether MFT has effective control over the people and the premises and the aircraft is to find out who employs the people, who controls the premises and who is the registered operator of the aircraft. Even if no CASA officer finds those things out – for whatever reason, including that every CASA officer has no clue as to the implications of those things – CASA ought to know them because they are at the essence of CASA’s regulatory task in the circumstances.

In short, on every occasion that I applied for a variation to my AOC so as to cover an additional ‘alliance’ ‘base’, CASA ought to have found out who employed the people, who controlled the premises and who was the registered operator of the aircraft whom and which would be engaged in flying training activities at the base. On every occasion. And CASA ought to have understood any potential implications.

Irrespective of what individual CASA officers understood or assumed and when, CASA was at least on constructive notice of the structure and its implications from a regulatory perspective from additional ‘alliance’ ‘base’ one. It was CASA’s job to find those things out. It was the very purpose of the variation application process.



I look forward to your response confirming whether or not that CASA first became aware of the specific nature of my structure just prior to October 2018, as CASA has led the Ombudsman to believe.



Respectfully



Glen Buckley

[Sandy Reith]

Suggest address the letter to your federal MP asking that she ask CASA CEO Ms. Spence to respond. At the very least your MP should pass it on and you could ask for acknowledgement.

it must be clear now that without MPs and Parliamentary intervention we are unlikely to obtain any timely action, if any at all, in any of the pressing issues let alone this particular glaring injustice.

[Lead Balloon]

Don’t forget you’re dealing with people who’ll seize on any words you use or mistakes you make to distract from the substantive issues.

I suggest you insert “fully” before “aware” and “specific” before “nature” in this sentence: “Recall that Mr Aleck asserts that CASA first became aware of the nature of the operations just prior to October 2018.” I suggest you review the entire draft to ensure consistency in those words.

And if you’re arguing that a named person said those words to the Ombudsman, you’d better have a basis for that argument, especially if you’re alleging that person did so out of malice towards you. There’s a difference, for example, between arguing someone said something to the Ombudsman and arguing someone made the decision to authorise the release of a document saying those words to the Ombudsman, which words were drafted by someone else. Same ultimate responsibility but, as I say, any chink in the armour will be exploited to distract and the distinction may be fundamental on the malice issue. You twigged to the point yourself, here: “These applications were submitted over twelve months prior to the date that Mr Aleck/CASA claims that CASA first became [fully] aware of the specific nature of my operation.”

Of course the words “fully” and “specific” are exquisitely imprecise in context and were used for that precise reason. Nonetheless, the complete answer in principle is that CASA was on at least constructive notice of all of the facts which were relevant to APTA’s applications. And based on the documents submitted by APTA to CASA in support of variation applications and what CASA was paid to do to consider and decide the applications, only a deaf, dumb and blind pinball player in the CASA process could claim ignorance rather than actual knowledge of the details of the structure. (The ICC in effect says that in the 12/04/19 finding you quoted!)

But I suggest you still need to be prepared to provide a crystal clear explanation in response to the ‘pub test’ applied to the statement on APTA’s website that ‘alliance’ ‘members’ would remain in ‘complete control of their business’. It’s obvious to me that ‘CASA’ will focus on the words ‘complete control’ and argue that ‘business’ covers the whole of the activities carried out at the relevant ‘base’, including flying training. ‘CASA’ will argue that this control issue was fundamental and struck CASA with the force of complete novelty, out of the blue just prior to October 2018. Try to formulate some clear, layman-understandable explanation as to the distinction between control over the moving parts that determined compliance with regulatory requirements on the one hand, and what you meant by ‘business’ on the APTA website on the other (assuming of course a distinction was intended and operated in fact).

There’s nothing wrong with that distinction as a matter regulatory principle, if the certificate holder has legal and effective control over the moving parts that determine compliance with regulatory requirements. Except for financial viability potentially putting compliance at risk, how money flowed around and between whom inside the structure was none of CASA’s business. Provided regulatory requirements continue to be complied with, smart or dumb business decisions, who’s making them and profiting or bleeding money from them are irrelevant to CASA’s decision-making. CASA has certified many, many operators who eventually went broke while holding an AOC, and many more continue to line up for certification.

Delete the ‘s from this: “For Mr Aleck to lead the Ombudsman’s …” or add “Office”.

There is a typo and some dangerous words in this: “I then applies to CASA for a variation of my AOC so as to authorise MFT to also conduct flying training at Darwin aerodrome on behalf of AV8 a Freight operator in Darwin.”

“applied” not “applies”

I don’t think APTA was conducting any flying training “on behalf of” anyone other than APTA, at least not under the ‘alliance’ ‘base’ structure. Remember: The fundamental structure was that only one entity was conducting flying training – APTA – not “on behalf of” anyone else – but utilising people who weren’t APTA employees, premises of which APTA was not the owner or lessee and aircraft of which APTA was not owner or registered operator.

And I know it hurts, but the AOC was never yours personally. The AOC was and remains APTA’s. So try to avoid “my AOC”.

I hope I’m wrong, but I expect you’ll be fobbed off by Ms Spence. At the moment, I reckon a number of people in CASA are staring into the middle distance hoping this will go all away when you’re finally driven to despair again. They know you were led down the garden path but, sadly, CASA does not have the corporate integrity and corporate competence to admit it. CASA has ‘form’ in toughing out arguments with powerless individuals and only conceding when there’s a chance of being found out by a court or tribunal.

[glenb]

This draft has been finalised and is posted at #2379 and #2380

[glenb]

This conatined a draft, moved to Post #2379 and 2380

[Lead Balloon]

I reckon this is a very powerful point, Glen:I note that you have previously advised that you are reluctant to “interfere” in the Ombudsman investigation. By having a reasonable doubt as to the accuracy of information provided by CASA, and choosing not to act, you are in fact choosing to interfere in the outcome, by being complicit in the provision of false and misleading information.I would have thought that the ICC's finding as to the timing of CASA's knowledge of the details of the APTA model would, in and of itself, demand further internal investigation by any organisation with even a modicum of corporate integrity. And, if CASA is and remains of the view that the ICC's finding on that issue was wrong, CASA should tell you and the ICC why.

[sagesau]

If CASA had a leg to stand on in then all of this discussion would have been shut down years ago.

[Flaming galah]

I reckon this is a very powerful point, Glen:I would have thought that the ICC's finding as to the timing of CASA's knowledge of the details of the APTA model would, in and of itself, demand further internal investigation by any organisation with even a modicum of corporate integrity. And, if CASA is and remains of the view that the ICC's finding on that issue was wrong, CASA should tell you and the ICC why.

As Glen has noted, the ICC avoided the key issues, and failed to provide an honest, open and transparent assessment of the complaints. Whatever was said by the ICC is tainted by those shortcomings.

[Lead Balloon]

That’s some rather odd logic there, FG. It does not necessarily follow, from those shortcomings, that the ICC’s finding that CASA was on notice of the detail of the APTA structure “for a significant period of time prior to its compliance with regulation being called into question” is incorrect. If the ICC stuffed that up as well, might as well punt the whole ICC concept and save the money. (I’ve always considered the concept, of a fundamentally conflicted internal CASA employee - with no powers - being masqueraded as some grandiose ‘commissioner’, to be a nonsense, notwithstanding that the people involved are probably lovely and kind to their Mums.)

But nail your colours to the mast, FG.

Given all of the interactions between CASA personnel with APTA over the years during which APTA expanded to more ‘bases’ - all approved by CASA through AOC variations after applications with supporting documentation from APTA - do you honestly believe that: “CASA was not fully aware of the specific nature of APTA’s operations until just prior to issuing the notice in October 2018.”? Say it.

(Glen: See what I mean by some of your words being used to try to distract from the real issue?)

[Flaming galah]

But nail your colours to the mast, FG.



CASA must have known.

[glenb]

I will remove previous drafts. This has been sent to the recipients indicated in the letter, with the exception of the ABC who i will contact tomorrow. Cheers All.

Only minor changes based on feedback here. i.e. repositioning the considerations to weight them accordingly.

Ombudsman Investigation ref 2019-713834-R



Dear Ms Pip Spence, CEO of the Civil Aviation Safety Authority (CASA), and other included recipients, including but not limited to:

The CASA Board, The Ombudsman’s Office, Ms Carina Garland MP for Chisholm, Senator Glenn Sterle, and the ABC.

As you are fully aware in your role as the CASA CEO, I have alleged that CASA has deliberately provided false and misleading information to the current Commonwealth Ombudsman’s Office investigation into the closure of my business by CASA.

I note that you have previously advised that you are reluctant to “interfere” in the Ombudsman investigation. By having a reasonable doubt as to the accuracy of information provided by CASA, and choosing not to act, you are in fact choosing to interfere in the outcome, by being complicit in the provision of false and misleading information.



The false and misleading information has been provided by CASA on multiple occasions, over a protracted period, and on several different, but each very significant issues.

The person providing that information would be fully aware, that the information that was being provided to the Commonwealth Ombudsman investigation was both false, and misleading. For complete clarity, there were multiple considered and deliberate decisions to provide substantively false and misleading information.

The substantively false and misleading information was provided by CASA to pervert the outcome of the inquiry. I am fully satisfied that the information is so false and misleading in nature yet so fundamental to the entire matter, that it can only have been provided to pervert the outcome of that inquiry.

The person responsible for providing that false and misleading information to the Commonwealth Ombudsman investigation was, the CASA Executive Manager of Legal, International and Regulatory Affairs, Mr Jonathan Aleck acting in his role as the sole representative of CASA in communications with the Ombudsman’s Office as the “Agency” representative of CASA.

I am advised by the Ombudsman’s Office that by convention they only engage with one representative of the “Agency” i.e., Mr Aleck in this particular case.

It is important, going forward that I ascertain if Mr Aleck is acting alone in his decision making to provide false and misleading information to the Ombudsman’s investigation or is this in fact a broader, “CASA” decision, coming from higher up within CASA, and specifically the Office of the CASA CEO. As Mr Aleck is CASAs longest serving and second most senior Executive, the only positions higher in the direct reporting line is your Office, being the Office of the CASA CEO, noting that the CASA Board is my next option.

Therefore, I am seeking clarity on the position of “CASA” on this single matter. There are a number of issues that CASA has provided false and misleading information on.

Specifically, in this correspondence, I am addressing the false and misleading advice provided to the Ombudsman, regarding as to when CASA “first became fully aware of the specific nature of my operation”.

This is the operation that CASA closed because it was unlawful, only to find out much later from the Ombudsman investigation that in fact, it was not unlawful. CASA had no legal or valid basis to close my business. That is my position on this matter. None!

CASA have led the Ombudsman to believe that it was just prior to October 2018 when they notified me that I was operating unlawfully and closed my business of a decade, that Mr Aleck claims CASA, “first became fully aware of the nature of my business.”

I claim that it was almost a decade earlier, which is why this entire matter, and all the associated harm is so inexplicable, and so concerning.

A description of the nature of that operation follows. I need to be crystal clear however on this matter.

Mr Aleck has maintained to the Ombudsman that CASA never permitted the exact structure that I am about to describe, throughout the flight training industry.

Mr Aleck has maintained to the Ombudsman that CASA was not fully aware that I had adopted that structure,

I need to be blunt. Mr Aleck is blatantly lying to the Ombudsman’s office. He is deliberately providing false and misleading information, and substantially so.

CASA always, and on every occasion permitted this exact structure throughout the flight training industry for at least the 30 years that I was involved in it.

Glen Buckley’s business was the only one, ever in Australia that was declared unlawful by CASA.

CASA was fully aware of the exact and specific nature of every aspect of my operation throughout the decade that CASA approved it to operate.

It is simply not reasonable, it is deceptive, and it is false and misleading for Mr Aleck and/or the CASA CEO to falsely represent to the Commonwealth Ombudsman investigation that CASA was not fully aware of the exact nature of my operation for many years prior to Mr Alecks asserted date of October 2018.



The structure that Mr Aleck falsely claims CASA never permitted is:

· Only one CASA issued Air Operator Certificate (AOC) being issued to Entity A. Entity A operates a flying school under that AOC.

· Entity B approaches Entity A being the one and only AOC Holder. Entity B does not hold an AOC or CASA approval to deliver flying training in its own right. Entity B would typically be a rural voluntary run aero club with a committee. It has a building, aircraft, instructors, a refuelling facility etc, but no approval. It is primarily a social club.

· Entity B does not have a CASA issued AOC. Entity B does not have an Operations Manual, or syllabi of training, a Safety department, or the CASA required 3 X Key Personnel i.e. Head of Operations, CEO, or Safety Manager. Entity B has no involvement with CASA because quite simply it is a social aero club run by aviation enthusiasts who are not flying instructors and it is not a flying school.

· Entity B, approaches Entity A and enters into an arrangement whereby Entity A uses the only AOC being its own, to deliver flight training at Entity Bs location using Entity B facilities i.e. building, aircraft, flying instructors, refuelling and maintenance, after they are fully inducted into Entity A,

· After an application is made to CASA and CASA makes a formal fee for service assessment, they would formally approve that arrangement whereby Entity A delivered flight training at the Entity B location, with Entity A being the one and only AOC Holder taking on responsibility for all operations at both locations, with Entity B fully inducted into Entity A systems and procedures.

· As legislated the legislated Key Personnel from Entity A who hold all legislated responsibility for that operation are employed by me, and I hold the single CASA issued Authorisation. All responsibility in law for all operations rests completely with me, as the AOC Holder and my Key Personnel.

Considering that CASA had always permitted that structure, Mr Aleck/CASA has deceptively led the Ombudsman to be of the view that, CASA never permitted it, and that CASA did not know I had adopted it for many years with full and formal CASA approval.

Following is an italicised text, it is a direct quote from the Ombudsman’s written correspondence to me. The Ombudsman’s preliminary finding has obviously been perverted by Mr Alecks falsehoods.

“CASA was not fully aware of the specific nature of APTA’s operations until just prior to issuing the notice in October 2018,”

A subsequent telephone call with the Ombudsman’s office confirmed my concerns and has left no doubt in my mind that CASA had provided false and misleading information.

For Mr Aleck to lead the Ombudsman investigation to believe that “CASA” was not fully aware of the specific nature of APTAs operations until just prior to October 2018, is clearly false and misleading, and grossly so.

Importantly, it is easily proven to be false, and misleading.

There is so much irrefutable evidence to demonstrate the level of deception being perpetrated by CASA on multiple topics, but for pure simplicity, let me just attend to this one single topic in this correspondence as to “when” CASA first became fully aware of the specific nature of my operations.



Consideration One- CASAs own Industry Complaints Commissioner findings demonstrate that CASA is misleading the Ombudsman as to when CASA first became fully aware of the nature of my operation.

CASAs own Industry Complaints Commissioner (ICC) on 12/04/19 found that

“I don’t consider CASA treated APTA fairly when its approach changed on 23 October. That’s because collectively as an organisation, CASA had an awareness of the APTA business model for a significant period of time prior to its compliance with regulation being called into question. In changing its position so drastically, the circumstances were such that CASA’s actions weren’t fair, given APTA’s likely to have relied on CASA’s failure to highlight any concerns when conducting its operations and planning.”

So CASAs own Industry Complaints Commissioner finds that CASA knew for a “significant time prior” to 23rd October 2018, yet later Mr Aleck leads the Ombudsman to be of the view that CASA became fully aware “just prior to October 2018”.

Whilst the ICC did not specify what a “significant period of time” is, one would assume it is at least six years when CASA formally approved the first base in Darwin.

What concerns me most here is that CASAs own Industry Complaints Commissioner finds that CASA knew of the specific nature of my operation for a “significant period of time prior”, and my expectation is that that would be the official position of CASA, yet CASA leads the Ombudsman to be of the view that CASA only became fully aware of the specific nature “just prior to October 2018”.

How could two completely contradicting narratives be emanating from the same organisation i.e., CASA

There is only one correct and truthful answer, as you will be aware. Either CASA became fully aware of the specific nature of my operation in October 2018, OR CASA first became fully aware of the specific nature of my operation many years earlier.

It is concerning to me that CASAs own ICC would make such a fundamental finding that effectively CASA “led me up the garden path” and then closed me down, and that would not initiate some internal process of review, and most especially in the nations “safety” regulator.

Surely the contradicting narratives from two different CASA departments is evidence enough of the deceit being propagated.

[glenb]

Consideration Two- A magazine article about my business 12 months before CASA first became aware.

This magazine article was released at the end of 2017, being the January/ February edition of the Australian Flying Magazine article. This article is an essential read as it leaves the reader in no doubt as to the specific nature of my operation. I was approached by the magazine in mid-2017 requesting to do this article.

In this magazine article each of those respective schools talks of their experience with APTA and why they joined. Those operators interviewed in that article, had already been formally approved by CASA. It is just not feasible for Mr Aleck to assert that CASA was not fully aware of the exact and specific nature of my operation that CASA had formally approved, revalidated, and audited over many years.

It would be fair to say that if the aviation media was fully aware and approached me in mid-2017, it would be highly likely that CASA were aware of the operation that they had approved over a decade earlier, fully revalidated 18 months earlier, audited a year earlier, and approved bases under throughout the last decade.

If somehow CASA was not aware at the time the media were approaching me, most certainly CASA would have fully been aware by early 2018, on release of the article to the general public, being 10 months prior to CASA claiming to the Ombudsman that they first became fully aware of the specific nature of my operations. That being the operations that they had previously formally approved, years earlier. That article can be accessed here.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/1akmm9gxrashpfy/APTA%20BEFORE%20CASA%20ACTION.pdf?dl=0

Ms Spence, you will appreciate that as this entire structure was formally revalidated by CASA in April 2017, and the media is writing about it 6 months later, it is more likely than not that CASA was truthfully fully aware of the specific nature of my operation long before the claimed date of October of 2018.



Consideration Three- CASA formally approved multiple bases, years before they have led the Ombudsman to believe CASA first became aware.

Recall that Mr Aleck asserts that CASA first became fully aware of the specific nature of the operations just prior to October 2018.

Under FOI I obtained our application for what was our most recent base to be formally approved by CASA, before CASA reversed their position and declared it unlawful and unauthorised.

These most recent applications were submitted over twelve months prior to the date that Mr Aleck/CASA claims that CASA first became fully aware of the specific nature of my operation in October 2018. If you review those documents, and particularly the attached risk assessment, it is obvious as to the exact nature of the operation, in fact the risk assessment deals exactly with the considerations of incorporating another entity to operate under our AOC.

This Freedom of Information request cost over $300, so I have made a request for the most recent base only. I will invest further money in other applications if this single application alone is not enough to bring honesty and integrity to the process, and I will go as far back as the AV8 base over 6 years prior if that becomes necessary.

There can be no doubt that CASA was fully aware of the specific nature of our operation, at least twelve months earlier than CASA would lead the Ombudsman’s office to believe, and highly likely, as I claim that CASA was fully aware for many years.

Accesses via this link is the application for these bases, and risk assessment.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/4frisc0ufdv9eik/Documents%20in%20scope%20-%201-23%20-%20UNREDACTED.PDF?dl=0

https://www.dropbox.com/s/nqgytj8xjrzj2fo/Documents%20in%20scope%20-%2024-28%20-%20UNREDACTED.PDF?dl=0

Consider that multiple applications of bases were made to CASA over many years, and approved by CASA over many years. This was the last base approved by CASA and then reversed by CASA in October 2018.

As you will appreciate Ms Spence it is not truthful that CASA first became fully aware of the specific nature of my operation in October 2018.



Consideration Four- If CASA first became aware just prior to October 2018, how could they have been formally approving bases many years earlier.

CASA formally approved our first remote base at Darwin via the AV8 business in Darwin over 6 years before CASA claims that they first became fully aware “just prior to October 2018”.

There were no changes to the “structure” from that first base six years prior, to the last base that CASA approved in mid-2018, when CASA suddenly first became fully aware, and they declared that it was now unlawful.

Therefore, I absolutely maintain the position that CASA was fully aware of the specific nature of my operation for at least 6 years, and that it was in fact common CASA approved practice throughout the industry.

If there is any difference at all to how I operated, then CASA must be able to identify what that difference was that led them to first become fully aware of the structure in October 2018, and does CASA really maintain that they weren’t fully aware for many years.?



Consideration Five- CASA was fully aware of the exact nature of the structure when I was doing the planning and preparation to continue what I was doing in the new regulatory structure.

I have attached Emails with CASA in mid-2016, clearly discussing the expansion of the concept. That correspondence alone should have made CASA first become fully ware, if they hadn’t already become fully aware. This is over two years before Mr Aleck/CASA claim that CASA “first became fully aware of the specific nature”.

I have spoken to several of the CASA employees that were heavily involved in this project, both past and present, they will provide statutory declarations to support that contention that CASA was fully aware of the specific nature of my operation for many years. It should not be necessary to involve them in this matter, but I will do if your response compels me to obtain further evidence, of which there is an overwhelming amount as you will be aware.

Those past and present CASA employees were heavily involved in the design and approval of the specific structure. They each have a comprehensive recollection and are prepared simply to tell the truth. I am advised by one past CASA employee that, “I still retain extraneous note taking of the process’s in the lead up to the CASA issued revalidation of APTA in April 2017, 18 months prior to CASA reversing the approval and claiming “CASA” was not fully aware of the specific nature until just prior to October 2018.

That email correspondence from mid 2016 can be accessed here;

https://www.dropbox.com/s/e2kcuci2ik4oo68/APPENDIX%20SIX-%20Emails%20with%20CASA%20two%20and%20ahalf%20years%20before %20CASA%20claim%20they%20became%20awre.pdf?dl=0



Consideration Six – CASA was fully involved in the design and approval of APTA, it is not feasible that CASA only first became aware of the specific nature of the operation in October 2018.

After the discussion and encouragement from CASA as a result of those discussions in mid-2016, two and a half years before Mr Aleck claims CASA first became fully aware, I invested many hundreds of thousands of dollars in systems and procedures, IT, and personnel and I worked side by side with 10 CASA personnel redesigning every single aspect of everything we did to be ready for the new regulatory environment, with a vastly improved product with industry leading levels of operational control. CASA formally revalidated this exact structure designed from the ground up to do exactly what it did in April 2017, being 18 months before Mr Aleck claims to the Ombudsman that CASA first became aware.

It would be fair to say that it would have been one of the largest projects that CASA had undertaken with any flying school to date.

The checklist that CASA used to revalidate the entire business was obtained under FOI and is attached. This checklist generated a suite of Operations Manuals referred to as an Exposition. That document entails several thousand pages of policies, and procedures, responsibilities, accountabilities etc. The checklist that CASA used to revalidate the structure in April 2017. It is worth reviewing because it is exhaustive and clearly indicates that CASA was fully aware of the specific nature of my operation years before CASA would have the Ombudsman believe.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/xy5etr9253bk7ej/APPENDIX%20FOUR-%20CASA%20ASESSMENT%20WORKSHEET.pdf?dl=0

CASA revalidated this exact structure in April 2017, being 18 months before CASA claim that they first became fully aware. It is ludicrous to suggest that CASA were not fully aware, they just revalidated us in that multi base structure, as one of Australia’s first Part 141/142 organisations 18 months prior, and subsequently formally approved bases under that exact structure.



Consideration Seven- Only Mr Aleck and/or the CASA CEO maintain that CASA first became fully aware in October 2018.

After CASA revalidated the structure in April 2017, they returned six months later for a routine Level One audit over a one-week period. A Level One audit being the highest-level audit that CASA conduct.

This is a year before CASA supposedly first became aware of the specific nature of my operation, and it included visits to the base’s that CASA had previously approved, but according to Mr Aleck, were unaware of, despite CASA employees having been on site at those bases on multiple occasions.

To suggest that the CASA team audited different flying schools at different bases and weren’t aware of the exact structure is surely embarrassingly ludicrous. The systems and procedures, syllabi, etc would have been identical at each of those schools. They dealt with my team of Key personnel at each of the bases because there was no other team of Key personnel. Everything would have been branded “APTA” and the syllabus of training would have been identical, and the same instructors were probably moving freely through each of those bases at the same time as the CASA employees were there.

I must make it clear that I have spoken to those past and present CASA employees, they were themselves fully aware as CASA employees, many years before Mr Aleck claims CASA first became aware. The deficiency in Mr Aleck first becoming fully aware, is a deficiency within CASA, and the proposition that CASA only first became fully aware in October 2018 is simply not truthful.

That deficiency should have been the “trigger” for CASA or Mr Aleck perhaps to act with good intent.

If Mr Aleck, in his role, only became fully aware in October 2018, many years after the rest of CASA became fully aware, and was now going to declare the entire business of a decade unlawful, he should have recognised that CASA had erred, and adopted a conciliatory approach. He chose not to, and that is why this entire matter resulted in so much harm, and continues on four years later.



Consideration Eight- A CASA reversal of its position

In the CASA Office on 20/12/18, two months after CASA restrictions were applied, Mr Peter White the Executive Manager of Regulatory Services and Surveillance at the time, advised both me and my father that in fact CASA had been fully aware of APTA and that they would not adopt a stance of refuting that knowledge. Initially I recall being relieved but immediately afterward he went on to advise “his Senior” had advised it was still illegal and needed to be disbanded. Both my father and I are prepared to provide a Statutory Declaration to that effect. The current stance of CASA claiming that they were not aware of APTA is in direct contradiction to the commitment given to me by Mr Peter White at that meeting, and a complete reversal by CASA as to when CASA first became fully aware of the specific nature of my operation.



Consideration Nine- The second most senior CASA Executive knew almost two years prior.

On 18th January 2017, I met with the second most senior executive at CASA at the time, Mr Graeme Crawford the Executive manager of the Aviation Group in the Canberra Head office.

This being almost 2 years before Mr Aleck claims that CASA “first became fully aware of the specific nature of my operation”. There was no doubt from that meeting almost two years prior that the second most senior executive at CASA was fully aware of the specific nature of my operation. Some of the emails relating to that meeting are attached.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/7vavbhith3yu8pv/Graeme%20Crawford%20Emails.pdf?dl=0





Ms, Spence, I could go on and on and on, but there is enough information here, and you have enough historical knowledge to know that CASAs position is untenable. CASA obviously was fully aware of the specific nature of my operation for at least six years when the first base was approved in Darwin, by CASA

If there is any doubt in your mind, I have previously provided you with the name of a current employee of CASA.

I have spoken to him, and I am fully satisfied that he will be truthful on this matter. He was my CASA allocated primary contact for almost a decade and was heavily involved in every aspect of my business throughout the entire decade, including the project of many years whereby I worked with CASA personnel to gain revalidation in April 2017.

You have easy access to the truth if the above considerations leave you in any doubt.

So why do I believe that Mr Aleck would provide false and misleading information to the Ombudsman

Phase One of the Commonwealth Ombudsman investigation found that CASA had erred, and in fact I had not broken any regultory requirements, and as a result of that failure by CASA “detriment may have been caused”.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/7vavbhith3yu8pv/Graeme%20Crawford%20Emails.pdf?dl=0

What should have happened on release of that finding that CASA had erred, was a well-intentioned discussion between CASA and myself, and the written record clearly shows that is what I tried to achieve. At least some internal review procedure within CASA should have been initiated.

Sadly, what happened was a determined effort of bullying and intimidating and what can only be described as an attempt to crush me financially, emotionally, and physically. An inexcusable amount of public resources have been directed away from safety towards achieving that objective, and it has been largely successful

Understandably once the Ombudsman’s report was released, CASA was then placed in a difficult situation. There is no doubt after the release of the Ombudsman’s report that Mr Alecks decision now had no basis in either safety or law, and it may have caused detriment.

Once Mr Aleck realised that he had erred and had no valid basis to take the action that he had, It would be expected that CASA may try to position themselves as “not being fully aware of the specific nature of my operation until just prior to October 2018.”, when that is very clearly, very far from an accurate representation of the truth.

Consider how much more likely it is that CASA would adopt this position, if the single CASA employee responsible for providing information to the Ombudsman is the very same person that made the decision that the business was unlawful in the first instance. There would be an increased tendency to provide disinformation, and that is why your role in this is so important as the CEO , to clearly identify if it is CASAs position or the position of Mr Aleck only that CASA only first became fully aware of the specific nature of my operation.

There is an overwhelming body of irrefutable evidence to support how preposterous Mr Alecks and/or your position on this matter as to when CASA first became fully aware of the specific nature of my operations.

The purpose of this correspondence is to seek a formal response from your office clearly indicating if “CASA” maintain that they only first became fully aware of the specific nature of my operations just prior to October 2018, when they issued the notification and put trading restrictions in place.

The truth of this matter is that CASA was fully aware of the exact and specific nature of my operations throughout more than a decade that I operated, and CASA formally approved multiple bases to operate under my Authorization for many years.

What has really happened here is that Mr Aleck in his role was not fully aware, and the deficiency is entirely within CASA. It is not fair and reasonable that I can operate a business for a decade, and eventually when Mr Aleck does become fully aware, he reverses that approval of a decade, closes the business down.

The point being that “CASA” knew for many many years. Mr Aleck only found out just prior to October 2018. The fact that Mr Aleck personally was not aware for many years clearly substantiates industry concerns about the Civil Aviation Safety Authority.

The deficiency is clearly within CASA, and it is extremely concerning that it was his own department that approved each of those bases over many years, and in fact his own Department then fully revalidated the entire operation in that exact structure in April 2017, being 18 months before Mr Aleck claims that “CASA” first became fully aware.

Ms Spence, to demonstrate how ludicrous the “CASA” position is.

Consider that four schools all operated at the same airport, being Moorabbin Airport. Those schools were MFT, LTF, AVIA, and ARC aviation. The only school that had ever submitted an Operations Manual/Exposition to CASA was MFT. The only CASA approved Key Personnel were MFTs Key personnel.

CASA would have someone believe that CASA personnel who would visit the airport on an almost daily basis did not notice those three schools operating with no CASA approval or knowledge. If they did pop their head in and want to talk to the Key personnel, there were none. CASA had never approved any Key personnel for these other three schools. It truly is preposterous.

Its important to emphasise that your own CASA employees, past and present are not trying to portray that highly unrealistic scenario with the exception of course, of Mr Aleck, and depending on your response, “CASA”

In my position that I operate within it was not required or expected that I would have any dealings at all with Mr Aleck. It was not my job to let Mr Aleck know everything about my flying school. It was my job to ensure that CASA is provided with all of the information, as stipulated by CASA, in order for Mr Aleck to be able to find out the specific nature of my operation. I have a reasonable expectation that if I do something on multiple occasions over many years with formal CASA approval that CASA “knows” about it, as they obviously and truthfully did.


On each and every one of those applications to add an entity under our Air Operator Certificate, over the decade that I operated, a fee was paid to CASA. It was a fee for service, requiring CASA personnel attendance on site at each of those proposed bases. CASA also conducted a desk top assessment. In addition, consider that in the entire lead up to this process would have been discussed extensively with the CASA team attached to my Organisation referred to at the time as a CMT or Certificate Management Team. Significant accompanying documentation accompanied each of those applications would have been submitted to CASA. One example is found earlier in this correspondence.

The CASA personnel that I was dealing with, were each highly experienced in the flight training background, and had many years’ experiences within CASA. They had been professional, well intentioned, and we had a relationship of trust and confidence. I had the same CASA team allocated to my business for over 10 years. I spoke to them and met with them at least weekly throughout those 10 years. To suggest that I ran this operation without them being fully aware of the specific nature of my operation until just prior to October 2018 is absurd, as you will appreciate.



There would be absolutely no reason that I would not be fully upfront with CASA. It is not realistic that I would not have fully communicated the exact nature of my operation, as I was dependant on CASA for those approvals.



CASA knew about my structure as soon as CASA considered my first application for a variation to my Air Operator Certificate over 6 years prior. That was the application for a variation to my AOC to authorise operations at our first alliance base, being AV8 in Darwin.



CASA gets to know stuff as a consequence of experience, and that is through that frequent and formal communication with the team of CASA personnel allocated to my organisation, as well as extensive application, review, auditing and approval processes.


CASA gets to ‘know’ stuff as a consequence of what its human officers find out in their capacity as officers of CASA. And it is not necessary for every officer of CASA to know something before CASA, in law, knows that thing. That would be absurd. In law, the artificial person CASA can ‘know’ something after merely one officer of CASA becomes aware of that thing in their capacity as a CASA officer.

So when e.g. a CASA FOI receives an application from an AOC holder for e.g. a variation to an AOC, in law CASA ‘knows’ the application has been made and CASA has ‘received’ the application. The officers in ‘Head Office’ can claim, reasonably and truly, that they did not know that the application had been submitted, but that makes no difference to CASA’s obligations and my rights in the circumstances.

Furthermore, CASA can in law ‘know’ something even if not a single one of its officers is aware of that thing. One of those ways of ‘knowing’ is called “constructive knowledge”, which is stuff CASA ought to know in the circumstances.

Let’s now consider my application to add our second base. My own base Melbourne Flight Training (MFT) had been operating for many years and which holds a flying training AOC issued by CASA and conducts flying training under the authority of that AOC at Moorabbin Airport. I then applied to CASA for a variation of the AOC so as to authorise MFT to also conduct flying training at Darwin aerodrome at the AV8 base, a freight operator in Darwin. We utilised AV8 buildings, aircraft, facilities, and employees as we were fully approved to do by CASA.

What is the very purpose of the regulatory requirement for this application and variation process? The very purpose?

Its purpose is for CASA to find out whether MFT satisfies the criteria in section 28 of the Civil Aviation Act and other regulatory provisions in relation to the conduct of flying training at both Moorabbin and Darwin. And that task, of its very essence, requires CASA to, among other things, find out whether MFT has effective control over the people and the premises and the aircraft whom and which will be used to deliver flying training at the proposed Darwin location.

The only way in which CASA can find out whether MFT has effective control over the people and the premises, and the aircraft is to find out who employs the people, who controls the premises and who is the registered operator of the aircraft. Even if no CASA officer finds those things out – for whatever reason, including that every CASA officer has no clue as to the implications of those things – CASA ought to know them because they are at the essence of CASA’s regulatory task in the circumstances.

In short, on every occasion that I applied for a variation to the AOC so as to cover an additional ‘alliance’ ‘base’, CASA ought to have found out, as they did, who employed the people, who controlled the premises and who was the registered operator of the aircraft whom and which would be engaged in flying training activities at the base. On every occasion. And CASA ought to have understood any potential implications.

Irrespective of what individual CASA officers understood or assumed and when, CASA was at least on constructive notice of the structure and its implications from a regulatory perspective from additional ‘alliance’ ‘base’ one. It was CASA’s job to find those things out, as it did It was the very purpose of the variation application process.



I look forward to your response confirming that CASA first became fully aware of the specific nature of the structure I had adopted just prior to October 2018, as CASA has led the Ombudsman to believe.



May I respectfully request that you personally respond and clearly identify when CASA first became fully aware of the specific nature of my operation. It is reasonable that CASA nominate that date. There must have been something that acted as the trigger for CASA to become fully aware. It is a reasonable request, and something that should be available to me. That is, I should be privy as to the same information that you are providing to the Ombudsman. If CASA is acting truthfully, there would be no reason that you would not provide that date to me.



I have also attached a copy of correspondence sent through to the CASA Industry Complaints Commissioner. At this stage he has not initiated the investigation, as I am awaiting a response from my new Local MP for Chisholm, Ms Carina Garland whose support and assistance I will be seeking.



https://www.dropbox.com/s/sl0y2c18105df8q/ICC%20Complaint%20False%20and%20misledaing%20information%202 8%20July%202022.docx?dl=0





My hope is that ethics and integrity will be bought to this process, and you will act in accordance with obligations placed on you.



Whilst my hope is that ethics and integrity will prevail, I would also draw your attention to obligations placed on you. These include the Legal Services Direction 2017, and I draw your attention to the document in its entirety but most particularly the following obligation on CASA of ; “not requiring the other party to prove a matter which the Commonwealth or the agency knows to be true” Legal Services Directions 2017 (legislation.gov.au) (https://www.legislation.gov.au/Details/F2018C00409)



Also, I encourage you to consider the obligations placed on you by CASAs Regulatory Philosophy in your response. Our regulatory philosophy | Civil Aviation Safety Authority (casa.gov.au) (https://www.casa.gov.au/about-us/who-we-are/our-regulatory-philosophy#:~:text=CASA%20demonstrates%20proportionality%20a nd%20discretion%20in%20regulatory%20decision-making,outcomes%20in%20the%20exercise%20of%20its%20regulator y%20powers.)



I appreciate that CASA may contend that there is no litigation in progress at this stage, and therefore the LSD directions do not apply. That technicality should not absolve CASA from the responsibility to be truthful and act in accordance with those obligations. It should not only become an obligation on CASA once I initiate litigation. Those principles, and most especially; “not requiring the other party to prove a matter which the Commonwealth or the agency knows to be true” Legal Services Directions 2017 (legislation.gov.au) (https://www.legislation.gov.au/Details/F2018C00409)





Respectfully



Glen Buckley
​​​​​​​

[Lead Balloon]

CASA must have known.
Precisely.

So, this specific issue now resolves to a test of Ms Spence's integrity and intestinal fortitude. Hopefully she'll call the Ombudsman's Office to let it know that there's some formal, clarifying correspondence on the issue on its way (hopefully drafted by someone unconnected with the drafter of the original correspondence). Or maybe she'll try to tough it out and only act if manoeuvred into a position where she has little choice but to make a virtue out of necessity.

[Lead Balloon]

Don't forget, Glen: I suggest you still need to be prepared to provide a crystal clear explanation in response to the ‘pub test’ applied to the statement on APTA’s website that ‘alliance’ ‘members’ would remain in ‘complete control of their business’. If CASA's going to tough it out, I reckon 'CASA' will focus on the words ‘complete control’ and argue that ‘business’ covers the whole of the activities carried out at the relevant ‘base’, including flying training. ‘CASA’ will argue that this control issue was fundamental and struck CASA with the force of complete novelty, out of the blue just prior to October 2018. Try to formulate some clear, layman-understandable explanation as to the distinction between control over the moving parts that determined compliance with regulatory requirements on the one hand, and what you meant by ‘business’ on the APTA website on the other (assuming of course a distinction was intended and operated in fact).

There’s nothing wrong with that distinction as a matter regulatory principle, if the certificate holder has legal and effective control over the moving parts that determine compliance with regulatory requirements. Except for financial viability potentially putting compliance at risk, how money flowed around and between whom inside the structure was none of CASA’s business. (And obviously CASA did not do an analysis of those money flows when APTA submitted applications for AOC variations to cover additional 'bases'. So even if those flows were relevant from a regulatory perspective, CASA failed to do its job properly by analysing them.) Provided regulatory requirements continue to be complied with, smart or dumb business decisions, who’s making them and profiting or bleeding money from them are irrelevant to CASA’s decision-making. CASA has certified many, many operators who eventually went broke while holding an AOC, and many more continue to line up for certification.

Ms Spence and the Ombudsman's Office will be easily baffled with bull**** disguised in high sounding regulatory words invoking the safety of air navigation. I suggest you get prepared - if you haven't already - to hose that down the drain.

[glenb]

Sorry folks, I have jumped around here a bit. In post #2344 i commenced posting my rather large document of an allegation of misfeasance in public office and did digress with another topic. I am back to that original document, and I am continuing it here.

A quick recap. There are a number of sections, and it is structured around the Attorney General's Office guidance. Those sections are copied and pasted below. This post is a continuation of the bolded section being the "Bad faith mental element. I am still working on this substantive document, and will keep posting.1. Introduction/The allegation

2. Misfeasance in Public Office

3. First Element-Holder of Public Office

4. Second Element-Exercising a Public Power that was an incident of that Office

5. Must the Public Officer owe the plaintiff a duty with respect to the exercise of power.

6. Third Element- The Exercise of Authority must be invalid or otherwise lacking lawful authority.

7. Fourth Element- The “Bad Faith” mental Element

8. Can the Commonwealth be vicariously liable for the misfeasance of its employees?

9. Commonwealth liability for ministerial misfeasance?

10. Importance of an early and vigorous assessment of an allegation of misfeasance.

11. Damages

12. Assisting Commonwealth Officers, other than Ministers

13. Assisting Commonwealth Ministers

14. Reducing the risk of misfeasance claims

15. The need to report misfeasance issues as significant claims

16. Preference for CASA to investigate this allegation.

17. Considerations of Mr Aleck remaining in the role.

18. Summary/conclusion



Mr Aleck has clearly demonstrated a propensity to provide false and misleading information to the current Commonwealth Ombudsman’s investigation with the intention to pervert the findings of that investigation, and that is supported by substantial, supporting evidence evidence.

There can be no doubt that Mr Aleck has provided clearly and deliberately misleading evidence to the current Commonwealth Ombudsman’s Office investigation.



If in fact my allegations are upheld, and Mr Aleck has provided substantially false and misleading advice then that would be an indicator of acting in bad faith. Mr Aleck has clearly attempted to influence the outcome of the Ombudsman’s investigation to pervert the findings of the investigation.

Mr Aleck has provided false and misleading information to the Ombudsman on several critical facts,

He has led the Ombudsman to believe that CASA never previously formally approved both my own business, and in fact many businesses around Australia to operate in the multi base, multi entity single approval structure.

That is clearly false and misleading and easily proven to be so.

Mr Aleck has led the Ombudsman to believe that CASA first became fully aware that I had adopted the structure just prior to October 2018 when he declared it unlawful and closed the business down,

The truth is that in fact CASA was fully aware of the exact nature for many years prior, because CASA approved it at least six years prior, revalidated it, audited it, and approved bases under the structure for many years.

Mr Aleck is clearly providing false and misleading information as to when CASA first became fully aware of the specific nature of my operation.

The following correspondence provides more detail on these substantial matters. The investigation by the CASA Industry Complaints commissioner (ICC) has not commenced at my request, until I have had the opportunity to meet with my local MP, Ms Carina Garland seeking her assistance and support.

If Mr Aleck is found to have provided false and misleading advice, which he most obviously has, then that alone should be an indicator of the bad faith mental element. it is part of his deliberate decision making. He clearly is aware of the truth but chooses not to provide it to the Ombudsman’s Office.

https://www.dropbox.com/t/oGq7MulaoFIYobAL





Outcome Based Legislation

Mr Aleck personally made a commitment to industry of the move away from prescriptive legislation to outcome-based legislation.

Mr Aleck has chosen not to follow his own commitment that he gave to industry i.e. to adopt the principles of “outcome based legislation” that CASA is committed to by way of its own CASA advisory circular with particular reference to Section 8. advisory-circular-1-01-understanding-legislative-framework.pdf (file:///C:/Users/61418/Dropbox/My%20PC%20(LAPTOP-O536QJTE)/Downloads/advisory-circular-1-01-understanding-legislative-framework.pdf)

I also draw your attention to a presentation by Mr Aleck to industry providing his explanation of “outcome based legislation.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6QPjoBXDuUk

The point of this being. Consider that Mr Aleck as the sole decision maker closed down my business, yet cannot produce a single deficiency against a single outcome.

What Mr Aleck did was, make a considered and deliberate decision not to act in accordance with his commitments given regarding outcome-based legislation.

It is completely inexplicable that there would be absolutely no allegations against any quality outcomes at all. None. Isn’t that the very principle of outcome-based legislation, that Mr Aleck espouses.

For complete clarity. CASA has never stated that they had concerns about operational control. At no stage did CASA ever request that we amend or change any of our procedures or systems. There were no identified safety concerns, and we maintained our industry leading levels of safety and compliance

If CASA had any concerns about operational control, they should be able to clearly identify them. CASA cannot produce a single piece of evidence to support the closure of my business.

We had industry leading level s of operational control, and associated systems, a large team of highly experienced management personnel, the largest safety department of any school in Australia etc.

There is no doubt or argument that CASA must be satisfied that operational control is maintained. CASA were always satisfied, and that is how we operated safely and compliantly for so many years.

What Mr Aleck did here was reversed a previously given approval and CASA should be able to justify the reasons for that reversal.

If CASA became unsatisfied, a reasonable expectation is that CASA can identify what led them to become ‘unsatisfied, ” and most especially if Mr Aleck is acting in accordance with the commitments he personally gave to industry regarding outcome based legislation.

Some examples that CASA should be able to provide to support Mr Alecks decision making would be any regultory breaches, insufficient management structure, safety breaches, audit results, flight and duty breaches, anything at all. It is incumbent that Mr Aleck should be able to clearly identify a single piece of supporting evidence to support his decision making.

You will note that CASA has never said that they were unsatisfied. Their actions and decisions very much suggested that they were very “unsatisfied”, yet CASA only goes so far as to say “we have to be satisfied that I have operational control”.

If CASA were satisfied for many years, and became unsatisfied, they should be able to identify the “trigger” for that change of opinion. CASA refer to this trigger as an “SRF

I have made multiple requests for the “SRF” but CASA refuse to respond.

The point being that if CASA become “unsatisfied” then CASA should be able to identify what led them to be unsatisfied. CASA should be able to address this issue. If CASA could identify any concerns at all against any quality outcomes, CASA should be able to identify them, after all that is what “outcome-based legislation” is all about, if Mr Aleck is to be believed.

The point of this being that Mr Aleck was fully aware of his commitment, and he demonstrated bad faith by straying so far away from those commitments in his dealings with me. personally. In fact, what he did was take legislation and apply it so “prescriptively” that it made no sense at all.

Mr Aleck clearly acted in bad faith by inappropriately manipulating legislation to achieve his own personal desired outcome, and in doing so, showed a flagrant disregard for the principles of outcome-based legislation, and the commitment to outcome-based legislation that he gave to industry.

To make such considered and deliberate decisions, it is yet another indicator that Mr Aleck was acting in bad faith



The comparative analysis between APTA and other Operators.

Mr Aleck is the sole representative of CASA in dealings with the Ombudsman’s office.

The Ombudsman has advised me that by convention they do not contact “employees, of the Agency. They deal only with the Agency representative”.

Therefore the Ombudsman access to information is controlled by Mr Aleck.

That is unfortunate because every CASA employee that operates within the flight training sector would be able to confirm that what I am saying is the truth and that Mr Aleck is being blatantly deceptive.

Mr Aleck has led the Ombudsman’s office to be of the view that CASA did not ever permit the exact structure that I adopted. That is blatantly untrue and any CASA employee except for the CEO Ms Spence, and Mr Aleck will attest to that fact.

The question that should be presented to any CASA Employee with experience in the flight training sector, and would fully resolve this entire matter once and for all would be something along the lines of….

Did CASA always and on every occasion with multiple operators throughout Australia, always permit the following arrangement?

· Entity “A” is the holder of the sole CASA Authorisation referred to as an Air Operator Certificate (AOC). An AOC is issued by CASA to permit a flying school to operate.

· Entity “B” does not have an AOC, and is not permitted to deliver flying training but may want to deliver flying training.

· Entity B has the facilities and equipment to operate a school, i.e. buildings, classrooms, aircraft, instructors, refuelling, maintenance etc. Typically, Entity B would be an aero club with its members privately flying and renting aircraft, but importantly it has no approval to operate a flight training school

· Entity “B” approaches Entity “A”, and asks that they enter into a commercial arrangement, whereby Entity A delivers flight training at Entity Bs location using the facilities and equipment of Entity B.

· Entity A agrees after conducting its due diligence of Entity B.

· Entity A being the sole CASA AOC Authorisation Holder, approaches CASA and advises that it has entered into an agreement with Entity B to deliver flight training at Entity Bs location and using its facilities and equipment.

· CASA then stipulates its requirements to Entity A and Entity A submits the application, with substantial supporting documentation to CASA of how Entity A will maintain operational control of its operations at Entity Bs location.

· CASA conducts a formal assessment including a visit to the site and issues an approval for Entity A to deliver flight training at Entity Bs location, and Entity A commences delivery of flight training, once Entity B is fully inducted into Entity As CASA approved systems and procedures.

An example of this would be both the Ballarat Aero Club and the Latrobe Valley Aero Club.

Both aero clubs that operated a flying school using exactly that arrangement with other AOC Holders over an extended period of time, with full and formal CASA approval until the day they transfer to my operation, and it became unlawful.

It’s ludicrous, and this is exactly why I believe that Mr Aleck was acting in bad faith in his dealings with me, and why I believe that his malice was targeted towards me specifically, and not other persons.

If Mr Aleck was not acting in bad faith, he should be able to clearly and concisely explain why Latrobe Valley Aero Club and Ballarat Aero Club were permitted by CASA to operate under other Operators AOCs previously but not Mr Buckley’s?

If we accept that in fact CASA had always approved operators throughout Australia to adopt the very same structure that I used then that allows a comparative assessment.

This would lead to a number of pertinent questions that should be addressed and will go some way as to ascertain whether Mr Aleck was acting with good intent i.e., in the interests of aviation safety, or was he acting in bad faith.

Importantly, once it is ascertained that in fact CASA did always and on every occasion approve this exact structure it allows a comparative assessment to be made, as in fact it should be. The comparative assessment can then be made as to the quality and level of operational control.

That comparison can be made between my operation that was not permitted, and the operations that CASA permitted the day prior. That being the two other Operators that held the respective AOCs delivering flight training at the Ballarat Aero club and Latrobe Valley aero Club.

That comparison could be made against an infinite number of criteria but could include a comparison of

Management size and structure, Safety Departments, systems of oversighting maintenance, training records, fatigue monitoring, internal auduiting,frequency of meetings, continuous improvement programs, manuals, mentoring and staff development etc etc

In this correspondence I will provide just one example, there are hundreds.

Fatigue monitoring.

The fatigue monitoring of pilots is done through the monitoring of flight and duty times.

The system that CASA accepted from the previous operators at both Latrobe valley and Ballarat was a paper-based system where pilot instructors would enter their flight and duty times retrospectively (it had no predictive capability). Whilst I am not suggesting that this did happen there was the ability for entries to be manipulated, a process referred to as “fudging the flight and duties.” CASA would check the flight and duties occasionally, and in the case of both those operators, those flight and duties had been checked by CASA on one occasion in the last twelve months. Because those flight and duties were completed after the flight there was absolutely no capability to prevent a pilot flying fatigued or committing a breach. If an accident were caused by pilot fatigue, this system could not have prevented it. An investigation would only identify fatigue as a factor after the accident.

The system that we introduced when aero clubs joined APTA. All instructors moved to a fully electronic system, which tracked their flight and duties automatically when they signed out and returned from flights. It had a predictive capability and tracked the flying that had been done up the point of sign out. It then applied a predictive capability using the intended flight time with a safety margin for the intended flight. It would not permit the pilot to depart on that flight if it would lead to a breach of flight and duty times. CASA had full access to this system, so that at any time, not only my management team but also CASA could conduct a full audit of our flight and duty times from the Melbourne Head Office without even leaving their desk.

Such systems were repeated throughout our entire Exposition, and I would welcome any comparative analysis of the levels of operational control between my operation and what CASA previously permitted. from other operators.

I am fully satisfied that I maintained industry leading levels of operational control, and that Mr Alecks decision making was in bad faith and motivated by factors other that safety, compliance or quality outcomes.

Consider that this is the first flying school to my knowledge that CASA has closed down.

A comparative analysis is surely essential to ascertain that Mr Alecks decision making was valid and could be justified, and with

[glenb]

MR ALECKS ACTIONS AND DECSIONS REDUCE THE SAFETY OF AVIATION

Mr Alecks actions and decisions have absolutely no basis in the safety of aviation.

Consider that CASAs very purpose is to increase the safety of aviation.

It would be expected that if Mr Alecks actions and decisions close down a well intentioned operator of ten years, who, according to CASA has consistently delivered an industry leading level of safety and compliance, then there should be some supporting safety case that CASA can supply in order to justify Mr Alecks actions and decision making. Something. Anything.

There is none, and that only confirms that Mr Alecks actions and decisions were done in bad faith. It would be a reasonable expectation that the nations aviation safety regulator could present some supporting evidence-based safety case to support that decision making. There is none. If there is one, I would urge CASA to go public with it. More importantly, I should be entitled to that supporting safety case.

As stated, Mr alecks actions and decisions demonstrably reduce the safety of aviation.

Utilising the single approval, multi base, multi entity approach that I had adopted for many years with full CASA approval since our first CASA approved base over 6 years prior we were able to pool and develop safety resources.

Just prior to Mr Aleck reversing APTAs approval, by pooling our collective resources we had the largest Safety Department of nay flight training organisation in Australia. It had an annual budget of approximately $500,000 per annum.

Regarding a comparative analysis that I have suggested previously, an excellent example that would demonstrate the quality of that department would be an “incident investigation”. If an investigator was to obtain three incident or accident reports from CASA. One for APTA, and one from each of the previous operators of Ballarat and Latrobe Valley and compare the result. I have viewed all three Operators reports, the comparison is revealing. Alternatively, a comparison of risk assessments made, safety educational material, safety training programs etc would be equally revealing.

To put this in comparison, the safety department of APTA exceeded the size of the safety departments of the large foreign owned schools delivering well in excess of 10 times the volume of flying that we were.

The point of this being that by dismantling the collaborative approach that CASA had previously approved, each of those entities lost access to a well-funded safety department.

Of the operators that did continue on in a one form or another after CASA forced them to leave APTA, not one of them maintains a fulltime safety department. Each member also lost access to group expertise, and safety data sharing that was previously available to them as part of APTA.

In actual fact, Mr Alecks actions and decisions have not increased aviation safety, and nor have they maintained the safety of aviation. They have decreased the safety of aviation.

The consistent approach of bullying and intimidation that Mr Aleck chooses to engage industry with cannot possibly enhance the safety of aviation. These are not just my views, these are industries views, and that is not in dispute. Mr Aleck has headed up the legal department of CASA for two decades. The approach of CASA towards industry has been a significant issue, and it has been highlighted at many Governments initiated reviews and through Senate inquiries.

If any regulator be it the Police, ASIC, or CASA adopts an attitude of bullying and intimidation with the people that it regulates. that cannot possibly improve outcomes, and in the case of CASA it simply cannot improve the safety of aviation.

Multiple well documented allegations of misconduct by Mr Aleck have been made over many years, and all of them have been crushed by Mr Aleck.

This narcissistic approach that Mr Aleck adopts in the workplace, towards industry has the potential to reduce the safety of aviation, and it does not align with CASAs own regulatory philosophy that Mr aleck is obligated to comply with.

One only has to ask Angel Flight or Bristelle about their experiences dealing with Mr Alecks decision making. The constant theme is that there is no supporting safety case, just as there is none with my matter. These are matters that have been raised before the current Senate inquiry

If Mr Aleck is making decisions cannot be supported by a safety case, and if in fact they degrade safety, and if they damage the relationship of CASA and industry, one must question whether Mr Aleck is genuinely acting in the interests of safety or is he in fact using his significant power primarily for reasons other than the safety of aviation.



Mr Aleck acted alone in his decision making.

Mr Aleck acted alone in his decision making. Mr Aleck applied his opinion only.

For clarity Mr Aleck is a lawyer, and highly experienced on aviation law. That is not in dispute. It is his integrity only that is being called into question, and whether he is acting in good faith or bad faith.

Mr Aleck sits in an Office in Canberra, and has done for twenty years, he has never been to any of my Bases, and I would not necessarily expect him to. The point being that he is not a Subject Matter Expert (SME) on flight training per se. He has no expertise in flight training. He has no exposure to syllabus design, training, assessing, designing remedial training, proficiency checks, flight testing, inducting pilots etc.

He has no experience in operating a flight training organisation, his area of expertise is law for the entire aviation industry.

Mr Aleck in his role can make an assessment as to the legality or not of my operation, that I accept.

If however he is making a determination that I did not have operational control over my operation, he is probably not qualified to make that determination, and if he does, then he should be able to justify that decision making, or have the CASA CEO formally endorse Mr alecks conduct and decision making.

If in fact Mr Aleck did not act alone, then I feel that the CASA CEO should clearly state CASAs position on this entire matter, and clearly identify if Mr Aleck was acting alone or on behalf of “CASA”, as I increasingly suspect.



This was a substantial move by CASA. To the best of my knowledge from my involvement in aviation since 1982, CASA had never previously closed down a flying school.

One would imagine that there was a significant process behind that. I am led to believe that is not the case, and I have that on good advice from within CASA.

Should this matter proceed to litigation the process of “discovery” would be revealing, although in your role as the CASA Industry Complaints Commissioner you will have access to that information.

Mr Alecks decision making was not subject to any procedural scrutiny within CASA, and where there were procedures under administrative law outlined in CASAs manuals, he chose to bypass those procedures, and specifically the procedures related to “varying, suspending and cancelling AOCs” is found in CASAs Enforcement Manual. Section 6. 12

CASA Enforcement Manual.pdf (file:///C:/Users/61418/Dropbox/PC%20(2)/Desktop/Glen/CASA%20Enforcement%20Manual.pdf)

Quite simply because Mr Aleck acted alone, and his decision making has no supporting safety case, no identified regulatory breach, no deficient quality outcome of any sort, and is in clear contradiction to previous CASA precedent, one has to question what was actually motivating Mr Alecks decision making, and what protections were in place.

Mr Aleck had previously been involved in closing down a number of aviation businesses, and there is almost no scrutiny over his conduct. It is extremely concerning and creates an environment whereby he can yield his significant power unchecked, as he has done with not only me, but many others.

In Mr Alecks application of his opinion, he drew on no external and independent legal advice. Due to the unique nature of the approach he adopted with my business, and the substantive nature of it, and particularly as there were no supporting safety concerns, no allegation that we did not have full operational control, no supporting case to justify that decision making, one would have expected Mr Aleck was aware of the tenuous nature of his actions and decisions, and if he was acting in good faith, he would have had his decisions independently and professionally validated.

The fact that his conduct and decision-making decision making continues unchecked, will only allow him to keep doing to others as he has done to me and so many others.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxI am confident that Mr Aleck was the sole decision maker, for a number of reasons.

The exact structure that I operated in was widespread CASA approved structure used throughout the industry. CASA was widely involved in the design and approval, many years prior. It became “illegal” in October 2018 when Mr Aleck personally first became fully aware of the specific nature of my operation. For clarity, the only way that I could have operated for many years in that structure was with CASA approval. Mr Aleck initiated the reversal of the approval.

I had the opportunity to meet with Mr Aleck personally at Melbourne Airport on this very matter. He made it very clear at that meeting that he was the “decision maker”.

In all communications with the Executive Manager of Regulatory Services at the time he would default to “his senior”.

The email from Mr Peter White, where he confirms that after 6 months the matter is finally resolved and we will be able to return to business as usual as CASA is now satisfied, then hours later, Mr Aleck then reverses that approval, and the entire matter is exactly back where it was 6 months prior. That will be dealt with later in this document.

From CASAs perspective this was a highly complex legal matter. There would be no other person in the CASA Organisational Structure that could reasonably be expected to have the experience to deal with this matter.

I acknowledge that Mr Aleck is very capable of “distancing” himself from involvement in these matters, and that has been his pattern of behaviour over many years, on these issues.

Noy only from my own personal observations, and Mr Alecks wider industry reputation for doing exactly that. Interestingly these exact characteristics of distancing himself from involvement and that exact trait has been raised by Senator Sterle and Senator McDonald in Senate. A link to those concerns raised by the Senators can be accessed here. XXXXXXX

[Lead Balloon]

Have you spoken to Mr White about the content of the March 19 email? You do realise that Dr A will likely say that he made no administrative decisions and imposed no requirements that affected APTA, and that those were instead operational decisions of others like Mr White?

[glenb]

Lead balloon, this continuation has addressed your feeback hopefully. Cheers. Glen

This is a continuation of the "bad faith element" covered in previous posts. Mr Aleck unfairly exercised his power and placed unique requirements on me and my business only and would not lift the trading restrictions on the business until he was personally satisfied.

I am fully satisfied that Mr Aleck has provided what is clearly and false and misleading information to the Ombudsman investigation. I have addressed this earlier in this correspondence

Mr Aleck asserts that CASA never permitted the exact structure that I adopted, which is clearly disinformation provided by him to pervert the outcome of the inquiry.

Once this matter is clarified that in fact CASA had always approved the identical structure that I adopted it allows for a comparative assessment to be made that clearly highlights that I was having unique but challenging hurdles placed in front of me as justification for Mr Aleck leaving the trading restrictions in place and preventing me from returning to Business as Usual.

Mr Aleck had chosen to target me and my business rather than another business adopting the identical structure.

Recall that Mr Alecks initial strongly held position was that APTA was unlawful and unauthorised and that it needed to be “dismantled”.

I put up a robust defence as outlined earlier in the document. Mr Aleck was by now becoming aware of the tenuous nature as to the validity and lawfulness of his original course of action.

A new “issue” arose. CASA would only lift the trading restrictions once we produced a “contract” that satisfied CASA.

I need to make the following points here.

CASA already held the contracts and had done so for a long time.

They had been provided to CASA on multiple occasions over previous years to multiple CASA employees including CASAs second most senior executive at the time, Mr Graeme Crawford.

Initially CASA denied this. I provided irrefutable evidence by showing CASA a sampling of those emails.

This left Mr Aleck in an awkward situation.

An example of our 2016 contract provided to CASA on multiple occasions is accessed via the following link. A viewing of that contract, and particularly the latter component (The spirit of APTA) is an important read.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/ymsyq1vd1bswrm8/Contract.doc?dl=0

It is obvious from reading this document alone and without the overwhelming body of supporting evidence that the concept was not a single flying school structure, and this is two years before Mr Aleck claims CASA first became fully aware that it was a multi base, multi entity, single authorisation structure.

This exact structure that Mr Aleck was calling into question, had always been formally approved by CASA on multiple occasions, with multiple operators, including mine for all time and on every occasion, despite Mr Aleck denying this in his representations to the Ombudsman office

CASA had never stipulated the requirement for any other Operator whereby CASA required a contract from any other Operator as to the commercial nature of their agreement with their customers.

As the CASA Industry Complaints Commissioner, you will promptly and easily be able to verify that CASA holds no agreements for any other operator on file with CASA, as it was never previously a requirement.

This was truly a most unusual requirement, and I was the first flight training organisation in Australia with this requirement placed on me.

The issue was not that CASA had placed this requirement on me. The issue was that crippling trading restrictions would remain in place until Mr Aleck was satisfied with the contents of that commercial contract.

I had absolutely no resistance to anything that CASA wanted in the contracts as I explained earlier. This entire matter could have been finalised in a matter of hours, yet it continued on for a staggering eight months.

It only needed for Mr Aleck to clearly and concisely explain to me what he wanted to see in those commercial contracts, and it would have been completely resolved within hours.

Once Mr Aleck had no option but to admit that CASA already held the contracts that he was calling, for he was presented with two options.

On each and every occasion that Mr Aleck was presented with two options he would on each and every occasion choose the option that created the greater harm, and here is only one example that leads me to believe Mr Aleck was not acting in good faith, and he was not conducting himself as if he were a well-intentioned person making his decisions on the basis of good intent. He was acting in bad faith.

Once Mr Aleck realised that he had made an error. He should have fixed it. The trading restrictions were causing enormous commercial harm as Mr Aleck was aware and notified of in writing on multiple occasions.

This was an important opportunity in this entire matter. It needed only for Mr Aleck to say something along these lines.

“Yes Glen, we do actually have the contracts, and have done so for a long time, but we would like to tweak the wording with you, to get it to my full satisfaction.”

There would have been absolutely no resistance at all from me.

Why would there be?

I am fully responsible for the actions of every person that operates under my AOC as the law states. I have 100% responsibility. If CASA want to add something that takes that to 120% in their mind, I will have no objection, in fact I would welcome it.

By complying, as I willingly would have, the trading restrictions could have been lifted by Mr Aleck and I could have potentially salvaged the business at this stage.

However rather than act as a well-intentioned person would have, Mr Aleck made a number of alternating narratives with regard to finalising the “contracts issue”, and dragged it out unnecessarily for eight months until he stood by his initial decision and declared it unlawful. Throughout that entire period, the trading restrictions were never lifted.

There can be no doubt that the only reason that the entire matter was not resolved in a matter of hours was because Mr Aleck chose for it not to be resolved in a matter of hours. He chose for the matter to continue over many months.

Throughout that period, he was fully aware of the commercial harm being caused, as CASA was notified of it in writing.

I called on CASA to make a “decision” based on the contracts that they held. Had CASA made a “decision” I would have had something to attend to or appeal.

Instead, Mr Aleck pursued an alternating narrative of requirements in those contracts that was ever changing, and it was obvious that Mr Aleck could not be satisfied.

By refusing to “make a decision” on the existing contracts and with no ability to appeal the trading restrictions that he had put in place, Mr Aleck was able to maintain those trading restrictions in place and deny me access to any right of appeal, natural justice or procedural fairness.

In finalising this matter I need to make some points very clear.

· The contract issue was a unique requirement placed on my business only, and that is why I feel that I was being targeted by Mr Aleck.

· CASA met absolutely no resistance at all from me as to the additional wording that they required in those commercial contracts.

· The entire matter could have been and should have been resolved in a matter of hours.

· CASA at no stage ever required any changes to any of our systems or procedures to maintain operational control, compliance or safety that are contained within our CASA approved suite of Operations manuals referred to as the Exposition.

· This entire matter was regrading the wording that CASA wanted in the commercial contracts. These are not normally anything that CASA has involvement in, and concerningly. CASA was stipulating wording in our commercial contracts that were a requirement for trading restrictions to be lifted, yet CASA was not prepared to be a signatory to those contracts.

The fact that the requirements placed on me by CASA were only applied to me, the fact that this matter could not be resolved to Mr Alecks satisfaction after a staggering eight months, lead me to believe that Mr Aleck was not acting in good faith.

Recall that throughout the eight months Mr Aleck refused to make an administrative decision. What he did was impose trading restrictions in place that were crippling both commercially and reputationally to both me and my business.

Mr Aleck thought about this entire matter, then after eight months determined that the structure was unlawful and forced all customers to leave APTA despite their expressed preference being to remain a member of APTA, and this included my own flying school of more than decade, obviously leaving the “Company” intact but the business of that Company decimated.

[Lead Balloon]

Why do you think Mr White, and not Dr A, was the signatory of the email to APTA in March 19? If Dr A was the sole decision maker in your matter, why did Mr White have anything to do with APTA?

The answer to the question as to who made the operational decisions to adopt the regulatory positions set out in the letter of October 18 and email of March 19 as ‘CASA’s’ positions seems to me to be a very important one. I would not be surprised if Dr A said the signatories of those pieces of correspondence made those decisions. Why else are they paid the big bucks?

[glenb]

CASAs Regulatory Philosophy



CASA Regulatory Philosophy’s gives a commitment to industry of how CASA will engage with industry.

The CASA CEO at the time, Mr Mark Skidmore released CASAs ten point Regulatory Philosophy in September 2015 in line with one of the key recommendations of the Forsyth Report that had identified CASAs engagement with industry was sub optimal.

An overview by a legal firm and link to that report can be accessed here. The Forsyth Report: Challenging times ahead for CASA and the aviation industry - Cooper Grace Ward (cgw.com.au) (https://cgw.com.au/publication/the-forsyth-report-challenging-times-ahead-for-casa-and-the-aviation-industry/)

On release of the Regulatory Philosophy, the CASA CEO, Mr Skidmore said

“We now have a clear and concise set of principles that will guide all our actions,” Skidmore said.

“It is vitally important every CASA person understands these principles, how they apply to the work they do and the need to ensure they adhere to them in practice.

“These principles will guide and direct the making and implementation of regulations, safety education and support, the delivery of regulatory services, operational surveillance and enforcement, as well as our consultation and communications.

“Where necessary, CASA will develop new policies and procedures to give meaningful effect to our regulatory philosophy.

“I am committed to ensuring these principles make a real, positive and lasting difference to the way CASA operates and way we interact with the aviation community."

The philosophy is in response to Recommendation 14 of the Forysth Report, which stated "The Civil Aviation Safety Authority changes its regulatory philosophy and, together with industry, builds an effective collaborative relationship on a foundation of mutual understanding and respect."

The ten basic principles are:

CASA is committed to maintaining the trust and respect of the aviation community
Mindful of the primacy of air safety, CASA takes account of all relevant considerations, including cost
CASA takes risk-based approaches to regulatory action and decision-making
CASA performs its functions consistently with Australia's international obligations
CASA approaches its regulatory functions consultatively and collaboratively
CASA communicates fully and meaningfully with all relevant stakeholders
CASA fairly balances the need for consistency with the need for flexibility
CASA embraces and employs rational 'just culture' principles in its regulatory and related actions
CASA demonstrates proportionality and discretion in regulatory decision-making and exercises its powers in accordance with the principles of procedural fairness and natural justice
CASA has a legitimate, but limited, role in pursuing punitive action for breaches of the civil aviation legislation

“I understand some people may be sceptical at first about how or whether these principles will make a practical change to the way we carry out our regulatory responsibilities," Skidmore said.

“To regain trust, we must earn that trust. We look forward to the opportunity to do just that, and I invite the aviation community to use CASA’s regulatory philosophy as a benchmark against which our performance is measured."

The ten principles including explanatory text is available on the CASA website and can be accessed here. Our regulatory philosophy | Civil Aviation Safety Authority (casa.gov.au) (https://www.casa.gov.au/about-us/who-we-are/our-regulatory-philosophy)

I do understand that CASA may not be legally bound to comply with its own Regulatory Philosophy. It does however get to the central theme of this matter being the “bad faith mental element”.

When you consider the harm caused to me and my business by Mr Aleck, and this matter in its entirety, there can be no doubt that Mr Aleck has shown a callous disregard for those commitments in that Philosophy.

Mr Aleck would be fully aware of CASAs Regulatory Philosophy as he would have been the person responsible for drafting it.

By choosing to stray so far away from these commitments in his dealings with me, Mr Aleck has demonstrated that he was acting in bad faith. It cannot be a lack of awareness, an error or an omission, it is a considered decision not to conduct himself in accordance with that Philosophy.

On the CASA website where CASA presents the Regulatory philosophy, it outlines the purpose of the Regulatory Philosophy and gives industry a very clear commitment as to how CASA employees will engage with industry.



“The CASA Regulatory Philosophy outlines the principles underpinning the way we perform our functions, exercise our power, and engage with the aviation community.

Consistent with CASA's obligation to comply with the laws governing its regulatory activities, this statement of regulatory philosophy sets out the principles that guide and direct CASA's approach to the performance of its regulatory functions and the exercise of its regulatory powers.

Fidelity to these principles will be reflected in CASA's regulatory policies and practices and will extend to the fullest extent possible to all aspects of CASA's engagement with the wider aviation community.

I will address each of those ten commitments individually, with my brief comments in italicised text.1. CASA is committed to maintaining the trust and respect of the aviation communityCASA is committed to maintaining the trust of the Australian aviation community and regaining that trust where it has been shaken or compromised. CASA is likewise committed to fostering mutual respect between itself and the aviation community in every aspect of our engagement with members of that community.

My comment: You yourself as the CASA ICC previously identified that “CASA” had breached this first commitment of CASAs regulatory philosophy.

You identified ‘CASA”, I am merely trying to be a bit more specific.

There can be no doubt that from the very first contact in October 2018, CASA has shown a flagrant disregard for this commitment in its entirety. This extends from Mr Aleck initiating that notification with no prior warning, to consistently changing the “goalposts”, to providing clearly false and misleading information to the Ombudsman. Mr Alecks actions and decisions do nothing to regain the trust of the aviation community. This entire matter has received widespread industry attention and is an industry example of exactly why CASA will not be able to “regain that trust where it has been broken”, because the engagement with industry continues to decline and become increasingly combative in nature. 2. Mindful of the primacy of air safety, CASA takes account of all relevant considerations, including costAlthough safety must always be CASA's 'most important consideration', this does not mean that safety is the only consideration CASA takes into account when performing its regulatory functions and exercising its regulatory powers. CASA is required to take all relevant considerations, including cost, into account.

Where reasonable alternative approaches to the fulfillment of a regulatory requirement-
satisfy applicable legal requirements and
do not unacceptably compromise safety

CASA will readily entertain such alternatives if they are proposed and accept them in the absence of compelling reasons not to do so.

My comment: Consider that commitment that CASA gives to industry, “Where reasonable alternative approaches to the fulfilment of a regulatory requirement satisfy applicable legal requirements and do not unacceptably compromise safety, CASA will readily entertain such alternatives if they are proposed and accept them in the absence of a compelling reason not to do so.

Well quite clearly Mr Aleck did not accept my reasonable alternative that I had been adopting for many years and with wider CASA approval. This entire matter clearly indicates that Mr aleck did not, readily entertain such alternatives, and he can offer no compelling reason why he did not accept my structure. He has clearly not acted in accordance with CASAs Regulatory Philosophy, and that is a clear indicator that he was choosing to act in bad faith.

3. CASA takes risk-based approaches to regulatory action and decision-makingCASA will adopt a regulatory approach based on a sound assessment of the level of risk associated with particular aviation operations. In doing so, the highest safety priority will be afforded to passenger transport operations, and operations in which passengers and others exposed to higher levels of risk are not in a position to make informed judgements and effective decisions about the risks to which they are exposed.

CASAs approach was extremely disproportionate, and most especially considering that on CASAs own commitment here, flight training has a relatively “low level of risk” due to students being in a position to make informed judgements, and effective decisions as to the risk to which they are exposed, and particularly so compared to an Airline passenger.

Mr Aleck most certainly did not adopt a risk-based approach to regulatory action. There was no risk, there were no safety concerns, and there were no deficient outcomes identified by CASA at all.

Mr Aleck did not make “risk based” decisions. His decisions were motivated by reasons other than “risk”, and I believe that indicates that he was acting in bad faith.

4. CASA performs its functions consistently with Australia's international obligationsExcept where a difference to a standard specified in an Annex to the Chicago Convention has been properly notified to the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) by Australia, CASA will strive to ensure its regulatory requirements, policies and practices:

are consistent with ICAO standards
harmonise with best international regulatory practice, having particular regard to aviation jurisdictions with features similar to Australia's.

Harmonisation does not necessarily mean replication, and where it is appropriate to do so, CASA's regulatory requirements, policies and practices should reflect considerations that are distinctive to the Australian aviation environment.

My comment: I have no complaint against this commitment. It commits to international standardisation; my issue was more local standardisation i.e. a different person in CASA applying a completely different interpretation of legislation to my business.

5. CASA approaches its regulatory functions consultatively and collaborativelyCASA will develop and implement appropriate, and appropriately inclusive, consultative and collaborative policies and practices with a view to:

understanding the nature and practical implications of existing and potential aviation safety issues and problems
deciding whether, and if so the extent to which, CASA should be involved in addressing such issues and problems
identifying the most appropriate contributions CASA can make to addressing such issues and problems, recognising that a regulatory response will not always necessarily be the most appropriate contribution.

Correspondingly appropriate consultative and collaborative policies and processes will be developed to guide and direct the way in which CASA carries out its distinctive responsibilities (regulatory and otherwise) in addressing the aviation safety issues and problems in respect of which CASA's responsibilities have been identified.

My comment: The approach adopted by Mr Aleck was most certainly not one of being consultative and collaborative,

Mr Aleck obviously had the option to approach me in a consultative and collaborative manner. The option for a well-intentioned four-hour meeting could have avoided this matter in its entirety. Yet he chose to adopt a highly prescriptive regulatory response, when he options were available to him that clearly caused less harm.

6. CASA communicates fully and meaningfully with all relevant stakeholders
At every stage of the regulatory activities in which CASA engages-from contemplating the need to make a rule or impose a requirement, to the application of a rule or requirement-and to the fullest extent possible in the circumstances, CASA will ensure that everyone whose rights, interests and legitimate expectations will, or are likely to, be affected by CASA's contemplated actions has access to information and advice about:

what it is CASA proposes to do
why CASA is proposing to do so
what considerations CASA has taken into account in forming its view on the matter to hand
what alternatives (if any) had been considered and why those alternatives had been ruled out
what the effects of the proposed actions are expected to be
what recourse is available to persons who are, or are likely to be, affected by the proposed action.

CASA will ensure that the information and advice it provides to the aviation community, generally and in individual cases, is:

clear and concise, using plain language and concepts wherever possible
correct and complete, authoritatively informed and fully informative
responsive to the questions or issues to hand and timely.


effects of the proposed actions are expected to be
what recourse is available to persons who are, or are likely to be, affected by the proposed action.

CASA did not communicate with me fully and meaningfully.

CASA did not communicate with me at “every stage from contemplating the need to impose a requirement to the application of that requirement”, in fact CASA did not give me any indications that there were any concerns at all until the very moment that they imposed that requirement. I walked into work at 8 am on October 23rd 2018, having absolutely no idea that by the end of the day my business of more than a decade would be determined unlawful and unauthorised, given only 7 days certainty of operations, that I would be threatened with prosecution by CASA as would my customers through their involvement with me. I was in daily communication with my CASA Certificate Management Team, the very CASA team that was responsible for the “management of my CASA certificate”, and was allocated to my business. Surely someone in that team should have raised concerns with me, before CASA issued that notification.

The Regultory Philosophy commits that everyone whose rights, interests and legitimate expectations will, or are likely to, be affected by CASA's contemplated actions has access to information and advice about:

what it is CASA proposes to do
why CASA is proposing to do so
what considerations CASA has taken into account in forming its view on the matter to hand
what alternatives (if any) had been considered and why those alternatives had been ruled out
what the effects of the proposed actions are expected to be
what recourse is available to persons who are, or are likely to be, affected by the proposed action.

Consider that CASA gave me no prior indication of what it proposed to do, despite that being easily done, CASA has refused to identify the considerations taken into account in forming its view, CASA steadfastly refuses to identify what alternatives had been considered including my preferred alternative to resolve the entire matter within four hours at any time, CASA refuses to identify why it chose not to seek the alternative of resolving the entire matter in that four hours, and Mr Aleck specifically used a process of placing crippling trading restrictions on the business for eight months while he “thought about it” therefore denying me any right of appeal against his conduct, and giving the person affected by the action absolutely no recourse at all.

For these reasons against this item of CASAs own Regulatory Philosophy, I am fully satisfied that Mr Aleck did not act in good faith.



7. CASA fairly balances the need for consistency with the need for flexibility
CASA will consistently employ the same processes, and have regard to the same criteria, in all cases involving the consideration of particular facts and circumstances for the purposes of determining whether, and if so how, a regulatory requirement should be interpreted or applied in any given situation. In this way, everyone may be confident that they are receiving the same advice about the general meaning and application of any regulatory requirement.

CASA will also ensure that all relevant facts and circumstances peculiar to an individual situation have been fully and fairly considered on their merits, and will provide advice about, or decide the outcome of, a particular matter governed by a regulatory requirement on that basis. In this way, everyone may be confident that, within a regulatory framework that consistently employs the same processes and assesses facts against the same criteria, their individual circumstances will be fully and fairly considered.

My comment: You yourself as the CASA ICC identified that “CASA” had breached item seven of the regulatory philosophy. I am merely trying to be more specific. “CASA” incorporates many highly professional personnel working towards aviation safety. My complaint is more specific and aimed at a specific CASA employee, being Mr Aleck.

Item Seven of CASAs Regulatory philosophy is another commitment that is particularly pertinent to this entire matter.

Consistency. Let me be very clear on this. Mr Aleck and/or Ms Spence the CEO of CASA are responsible for providing false and misleading information to the Ombudsman investigation.

The truth is very clearly, that CASA on each and every occasion formally approved the identical structure that I had adopted, throughout the flight training industry, that is the single authorisation, multiple bases, multiple entity structure.

This entire matter is about how I was targetted

Mr Aleck targeted me specifically in October 2018 when that notification was sent. This commitment in item 7 of CASAs Regulatory Philosophy was clearly not complied with. The fact that this was not an industry wide application of Mr Alecks opinion but rather one directed at me only, leaves me in no doubt that I was targeted. One would expect that there should be an accompanying explanation from CASA as to what was different about my structure, compared to others that caused only my organisation after operating for over a decade to be declared unlawful and unauthorised, whilst not the other Operators across Australia adopting the identical structure.

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8. CASA embraces and employs rational 'just culture' principles in its regulatory and related actionsCASA embraces, and encourages the development throughout the aviation community of, a 'just culture', as an organisational culture in which people are not punished for actions, omissions or decisions taken by them that are commensurate with their experience, qualifications and training, but where gross negligence, recklessness, wilful violations and destructive acts are not tolerated.

Appropriate polices will be developed and implemented to ensure the integrity of this approach, and to guard against any inappropriate punitive action by CASA, or disciplinary action by a service provider, in a manner inconsistent with this principle.

My comment: Once again, one must question Mr Alecks application of a “just culture”

Considering that there are no regulatory breaches, no safety concerns, no evidence or data at all, and no identified deficiencies against any quality outcomes to justify Mr Alecks decision making. It must raise concerns.

The consequences have been significant not only to me and my family but to staff, customers, students and suppliers.

Apart from taking an industry lead on raising concerns about the new regulatory structure, I don’t believe that CASA has ever identified what I did wrong. In fact there is nothing, and that is what makes the entire matter so absurd.

You will understand that my life has been decimated by this entire matter, so I am very much of the opinion that Mr Aleck has not acted in accordance with the principles of “just culture” and I call into question his integrity and motivations.



Item 9 is a rather long commitment so I will break this one down. The bolding being the CASA text, and the italicised text being my comments.9. CASA demonstrates proportionality and discretion in regulatory decision-making and exercises its powers in accordance with the principles of procedural fairness and natural justiceCASA will seek optimal safety outcomes in the exercise of its regulatory powers. On that basis and to that end, CASA will ensure that its actions and responses are appropriate and proportional to the circumstances.

My response: Consider that CASA has never closed a flight training organisation down or applied the trading restrictions that were applied to my business, throughout my involvement in the industry over more than more than 30 years, yet I actually did nothing wrong, its ludicrous.

There is no safety concerns ever raised by CASA and there is no valid reason that this entire matter could have been fully resolved at any time within four hours. That option was always available to Mr Aleck, so I very much question not only the intent, but also the proportionality of his response, as it was entirely unnecessary.

Furthermore, by thinking about it for 8 months with crippling trading restrictions in place, rather than make a decision that I could appeal, I was completely denied both procedural fairness and natural justice.

CASA most certainly did not exercise proportionality and discretion in its decision making. After operating in that identical structure with full approval from CASA for many years. Once Mr Aleck formed the opinion that I had been operating “unlawfully” with full CASA approval for many years that should have initiated a well-intentioned process, such as the four-hour discussion that I have previously mentioned. The approach adopted was entirely unnecessary, and caused significant harm that was entirely not necessary

The commitment “exercises its powers in accordance with principles of procedural fairness and natural justice, is something I very much call into question, as I had no appeal or processes available to me to prevent Mr Aleck putting crippling trading restrictions on the business. The breaches of administrative law, procedural fairness and natural justice are significant, and as stated earlier CASA bypassed their own procedures. Consider that CASA was able to deprive my business of revenue for a staggering eight months while Mr Aleck “thought about it”, and throughout that time, I have no right of appeal.



In the first instance, and in the absence of demonstrable safety-related reasons for doing otherwise:

CASA will adopt an approach to regulatory compliance based on the encouragement of training and education, with a view to remedying identified shortcomings and correcting specified deficiencies
where it is necessary in the demonstrable interests of safety for CASA to exercise discretionary powers in order to achieve a specified safety-related outcome, CASA will employ the least intrusive and least disruptive means consistent with the achievement of that outcome.
My response, Mr Aleck had the option of the 4 hour well intentioned discussion available to him. A total exercise that would have been resolved on the same day. He was not compelled to put those trading restrictions on the business, they were entirely unnecessary. On every occasion that Mr aleck was presented with two options he would choose the most intrusive and disruptive means, and I will deal more with that later in this document. The point being that this entire matter could have been resolved in four hours with no trading restrictions in place at all, and most particularly not for eight months. It was entirely unnecessary to shut my business down causing significant impact to me and my family, staff, students and suppliers who were also impacted. It is quite obvious that despite Mr Aleck having a number of options available to him, he clearly adopted the most intrusive and most disruptive options that were available to him.
CASA will not utilise its discretionary powers to vary or suspend a civil aviation authorisation for punitive or disciplinary purposes, but only for purposes reasonably calculated to achieve specified safety-related objectives, including the protection of persons and property pending the satisfactory demonstration by the person whose privileges have been, or are to be, varied or suspended, that the shortcomings or deficiencies giving rise to CASA's action have been effectively addressed.
My response. CASA commits to only varying, suspending or cancelling an AOC for purposes reasonably calculated to achieve specified safety related objectives, although CASA can offer absolutely no “specified safety related objectives. to justify the decision to vary my AOC. This gets to the very central theme being that CASA had absolutely no valid basis to take the action that they took. Mr Aleck was acting in bad faith.

In determining whether and how to exercise its regulatory discretion in a particular matter, CASA will have regard to:

the seriousness of the safety-related implications of the instance of noncompliance under scrutiny
My response, there is absolutely no noncompliance which makes this entire matter so absurd.
mitigating or aggravating circumstances impacting on the appropriateness of the responsive regulatory action(s) contemplated
My comment:The mitigating or aggravating circumstances are that CASA approved me to operate in this exact structure for many years, formally approving bases under this exact structure, then worked side by side with me over two years as I invested in completely overhauling every aspect of the business, in preparation for the new regulatory structure, then CASA fully revalidated me in April 2017, then audited the entire structure in November 2017, and then formally approved further bases, and then in October 2018, Mr Aleck declares it unlawful. It makes no sense at all. Surely the starting point once that CASA realise a business has been operating unlawfully for a decade due to an oversight by CASA because Mr Aleck was unaware, and in cases where they have audited, revalidated, and visited the business, surely a softer, less combative stance could have been adopted. Surely rather than send me an email, threatening business closure and prosecution, one of the CASA personnel that I dealt with on a daily basis could have raised concerns and given me the opportunity to work with CASA to rectify the perceived l issue.

Its important to note here that the Ombudsman found that CASA had erred and in fact there was nothing unlawful about the structure, which makes this entire matter so obscene. Mr Alecks actions and decisions were unlawful.

the history and background of the person whose acts or omissions are under scrutiny, in relation to that person's demonstrated ability and willingness to comply with regulatory requirements
My response: I had maintained an industry leading level of safety and compliance for over a decade that I had been running the business, and that is based on feedback from CASA. I was at all times completely willing to put any wording into our commercial contracts that CASA required, there was always a complete willingness to comply and that is why I maintain that the only reason this matter was not resolved in four hours is because Mr Aleck chose for it to be that way.
the passage of time since the acts or omissions under scrutiny occurred, and when they were discovered by, or otherwise came to the attention of, CASA.
My comment, CASA had approved me to operate in this exact structure for approximately a decade, and I had done so with full CASA approval and full awareness of exactly my business structure. Once Mr Aleck realised that I had built and operated my business on that structure for over a decade with full CASA approval, them my reasonable expectation that was CASA would have engaged in a conciliatory manner and worked with good intention to rectifying their oversight, rather than adopt such a totally unnecessary combative approach that resulted in so much harm.
the degree of responsibility of the individual(s) whose acts or omissions are under scrutiny
My comment: I was completely dependent on CASA for design, and approval of the structure that I adopted. CASA formally approved it, many years earlier. CASA encouraged me on it, approved bases under it, audited it and the CASA personnel that I dealt with on a daily basis, that being my CASA allocated Certificate Management Team(CMT) were most certainly fully aware of it. Throughout that decade that I operated the business, I could not have possibly been aware that I had broken any regulatory requirements. As has now been evidenced and attended to in this document, in fact there was no regulatory breach. I was 100% dependent on CASA to do operate my business, I could not possibly have been aware that they had supposedly made an error.
the effect on the wider aviation community (including the general public) and confidence in CASA's administration of the civil aviation legislation in the interests of safety
My comment. This entire matter cannot possibly build confidence in CASA. A well-intentioned Operator who delivers industry leading levels of safety has his business close down, with no supporting safety case or regulatory breach. All of this with no right of appeal.
the obsolescence or obscurity of the law
Apparently the only person in CASA that was awre that I was operating outside of the law, was Mr Aleck, and he only became aware many years later, and the legislation that he drew on to make his decisions was grossly misused, and it was used in a way that specifically targeted me, as it was in contrast to all industry precedent.
whether a contemplated regulatory response would be perceived as counter-productive, for example, by bringing the civil aviation legislation or CASA into disrepute.
My comment, this matter has attracted widespread industry support, and Mr alecks actions, decisions and conduct does bring CASA and its well intentioned personnel into disrepute.
the availability and efficacy of appropriate alternatives to a particular regulatory response
My comment: There is absolutely no valid reason that this entire matter could have been resolved in 4 hours with a well-intentioned discussion, without any CASA paperwork even requiring to be raised. If Mr Aleck can provide no valid reason why he did not choose that option. Had he have chosen that option no harm would have been caused.
whether the consequences of the regulatory action contemplated would be unduly harsh or oppressive
Placing restrictions on a businesses ability to trade that cause reputational and commercial damage over a period of eight months, then closing that business down, when there is no reason a 4 hour well intentioned meeting could have avoided all of that. Most definitely, Mr Alecks imposed restrictions were not only totally unnecessary, they were unduly harsh, oppressive and from my personal experience with the man, cruel.
whether the matter is one of considerable public concern
the actual or potential harm occasioned to an individual or the damage to property and
My comment, this was a “simple” matter of adding some wording into our “commercial contracts”. It was not a change to any of our CASA approved operating procedures. There was absolutely no public concern, potential harm to an individual or damage to property. It was just some words in a contract. As I keep stating, how could that have been so difficult to resolve.
whether the person whose acts or omissions are under regulatory scrutiny is (or has been) willing to co-operate with CASA in the efforts to address the particular matter to hand and/or to address relevant safety-related issues more generally.
My comment: There was never any resistance from me at all, and CASA will not be able to refute that. At all times, I was fully prepared to put whatever wording CASA wanted in our commercial contracts, and that is why the entire matter should have been fully resolved in a matter of hours. The restrictions were crippling my business reputationally and commercially. There is absolutely no reason that I would not want the wording into the contracts as soon as possible so that I can return to business as usual.

The applicability of and weight to be given to these and other factors will depend on the particular circumstances of each case.

Beyond its legal obligation to do so in most cases, in all cases in which CASA exercises discretion in determining whether, and if so to what extent, a requirement will be imposed on a person, except where the interests of safety prevent it or it is otherwise demonstrably impracticable to do so, CASA will afford persons affected, or likely to be affected, by a decision with an appropriate measure of procedural fairness and natural justice.

My comment. Mr Aleck clearly did not provide me with an appropriate measure of procedural fairness and natural justice by completely bypassing the protections put in place in CASAs own manuals when they “cancel, vary, or suspend an AOC.

10. CASA has a legitimate, but limited, role in pursuing punitive action for breaches of the civil aviation legislationCASA has a legitimate, but limited, role in the pursuit of punitive action against a person for alleged breaches of the civil aviation legislation. CASA will not pursue regulatory administrative action to vary, suspend or cancel a civil aviation authorisation for punitive purposes.



My comment. I operated in that identical structure for many years. I did take an industry lead on raising concerns in the years leading up to the introduction of the new legislation and did gain some media coverage. From my experience dealing with Mr Aleck and this matter, and considering that there no supporting safety case, no regulatory breaches, and absolutely no compelling reason for Mr Aleck to act as he did.



I can attend to each of those items of the regulatory philosophy in more detail, but this brief summary above, should indicate that Mr Aleck was acting in bad faith. If a CASA employee adheres to that philosophy, they would be well protected, but when a CASA employee strays so far from these obligations then that must surely raise concerns as to the employee acting in bad faith.

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“Attempts to resolve the contract issue.

Mr Aleck has led the Ombudsman’s Office to be of the view that CASA made a number of “good faith attempts” to resolve the contracts issue.

That representation is very far from the truth, and I will attend to that here.

Recall that the crippling trading restrictions dealt with, in detail later in the “Damages section” will not be lifted until Mr Aleck is personally satisfied with the wording of our commercial agreements.

A simple task that could and should have been completed within a matter of hours was dragged out unnecessarily over 8 months. This was simply a task of putting CASA required text into our commercial agreements. Within hours of CASA providing that text at any time after October 2018, or preferably years prior, this matter could have been finalised. I was dependent on CASA clearly and concisely advising what they require in our commercial contracts. There was no resistance at all from me. Mr Aleck was able to maintain the crippling trading restrictions on the business for a staggering six months, while denying me any right of appeal while he “thought about the wording that would satisfy him” and refused to make a decision, despite me calling on him to do so.

As I have stated previously, there is absolutely no reason that this entire matter could not have been resolved in a matter of hours.

On every occasion that I met a CASA requirement and embedded it into the commercial contracts, CASA would stipulate a new requirement. It was increasingly obvious that there was little intent to resolve the issue of the “contracts”. I was chasing a moving target.

Some important considerations and underpinning knowledge here:

· It’s important to recall CASAs alternating narrative. First, my structure was deemed unlawful by Mr Aleck, then after a couple of months, as that position became tenuous, he moved over to the “Temporary Locations” procedure that we utilised to induct new members. This exact process that we adopted was the exact procedure that CASA had suggested to me and approved years earlier. Once CASA realised that it was in fact their own approved procedure, there was no option, either lift the restrictions, which is exactly what should have happened, or find a new topic to maintain the restrictions on the businesses ability to trade. That topic now became the “contracts” issue, and the restrictions on trade remained in place, until that was resolved to Mr Alecks satisfaction.



· This requirement for CASA to be involved in the wording of the “commercial” agreement between the Members was a new and unique requirement that Mr Aleck placed on my business only. No other Operators, including mine, had ever previously been required to hold a CASA approved commercial contract. CASA has no such contracts for any operator on file. There is no legislative or safety argument to suggest CASA should have any involvement. Mr Aleck was not compelled to place those restrictions on the business for eight months while the wording was considered by CASA, it was a considered decision by Mr Aleck. He would have been fully aware of the commercial and reputational harm that would be caused by his action, and I advised CASA on multiple occasions in detail of the commercial and reputational harm being caused.



· In fact, I truly do not believe that Mr Aleck had any valid basis to stipulate this requirement for CASA to even become involved in commercial contracts. It is critical that the reader has an understanding of what an “Exposition” is, as opposed to a “commercial agreement. The commercial agreement being the document that CASA insisted on becoming involved in. Once the reader has an understanding of the difference between the Exposition and the Commercial Agreements, it becomes increasingly obvious that the requirement by CASA is quite bizarre.



The “commercial agreement” is simply the contract that the majority of businesses in any industry will have with their customers, outlining the “business” and “financial” aspects of the relationship. As it is commercial in nature, and not related to safety or compliance, CASA has traditionally not been involved in these arrangements, and has no legislative obligations to do so. The commercial contract is a normal part of doing business. This was not only a case of CASA wanting us to have commercial contracts, but also wanting to stipulate the wording in those commercial contracts. Unusually CASA refused to become a signatory.



The “Exposition” on the other hand is a comprehensive suite of documents of several thousand pages. The Exposition is a CASA requirement, and I will draw on CASAs own definition of what an Exposition is;

An Exposition is a document, or set of documents, which describe how your organisation will conduct its operations safely. It sets out both for CASA and the personnel involved in your operation how you intend to comply with all applicable legislative requirements and manage the safety of your operation. The relevant regulations will outline what you must include. It will include information about your organisation, personnel, facilities, policies, systems and procedures for conducting your activities.

A flight training organisation is required to describe procedures by which the operator conducts and manages its training activities, including the supervision of instructors and trainees. Your exposition must accurately reflect how you will conduct your activities. It needs to be written and structured in a logical way. This will ensure the relevant parts can be readily identified and provided to your personnel who are responsible for complying with them.

Example, CASR 142.340 requires a Part 142 flight training organisation to describe procedures by which the operator conducts and manages its training activities, including the supervision of instructors and trainees. Your exposition must accurately reflect how you will conduct your activities. It needs to be structured in a logical way. This will ensure the relevant parts can be readily identified and provided to your personnel who are responsible for complying with them. The procedures in your exposition should also provide enough detail so that your personnel can conduct their activities consistently in line with your intentions. Each procedure should address, where required.

· What must be done?

· Who should do it?

· When it must be done.

· Where it must be done

· How it must be done

· Record Keeping

· How the procedure is monitored and approved



Once the relevant authorisation has been issued by CASA, you are obliged to conduct your activities in accordance with your exposition.

Below is an extract from CASR 142.340. This link outlines the regulatory requirements for the contents of the Exposition.As stated before. If CASA required any structural or significant changes it was essential that they are contained within the Exposition, not a commercial contract.

CIVIL AVIATION SAFETY REGULATIONS 1998 - REG 142.340 Part 142 operators--content of exposition (austlii.edu.au) (http://classic.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/cth/consol_reg/casr1998333/s142.340.html)



· The Exposition document that CASA is heavily involved in and would be where I would expect matters of operational control to be contained. The “commercial” agreement between a business and its customers traditionally have not been something that CASA has any involvement in.



· Furthermore, it seemed unreasonable that Mr Aleck would stipulate CASA requirements into a commercial contract and not be prepared to be a signatory to that contract. I have no legal training at all but surely CASA has no right to “interfere” in the contents of commercial contracts, and most especially if they will not be a signatory. Nevertheless, I showed no resistance at all and was willing and able to do whatever CASA required in order to have the trading restrictions lifted. I just needed CASA to tell me what they wanted.



· It is also important to understand that when CASA wrote to me in October 2018, notifying their intention to close my business, they called for me to provide copies of commercial contracts. I advised CASA that I had provided them multiple copies over the preceding years, including to Mr Graeme Crawford, the Executive Manager of the Aviation Group and CASAs second in charge at the time. CASA denied this, I showed irrefutable evidence. CASA was now in a difficult situation. They had called for contracts, and now discovered that they already held them. Although there had been no requirement, I had provided them as a matter of courtesy. CASA was now in a difficult situation. CASA now had no safety case, no regultory breach, the Temporary Locations procedure had been found to be their own procedure, and now CASA realised that they already had the contracts. Mr Aleck had by now pushed himself into a corner. Rather than admit error, and work with good intent to resolve the matter, he chose a path forward where the trading restrictions would stay in place until we could adjust the wording in the contracts, to his satisfaction. As I was attending to his opinion only, I was fully reliant on Mr Aleck being satisfied if the trading restrictions were to be lifted. There was now a significant power imbalance, as Mr Alecks application of his opinion would determine the future of me and my businesses. I requested on multiple occasions that the trading restrictions be lifted, while Mr Aleck was “thinking” about it, but CASA refused to lift the trading restrictions.



What really happened here was that CASA kept changing their requirements. On each and every occasion that CASA provided information on their requirements, it was retuned on every occasion within 4 business days and CASA will not be able to refute that. On every occasion, CASA changed their mind, and the requirements were altered.

Finally, after 6 months with the crippling trading restrictions in place CASA again provides me with the “finalised” wording that will once again satisfy CASA.

Once again, I embed that into my contracts, submit it to CASA. CASA approve it, and then shortly, do exactly what they have done throughout the previous 6 months, and change their mind again, and I am right back exactly where I was 6 months earlier, with the trading restrictions in place. It was obvious to me that this matter could not be resolved. There was no intention for it to be resolved.

This happened on multiple occasions, but on the final occasion I was able to obtain a recording of that meeting, and I will provide that recording here. This recording has previously been provided to the Commonwealth Ombudsman, The CASA Board, and the CASA CEO.

Until now, I had not distributed that recording outside of that small pertinent group. I do intend to share that recording with other relevant parties that request it. I am fully satisfied that there is an attempted coverup of this matter, and that Mr Aleck is being “protected”. If my allegations are substantiated, there can be no doubt that the safety of aviation could be impacted by that misconduct, and especially so when considering the seniority of the Executives involved. I sought assistance from the previous LNP Government at Ministerial level, and the CASA Board who refuse to meet with me. My rights under administrative law have been ignored, as have my rights under natural justice and procedural fairness. The trauma and harm caused has been significant. On the basis of the safety of aviation alone, without all the other contributing factors, I feel that I have no option available to me, other than to release that recording, and expose that misconduct within CASA.

The point of this recording. It clearly demonstrates that CASA gave me guaranteed assurances that if I embedded the suggested CASA text into my contracts, they would finally lift the trading restrictions. CASA did not. That recording can be accessed in the timeline below. Understand that the crippling trading restrictions have now been in place for a staggering 6 months. There was no doubt in my mind that this was simply being used as a “delaying tactic”. Mr Aleck was fully aware that each week this matter went on, my family was having to subsidise continuing operations. Initially this was $10,000 per week and increased to $20,000 per week as business continued to decline as a result of the unnecessarily prolonged matter. By now, my own funds are exhausted, and my parents have contributed $300,000 of their retirement fund, to maintain operations. CASA was fully aware of the commercial and reputational harm being caused because I wrote to CASA on multiple occasions on this topic.

Not only commercially but reputationally the business is decimated. We have been unable to enrol any students into our courses, as we only have a limited surety of operations, i.e., 7 days. Customers are transferring away from us, staff are becoming increasingly concerned about their continuing employment, and enormous organisational instability exists.



On Tuesday April 2nd, 2019. CASA provide their “final” guidance on what will satisfy Mr Aleck, in order for the trading restrictions be lifted. It is inexplicable that CASA placed trading restrictions on the business 6 months earlier, and they have only just worked out the wording that they want. A fundamental principle is that “in order for something to be wrong, you need to know what right is”. If CASA deemed my commercial contracts wrong or deficient and in need of CASA involvement 6 months prior, surely, they should have thought about the wording that they wanted way back then, and that failure to resolve the matter is exactly why the matter could not be resolved in 4 hours as it should have been. Irrespective, CASA finally provide the wording that will satisfy “CASA/Mr Aleck” on April 2nd, 2019

My Accountant also contacts me on the same day requesting a meeting. I have now been assuring him for 6 months that this simple matter of the wording in our commercial contracts is about to be resolved. He had grave concerns about continuing operations and asked that I come to his office with my Admin Manager at 11.30 AM on April 4th being the Thursday, in two days’ time.



On Thursday April 4th being the day that we were to meet with our accountancy firm, I emailed Mr Peter White of CASA at 8.30AM in the morning requesting a phone conference call at 11.30AM that same day from the office of my accountancy firm. I advised that the meeting would be about the potential cessation of all operations at APTA, Ballarat Aero Club, Latrobe Valley Aero Club, Simjet, Whitestar Aviation, AVIA and Learn to Fly, and MFT, unless we could finalise this matter of the wording in the contracts. Like me, my accountant could not understand how such a simple matter was not resolved after 6 months. It was imperative that the matter of the contracts was resolved at that meeting. The business could not proceed if the restrictions remained in place. It was imperative that the “interim operations” and other CASA imposed restrictions be lifted and the business permitted to return to “business as usual’.

My accountant had grave concerns about the impact of the restrictions on the business over the previous 6 months, and like me, could not see any basis on safety or law for the CASA actions. It was a change of opinion. By now the business is under extreme financial distress. My accountant was extremely concerned that after 6 months waiting for CASA to determine what they want in the contracts; the matter was still not resolved.





4th April 2019 at 11.30AM The meeting proceeded at 11.30 AM by way of a conference call. In attendance representing CASA would be the Executive Manager Aviation Group Mr Graeme Crawford, and the Executive Manager of Regulatory Services and Surveillance, Mr Craig Martin. Also in attendance were two staff from my accountancy firm and two staff from APTA. Both CASA employees have since left the Organisation.

The point of providing this recording. It includes several very clear commitments from each of those employees, that if I embed that wording, the trading restrictions will be lifted, and I will be able to return to business as usual.

At that meeting, CASA Executives Mr Martin and Mr Crawford individually gave me firm and repeated commitments that if I embedded the CASA suggested text, that was provided to me only two days earlier by CASA into the contracts, then the restrictions on the businesses ability to trade would be lifted. APTA would be promptly approved to continue operations and as CASA termed it, return to “business as usual”

Some points that I should mention regarding some statements made in the recording that I will shortly provide.

Mr Martin urged me to get the contract back as soon as possible, as that was “all we were waiting for”. His tone suggested that they were waiting on me, as they were. I had been waiting on CASA to provide that text for 6 months. They had provided it only two days earlier on the Tuesday.

My accountant queried Mr Crawford as to why it had taken 6 months for CASA to provide the suggested text and lift the restrictions on the business. Mr Crawford advised my accountant that he didn’t have to explain CASAs position and that he didn’t have to talk to him because he was the accountant. It was obvious at that meeting that they were unable to justify the unacceptable timelines and were not going to explain the reason that it took CASA 6 months to work out what it was that they wanted.

There was no doubt in my mind at the conclusion of that meeting that CASA committed that they would lift the restrictions if I returned the contracts with the CASA guidance fully embedded, as they had committed to previously.

RECORDING of MEETING ( Pprune supporters please email me [email protected] if you would like to register your interest to obtain a copy.



Tuesday 9th April 2019 at 7.33AM It is now four business days after CASA provided their finalised requirements, which I had embedded into the contract. At 7.33AM, the contract is returned to CASA for review by Mr Peter White, the CASA Executive Manager of Regulatory Services and Surveillance at the time, and my point of contact to Mr Aleck. My reasonable expectation at this stage was that the business would soon be able to return to business as usual as CASA had already assured me on so many previous occasions during the previous 6 months, and in order to meet the commitments given by CASA Executives, Mr Martin and Mr Crawford at the Accountants Office days earlier on April 4th,



Tuesday 9th April 2019 at 6.32PM CASA has now received the finalised contracts approximately 12 hours earlier. Peter White the CASA Executive Manager of Regulatory Services and Surveillance at the time, responds and sends me an email titled “I can confirm the content is acceptable to CASA”. Within the body of the email, it goes on to state. “Dear Glen, I have reviewed the draft contract provided this date. I can confirm the content is acceptable to CASA. My appreciation to you and your staff for provision of same…….”

On receiving that email, I was relieved. Something that should have been solved 6 months ago, in a matter of a few hours, had finally been resolved to CASAs satisfaction By now the business had been decimated mine and the businesses funds were exhausted, my parents had put in $300,000 of their own money to ensure I could avoid any staff redundancies over the previous 6 months that the trading restrictions had been in place. Many of my customers and staff had already left because of the previous 6 months uncertainty, and I had been unable to take on new customers or students. The accountant had very firmly advised me that this matter must be resolved immediately, or he would have to intervene. He would not permit continued operations now costing approximately $20,000 per week.

I have now had a commitment from the following CASA Executives

1. CASA Executive Manager of the Aviation Group- Mr Graeme Crawford at my accountant’s office less than a week prior.

2. CASA Executive Manager Regulatory Services and Surveillance- Mr Peter White via email

3. CASA Acting Executive Manager Regulatory Services and Surveillance- Mr Craig Martin at my accountant’s office less than a week prior.



After waiting six months CASA has finally provided the suggested wording, which I have adopted, and the contract has been returned to CASA. I have assurances from all relevant CASA Executive managers with the exception of Mr Jonathan Aleck



Tuesday 9th April 2019 at 10.56PM.

Only hours later, there is yet another complete reversal by CASA and I am back at the start of the process again exactly where I was six months prior when CASA write back to me and ask, “can you hold off distributing for a day or two”. I am back in exactly the same situation that I was six months earlier. I have crippling trading restrictions in place, the damage reputationally and commercially is by now almost irreversible, and we still don’t have the CASA required wording that will satisfy Mr Aleck and permit me to return to Business as Usual.



12th April 2019, (Friday) CASA advise that they will contact me verbally over the weekend.



16th April 2019 (Tuesday) CASA advise that they would like another teleconference.



17th April 2019 (Wednesday) CASA advise that they have some “disappointing news”. The contracts were now not acceptable, CASA put a proposal to me that they would now pursue a different approach, although a new approval for interim operations would now be issued. It was the “interim approvals” that bought so much instability and uncertainty to the business. The matter was still not resolved, and another interim approval to operate is issued. Any remaining confidence in the APTA model by customers and potential customers is now lost as they have been in “limbo” for 6 months already. Their reasonable expectation, as was mine, was that this matter should have been resolved long ago.

24th April 2019 I write to CASA raising my concerns. Attached as Appendix D https://www.dropbox.com/s/yhtzovw4e1ere61/APPENDIX%20D-%20My%20letter%20to%20CASA.pdf?dl=0



There can be no doubt that this matter dragged unnecessarily on for 8 months, until Mr Aleck stood by his initial determination and declared that APTA was unlawful and forced all flying schools to leave APTA, including my own flying school of more than a decade. All of this without me having any right of appeal, as no Administrative Decision was ever made. There were no good faith attempts by Mr Aleck to resolve the contracts issue. There was only changing goalposts, and continual delaying tactics utilised that were completely unnecessary. From my experience as the owner of those businesses, at no stage did I ever feel that there was any intent to resolve this simple matter.

Mr Aleck was the decision maker whose “opinion” needed to be satisfied.

My trading restrictions would not be lifted until he was personally satisfied with the wording in the “commercial” contracts, of which CASA refused to be a signatory.

I was given solid commitments on that recording by CASA on April 4th from my accountants office that the wording they had now provided after 6 months would facilitate the lifting of trading restrictions. It didn’t.

[glenb]

Piston Broke. Sorry for the delay in replying. I agree it will be a substantial document. I have engaged the services of a journalist to work on layout, grammar etc and format two documents. One being "misfeasance" and one being "negligent misstatement".

I will submit those documents to
Ombudsman's Office
CASA Industry Complaints Commissioner
AFP
Attorney General's office
All members of Parliament with the exception of LNP Members.
My Local MP, Ms Carina Garland
ABC
Federal Anti Corruption body
CDDP

You are correct, may will not read it, but thoise that are compelled to do so, will do so. Hopefully

[Piston_Broke]

Attach an executive summary at the front - no more than an A4 page including dot points.

Your journalist will be well experienced in wording it in such a way to motivate further reading i.e. pull the punters in.;)

[Sbaker]

Glen, if you want I may be able to put you in touch with a channel 7 reporter I know here in Perth.

​​​​

[glenb]

1. Introduction/The allegation

2. Misfeasance in Public Office

3. First Element-Holder of Public Office

4. Second Element-Exercising a Public Power that was an incident of that Office

5. Must the Public Officer owe the plaintiff a duty with respect to the exercise of power.

6. Third Element- The Exercise of Authority must be invalid or otherwise lacking lawful authority.

7. Fourth Element- The “Bad Faith” mental Element

8. Can the Commonwealth be vicariously liable for the misfeasance of its employees?

9. Commonwealth liability for ministerial misfeasance?

10. Importance of an early and vigorous assessment of an allegation of misfeasance.

11. Damages

12. Assisting Commonwealth Officers, other than Ministers

13. Assisting Commonwealth Ministers

14. Reducing the risk of misfeasance claims

15. The need to report misfeasance issues as significant claims

16. Preference for CASA to investigate this allegation.

17. Considerations of Mr Aleck remaining in the role.

18. Summary/conclusion







. Can the Commonwealth be vicariously liable for the misfeasance of its employees?

Assuming that the CASA ICC determines that Mr Alecks conduct meets the threshold of misfeasance in public office, could I also ask in that final report that you clearly identify to me whether CASA consider the liability for misfeasance is a personal one, rather than vicarious.

With no legal training, my view would be that any liability would rest with CASA, as the CASA CEO, CASA Board, and the LNP Deputy PM were fully briefed on this matter from the beginning in 2018., so my reasonable assumption is that they accepted that conduct. I am sure that Mr Aleck felt the same way by that inaction.

Whilst the initial decision making may have been made by Mr Aleck, it is reasonable to assume that the CASA CEO, CASA Board, and LNP Deputy PM endorsed his decision making by their failure to act despite them being fully briefed on the matter, and me making multiple requests of each of them to meet with me.

For clarity, I believe that I am entitled to be advised of “who” the decision maker was. i.e. Mr Aleck or CASA. It is a fair and reasonable request.

[glenb]

1. Introduction/The allegation

2. Misfeasance in Public Office

3. First Element-Holder of Public Office

4. Second Element-Exercising a Public Power that was an incident of that Office

5. Must the Public Officer owe the plaintiff a duty with respect to the exercise of power.

6. Third Element- The Exercise of Authority must be invalid or otherwise lacking lawful authority.

7. Fourth Element- The “Bad Faith” mental Element

8. Can the Commonwealth be vicariously liable for the misfeasance of its employees?

9. Commonwealth liability for ministerial misfeasance?

10. Importance of an early and vigorous assessment of an allegation of misfeasance.

11. Damages

12. Assisting Commonwealth Officers, other than Ministers

13. Assisting Commonwealth Ministers

14. Reducing the risk of misfeasance claims

15. The need to report misfeasance issues as significant claims

16. Preference for CASA to investigate this allegation.

17. Considerations of Mr Aleck remaining in the role.

18. Summary/conclusion


Commonwealth liability for ministerial misfeasance?

The previous Deputy PMs of the LNP Government, both the Honourable Mr Michael McCormack and the Honourable Mr Barnaby Joyce were fully briefed on this matter by the Chair of the CASA Board in accordance with the Ministers Statement of Expectations of CASA. The Ministers Statement of Expectations can be accessed here. The document in its entirety is relevant to this matter, although I draw your attention specifically to 5d, which also confirms that both Deputy PMs were fully briefed. I retain extensive correspondence written to both ex-Deputy PMs over 4 years raising my substantial allegations and requesting a meeting. Both Deputy PMs chose not to provide me the opportunity to meet and submit my substantive complaint. I have received confirmation that all my correspondence was received, and that file can be provided to your Office if you deem it pertinent.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/xm7vw1flw3rn1qe/Ministers%20Statement%20of%20Expectations%202019.pdf?dl=0

[glenb]

1. Introduction/The allegation

2. Misfeasance in Public Office

3. First Element-Holder of Public Office

4. Second Element-Exercising a Public Power that was an incident of that Office

5. Must the Public Officer owe the plaintiff a duty with respect to the exercise of power.

6. Third Element- The Exercise of Authority must be invalid or otherwise lacking lawful authority.

7. Fourth Element- The “Bad Faith” mental Element

8. Can the Commonwealth be vicariously liable for the misfeasance of its employees?

9. Commonwealth liability for ministerial misfeasance?

10. Importance of an early and vigorous assessment of an allegation of misfeasance.

11. Damages

12. Assisting Commonwealth Officers, other than Ministers

13. Assisting Commonwealth Ministers

14. Reducing the risk of misfeasance claims

15. The need to report misfeasance issues as significant claims

16. Preference for CASA to investigate this allegation.

17. Considerations of Mr Aleck remaining in the role.

18. Summary/conclusion

Importance of an early and vigorous assessment of an allegation of misfeasance.

The AGS Legal Briefing identifies the importance of an early and vigorous assessment of an allegation of misfeasance. I have raised these most substantial allegations against CASAs second most senior Executive on multiple occasions over a protracted period, and in the most formal of settings. This has extended over a period of four years, and to date, CASA has initiated no investigation into this matter. My allegations have been submitted to:

1. The Senate Inquiry (contained within this document)

2. The Deputy PM of the previous LNP Government. (file held by me and available upon request)

3. The CASA Board . (file held by me and available upon request)

4. The CASA CEO . (file held by me and available upon request)



Inexplicably, and completely at odds with reasonable community expectations, CASA has not initiated any investigation into Mr Alecks conduct.
It is inconceivable to me, presumably and would be to wider community expectations, that such substantive allegations could be made against the second most senior Executive of Australia’s aviation safety regulator, and the Organisation itself is not willing, or is not capable of self-initiating an investigation into the allegations. This becomes even more concerningly inexplicable when one considers the potential to impact aviation safety if those complaints were validated, and the very formal nature of the submission of those allegations including before the Senate.

If I reflect on my own Organisation before CASA closed me down. If an individual were to raise an allegation against my second most senior manager. If that allegation was substantive, potentially involved unlawful conduct, involved techniques of bullying and intimidation, and clearly had resulted in significant harm and trauma. And if the person making those allegations against my manager, wanted to meet with me in a professional and respectful manner to discuss their complaint against that Executive. I cannot possibly imagine any scenario that I could justify refusing to meet with the individual raising those allegations, unless I was trying to “coverup” the matter.

That is precisely what I believe has occurred in this scenario. I have made multiple requests to meet with not only the CASA CEO, but the CASA Board, as well as the two previous Deputy PMs of the previous LNP Government.

Considering the potential impact on the safety of aviation if my allegations were substantiated, it would no longer be tenable for Mr Jonathan Aleck to remain in the position of Executive Manager of Legal, International, and Regulatory Affairs.

The failure by the previous Deputy PM, The CASA Board, and the CASA CEO to act on this matter necessitates me formally submitting this complaint to initiate that investigation, that CASA steadfastly refuses to self-initiate.

[glenb]

I know that this is a "juicy one" but needs some more work.

[glenb]

1. Introduction/The allegation

2. Misfeasance in Public Office

3. First Element-Holder of Public Office

4. Second Element-Exercising a Public Power that was an incident of that Office

5. Must the Public Officer owe the plaintiff a duty with respect to the exercise of power.

6. Third Element- The Exercise of Authority must be invalid or otherwise lacking lawful authority.

7. Fourth Element- The “Bad Faith” mental Element

8. Can the Commonwealth be vicariously liable for the misfeasance of its employees?

9. Commonwealth liability for ministerial misfeasance?

10. Importance of an early and vigorous assessment of an allegation of misfeasance.

11. Damages

12. Assisting Commonwealth Officers, other than Ministers

13. Assisting Commonwealth Ministers

14. Reducing the risk of misfeasance claims

15. The need to report misfeasance issues as significant claims

16. Preference for CASA to investigate this allegation.

17. Considerations of Mr Aleck remaining in the role.

18. Summary/conclusion

Assisting Commonwealth Ministers

Not relevant to address this topic at this stage, other than to reiterate that the last two LNP Deputy PMs of the previous Government were fully briefed by the CASA Board, and also by me. At this stage, this is an allegation against Mr Jonathan Aleck only.

[Sbaker]

GlenB - as they have denied you procedural fairness from the onset - you should be entitled to damages.

[Flaming galah]

GlenB - as they have denied you procedural fairness from the onset - you should be entitled to damages.

Not sure damages are the remedy here Chief.

[Sbaker]

Absolutely correct FG, gaol, and damages.... Is the only appropriate answer.

[Lead Balloon]

CASA will argue that the email of March 19 afforded APTA procedural fairness. Unfortunately, the time and cost demands it imposed drove Glen to despair.

And I concur with FG: Failure to afford procedural fairness in administrative decision-making renders the decision unlawful, but that does not result in any entitlement to damages. And gaol? Gimme a break… (A successful negligent misstatement or malfeasance in public office claim will get you damages.)

Perverting the course of justice by pursuing and delaying prosecution action while misleading the CDPP, so as to put an individual under constant, long-term stress as a reprisal – now yer talkin’ gaol. But no one in CASA would ever pursue and delay unmeritorious prosecution action while misleading the CDPP, so as to put an individual under constant, long-term stress as a reprisal, and CASA's executive would have proper governance arrangements in place to detect and curtail such corrupt and criminal behaviour.

[glenb]

1. Introduction/The allegation

2. Misfeasance in Public Office

3. First Element-Holder of Public Office

4. Second Element-Exercising a Public Power that was an incident of that Office

5. Must the Public Officer owe the plaintiff a duty with respect to the exercise of power.

6. Third Element- The Exercise of Authority must be invalid or otherwise lacking lawful authority.

7. Fourth Element- The “Bad Faith” mental Element

8. Can the Commonwealth be vicariously liable for the misfeasance of its employees?

9. Commonwealth liability for ministerial misfeasance?

10. Importance of an early and vigorous assessment of an allegation of misfeasance.

11. Damages

12. Assisting Commonwealth Officers, other than Ministers

13. Assisting Commonwealth Ministers

14. Reducing the risk of misfeasance claims

15. The need to report misfeasance issues as significant claims

16. Preference for CASA to investigate this allegation.

17. Considerations of Mr Aleck remaining in the role.

18. Summary/conclusion



6. Reducing the risk of misfeasance claims

Whilst it could be argued that the topic of reducing the risk of a misfeasance claim, is not worth addressing in this complaint, as “the horse has already bolted”.

Nevertheless, I feel that it is pertinent to address it in this complaint. The AGS Briefing states that the best antidote to misfeasance is sound decision making that is properly documented and accords with all applicable legal requirements.

The decision making by Mr Aleck is not properly documented and as addressed earlier in the correspondence does not accord with all applicable legal requirements, in fact as the Ombudsman found in phase one of the investigation, Mr Aleck was wrong in his determination that the structure was unlawful. The structure was determined not to be unlawful by the Ombudsman’s Office in phase one of the investigation

As CASA never identified any safety concerns, nor any breaches of procedures or any quality outcomes, there was no risk to the safety of aviation, and Mr Aleck was not under any pressure to cut corners in his decision making. It is reasonable to assume that Mr Aleck should accept a high level of responsibility for his decision making. It was considered, he was not compelled to make the decisions that he did, and he had no time pressure, other than to act within reasonable time frames, which clearly, he did not. Eight months was ample time for Mr Aleck to make considered decisions with availability to all relevant information to make decisions.

Mr Aleck would have been fully aware that his decision making had significant consequences for me. He was under no pressure to circumvent statutory requirements or deny procedural fairness to me, as the person affected by his decision. Mr Aleck was dealing with the liberty of individuals, and he was fully aware of that.

The AGS document identifies a number of ways to reduce the risk of a claim of misfeasance, and calls on well documented, evidence-based decision making, and that document then goes on to identify “high risk” elements. In my case, every single one of those “high risk” elements apply. in my situation, they include:

· “A decision or conduct that directly affects personal liberty or the financial position or reputation of a person to a significant extent”.



There can be no disputing that Mr Alecks decision making affected my personal liberty, my financial position and my reputation, and Mr Aleck would have been fully aware of that when he placed the crippling trading restrictions on the business. Mr Aleck was closing down my business from which I derived my livelihood and was intended to fund my retirement. If Mr Aleck tries to claim that he was not aware, I would dispute that. With his experience in the industry and his expert knowledge of the regulatory structure and his expertise in working with and using that regulatory structure, he was fully aware of the impact of his decision making. To ensure that he was fully aware of the impact both reputationally and financially I wrote to CASA on multiple occasions throughout the eight months. This matter is dealt with in more detail, in the “Damages” section. Recall that at any time Mr Aleck could have had resolved this within hours by simply advising what text he wanted in our commercial contracts. I am fully satisfied that Mr aleck deliberately chose the option that caused more harm. For complete clarity, I am fully satisfied that a reason that Mr Aleck took so long to make a decision was in fact because of the harm being caused both reputationally and commercially. These “delaying” tactics used by Mr Aleck are well documented in the industry and have been noted at Senate inquiries and in the AAT.



I will deal with this in more detail in the “Damages’ section but the damage has been significant. Businesses have been closed, I have lost my livelihood and life savings and forced to exit the industry. Students from overseas and Australia have been impacted as have staff that lost entitlements and employment, and suppliers left unpaid. other businesses closed down. Personally, the impact on me mentally, physically, reputationally and financially has been devastating, and will substantially affect the future of my wife and I, as Mr Aleck was fully aware.



· “The conduct is not otherwise subject to alternative statutory remedies such as internal reconsideration or external merits review”. This topic is dealt with comprehensively elsewhere in this document.

The procedures identified in CASAs own procedures when they “cancel, vary, or suspend an Air Operator Certificate” were clearly bypassed. Enforcement manual | Civil Aviation Safety Authority (casa.gov.au) (https://www.casa.gov.au/search-centre/manuals-and-handbooks/enforcement-manual)

With trading restrictions in place for a staggering eight months while Mr Aleck thought about it, I approached the AAT, but as Mr Aleck was still “thinking about it” and hadn’t made a decision, there was nothing I could appeal.

At no stage did CASA even issue a decision in writing, that I could appeal. This includes up to and including the time that CASA forced all customers to leave, including quite inexplicably my own school of over a decade was shut down. These are very clear breaches of CASAs own procedures and administrative law.

The Government does have a scheme to compensate for defective decision making but the way CASA is established means that I am not eligible for that scheme. Compensation-for-defective-administration.pdf (ombudsman.gov.au) (https://www.ombudsman.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0026/35594/Compensation-for-defective-administration.pdf)

I had absolutely no internal reconsideration, or external merit review available to me. My only option was to write to the CASA CEO and CASA Board requesting a meeting. My requests for a meeting were deflected. Finally after CASA had forced all customers to leave the Business and the business had effectively ceased to operate, the CASA Board did finally agree to a meeting in mid-July 19th 2019. This is eight months after my first request and after CASA had acted and forced all remaining customers to leave. . The business has ceased trading now, the Business has been effectively given away, and I have secured employment as an employee in the industry rather than a businessowner.

I had requested to meet with any two Members of the Board to maintain the integrity of the process. When I arrived at that meeting there were not two Members of the Board present as I had expected and requested , but one Board Member being the Chair at the time, and the CASA Regional Manager, Mr Jason McHeyzer.

Only weeks after the meeting with the one Board Member and the Regional Manager , Mr McHeyzer, it was Mr McHeyzer that sent a direction to my Employer on August 27th 2019 that my continuing employment was no longer tenable based on comments that I was making publicly. My employment was terminated, and I was unable to find alternative employment within the industry, and I left the industry that I had spent 30 years in.

There can be no doubt that I made multiple well-intentioned requests to meet with CASA and resolve this matter, although CASA refused every one of those attempts.

I have made multiple requests to meet with both the CASA CEO and Board over the last four years, and each have steadfastly refused to meet with me.

· “There are doubts about the limits of power.”

I am fully satisfied that Mr Aleck had no basis in law to close my business, and Mr Aleck has abused his significant power.

· “The decision relates to controversial/politically sensitive topics or people.”



I had taken an industry lead on raising concerns about the introduction of the new legislation and had received some media attention. It is likely that Mr Aleck first became aware of Glen Buckley via me raising my concerns at CASA forums and in the media.



· A history of acrimony precedes the decision.



There was a history of acrimony preceding Mr Alecks decision making, as referred to above. I can provide further information on this as you require.



· “Giving the subject of the decision-making process ample opportunity to be heard on the proposed decision and ensuring the principles of natural justice are adhered to.”

The notification that I had been operating unlawfully for many years, came with absolutely no prior warning despite me being in daily contact with my CASA Certificate Management Team. At any stage CASA could have approached me, and we could have avoided this matter in its entirety. CASA bypassed my right to be made aware of and respond to information which will be used in the course of Mr alecks decision making, that was to have a negative impact on me and my family.



· The use of clean skin decision makers who have not previously been involved in dealings with the subject of the decision-making process or matters relating to it.

This was a matter of concern for me, and continues to be. The decision maker being Mr Aleck. Mr Aleck is also the person responsible for providing false and misleading information to The Ombudsman investigation. I wrote to CASA on multiple occasions as it did not seem reasonable that I raise an allegation of misfeasance in public office against Mr Aleck, and that he be the person responsible for providing information to the Ombudsman

· “Obtaining Legal Advice.”



Noting that Mr Aleck took no external, independent legal advice. He was the sole decision maker. I am fully satisfied that he was acting in bad faith. He placed the trading restrictions on the business in October 2018. With the trading restrictions in place for six months, and the business is obviously by now “on its knees”, CASA write to me on April 30th 2019 advising that they have “now received the external legal advice and that it has confirmed, inter alia, that Part 141 certificate holder is not “precluded from entering into contractual arrangements with other parties to deliver flight training activities, and that is what makes this matter so inexplicable and totally unnecessary. Quite simply Mr Aleck was wrong. The structure was not illegal. This was yet another opportunity for Mr Aleck to act with good intent, admit error, and work with me to try and repair all the harm caused. By now my parents were funding staff salaries for the business of approximately $15,000 per week. Yet Mr Aleck went with his initial determination back in October 2018, deemed the structure unlawful and forced all customers to leave, despite having that independent, external legal advice. Mr Aleck was acting in bad faith, and in April 2019, when Mr Aleck received that legal advice, he knew he was also acting unlawfully.



· Paying careful attention to Administrative Law requirements.



As attended to previously, Mr Aleck bypassed all procedures stipulated in CASAs own Enforcement Manual when they act to close down a flying school.

[glenb]

1. Introduction/The allegation

2. Misfeasance in Public Office

3. First Element-Holder of Public Office

4. Second Element-Exercising a Public Power that was an incident of that Office

5. Must the Public Officer owe the plaintiff a duty with respect to the exercise of power.

6. Third Element- The Exercise of Authority must be invalid or otherwise lacking lawful authority.

7. Fourth Element- The “Bad Faith” mental Element

8. Can the Commonwealth be vicariously liable for the misfeasance of its employees?

9. Commonwealth liability for ministerial misfeasance?

10. Importance of an early and vigorous assessment of an allegation of misfeasance.

11. Damages

12. Assisting Commonwealth Officers, other than Ministers

13. Assisting Commonwealth Ministers

14. Reducing the risk of misfeasance claims

15. The need to report misfeasance issues as significant claims

16. Preference for CASA to investigate this allegation.

17. Considerations of Mr Aleck remaining in the role.

18. Summary/conclusion



6. The need to report misfeasance issues as significant claims

You will be aware that an allegation of misfeasance in public office is classified as a “significant issue” that is to be reported to the Office of Legal Services Coordination (OLSC) of the Office of Attorney General in cases where the Government Department is classified as a “non-corporate Commonwealth Entity”. The Civil Aviation Act defines CASA as a “Body Corporate.” My understanding is that this matter does not need to be notified to that Department.

Can I respectfully request that you advise me if you choose to report this allegation to the Office of the Attorney General. My intention is to write to that Department seeking guidance on this matter if CASA is unable to accept a complaint of misfeasance in public office. Please note that I have sent a copy of this allegation to the Office of the Attorney General, as if CASA determine that they are not prepared to initiate an investigation into Mr Alecks misconduct, I will approach the attorney generals Department seeking guidance.

Guidance note 7 - Reporting and settlement of significant issues (ag.gov.au) (https://www.ag.gov.au/sites/default/files/2020-03/Guidance-note-7-reporting-and-settlement-of-significant-issues.pdf)

[glenb]

1. Introduction/The allegation

2. Misfeasance in Public Office

3. First Element-Holder of Public Office

4. Second Element-Exercising a Public Power that was an incident of that Office

5. Must the Public Officer owe the plaintiff a duty with respect to the exercise of power.

6. Third Element- The Exercise of Authority must be invalid or otherwise lacking lawful authority.

7. Fourth Element- The “Bad Faith” mental Element

8. Can the Commonwealth be vicariously liable for the misfeasance of its employees?

9. Commonwealth liability for ministerial misfeasance?

10. Importance of an early and vigorous assessment of an allegation of misfeasance.

11. Damages

12. Assisting Commonwealth Officers, other than Ministers

13. Assisting Commonwealth Ministers

14. Reducing the risk of misfeasance claims

15. The need to report misfeasance issues as significant claims

16. Preference for CASA to investigate this allegation.

17. Considerations of Mr Aleck remaining in the role.

18. Summary/conclusion



. Preference for CASA to initially investigate this allegation.

I do have trust and confidence in your professionalism. My very strong preference is that the starting point for this allegation, must be within CASA, and I believe that would be the starting point of any well-intentioned process. The reason that I make this request is.

The Ombudsman has advised that the CASA ICC is the more appropriate body to receive a complaint of “misfeasance in public office”.

As part of this allegation is regarding Mr Aleck providing false and misleading information to the Ombudsman’s investigation and the effectiveness of that disinformation, the ICC is the better forum. Understandably, the Ombudsman’s Office lacks the industry expertise, to be able to identify disinformation as readily as the CASA Industry Complaints Commissioner. That is evidenced by the stark contrast between the determinations by the ICC that CASA was fully aware of the specific nature of my operation for a significant amount of time prior to October 2018, whilst the preliminary findings of the Ombudsman state that CASA became aware of the specific nature just prior to October 2018 when Mr Aleck falsely asserts that CASA first became aware of the specific nature of my organisation.

It seems only reasonable that the investigation initially be completed by the Employer. Whilst that does not mean other options are not available, it seems reasonable that the Employer should have the first option to investigate the conduct of the employee.

My allegation of misfeasance in public office is against Mr Jonathan Aleck, CASA Executive Manager of Legal, International and Regulatory Affairs. Mr Aleck is also the single point of contact with the Commonwealth Ombudsman’s Office. The Ombudsman Office advice that they engage with the single representative of the “Agency” being a sole point of contact, and in this case that is Mr Aleck. I have raised this matter previously, and at the highest levels. By submitting this complaint through the CASA Industry Complaints Commissioner, unlike the Ombudsman’s Office you will b e able to access multiple sources of information to fact check

You have significant background information on this topic and could be considered a Subject Matter Expert (SME).

You can work in a timelier manner. The 30-day response times between the Ombudsman Office and CASA make this matter unnecessarily protracted. You will have the opportunity to dramatically reduce those lead times due to your ready access to multiple sources of information, unlike the Ombudsman’s Office. This matter has dragged on unnecessarily for four years because of the disinformation supplied by Mr Aleck. I am fully satisfied that Mr Aleck is perverting the course of justice by delaying and misleading the Ombudsman’s investigation, so as to put me under constant long term stress as both a reprisal and to deny me procedural fairness.

[Lead Balloon]

Even if one accepts, as true, everything you've said about Dr A, Glen, I very much doubt whether the circumstances are an attempt to pervert or perversion of the course of justice. No judge is involved in your matter, no one is stopping you from getting one involved and - so far as I'm aware - no one involved has bull****ted to someone exercising judicial power in relation to your matter. (Ex-justice Marcus Einfeld was busted for perjury and perverting the course of justice, for making false statements under oath to the effect that someone else was driving the car when it was travelling 10km/h over the limit. The person he said had been driving at the time was in fact dead and buried years earlier. Big price to pay to try to avoid a $77 speeding fine...) The Commonwealth Ombudsman does not exercise judicial power. Nor does the CASA ICC.

[glenb]

Cheers, i will edit accordingly. Regards Glen

[glenb]

1. Introduction/The allegation

2. Misfeasance in Public Office

3. First Element-Holder of Public Office

4. Second Element-Exercising a Public Power that was an incident of that Office

5. Must the Public Officer owe the plaintiff a duty with respect to the exercise of power.

6. Third Element- The Exercise of Authority must be invalid or otherwise lacking lawful authority.

7. Fourth Element- The “Bad Faith” mental Element

8. Can the Commonwealth be vicariously liable for the misfeasance of its employees?

9. Commonwealth liability for ministerial misfeasance?

10. Importance of an early and vigorous assessment of an allegation of misfeasance.

11. Damages

12. Assisting Commonwealth Officers, other than Ministers

13. Assisting Commonwealth Ministers

14. Reducing the risk of misfeasance claims

15. The need to report misfeasance issues as significant claims

16. Preference for CASA to investigate this allegation.

17. Considerations of Mr Aleck remaining in the role.

18. Summary/conclusion



Considerations of Mr Aleck remaining in his role pending the results of an investigation.

I have submitted this complaint to the you in your role as the CASA Industry Complaints Commissioner (ICC).

For transparency, this correspondence has a number of recipients that I have included, with the primary intended recipient being your, Office of the CASA ICC.

I need to ensure a wider awareness of this matter, and my substantive allegations, and most especially with the change of Government, and the associated higher expectations on ethics and integrity in the Government and Public Service, as result of that change of Government to a Labor Government.

For that reason, I have also included the Minister responsible for the Civil Aviation Safety Authority, the Honourable Catherine King MP, Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government. Ms King is also the Local Member for Ballarat, with the Ballarat Aero Club being one of the schools impacted by this entire matter. I will be seeking a meeting with her Office to personally brief the Minister on my allegations against Mr Aleck. My preference being that Ms Spence, the CASA CEO, or her nominee/s, also attend that same meeting.

I have included my Local MP for the Electorate of Chisholm, The Honourable Ms. Garland MP for Chisholm. I am a 57-year resident of the Electorate, and I will be seeking the opportunity to meet with Ms Garland and seek her assistance in facilitating a meeting with the responsible Minister. I have previously submitted that request to Ms Garlands Office.

This section, as the title suggests is “considerations for Mr Aleck remaining in his role”. I fully appreciate that such a determination is outside the remit of the CASA ICC. Your Office does however have a direct report to the CASA Board. May I respectfully request that you ensure that the CASA Board has received this correspondence. That will provide the Board with the opportunity to act on this matter and determine the suitability of Mr Aleck remaining in the role, pending the results of an investigation.

Failing the CASA Board taking any action, I will be making my appeal direct to the Minister. In the first instance it is only fair that I provide CASA with the opportunity to consider that appropriateness or not if Mr Aleck were to remain in his position. As stated, I have included the Minister in this correspondence to assist in CASAs decision making and to provide background information to the Minister in anticipation of her Office facilitating a meeting.

The following link provides guidance that I have considered in formulating this list of considerations, with regard to Mr aleck remining in the role. Handling Misconduct - A human resource manager’s guide | Australian Public Service Commission (apsc.gov.au) (https://www.apsc.gov.au/circulars-guidance-and-advice/handling-misconduct-human-resource-managers-guide)

To the CASA Board.

As you are aware I have previously made allegations of Misfeasance in Public Office against Mr Aleck before the Senate Inquiry with that link being at the beginning of this correspondence.

My expectation was that the substantive nature of the allegations, the obvious harm caused, the seniority of the Executive, and the formal nature of the submitted allegation i.e. Senate Inquiry would have initiated some type of internal review within CASA. My understanding is that it has not.

My reasonable expectation, and no doubt the reasonable community expectation, is that an Employee cannot continue in his/her role if such substantive allegations have been formally made. I would have expected CASA to take some action when the allegations were raised by me in the Senate Inquiry two years ago.

My intention is not to cause any harm to Mr Aleck pending the outcome of any investigation. I am calling on the CASA Board to stand Mr Aleck aside from his operational role, pending the results of an investigation. I am making no suggestion to his remuneration during that period, in fact, the very nature of his entitlement to procedural fairness, but that is not my remit.

Rather than seeking to punish Mr Aleck, I believe an investigation will provide him with the opportunity to defend his conduct, and this process will protect the integrity of CASA and maintain public and industry confidence in the reputation of CASA. As Australia’s aviation safety regulator this must be an important consideration.

I have made requests over the last four years simply asking for the opportunity to meet at any location, at any time, with any two Members of the Board of CASA. I extend that same offer that I have for the last four years. To date, despite those multiple requests, no meeting has been offered

I continue to request that meeting with any two Members of the Board, and I will be seeking the assistance of my Local MP, Ms Garland, and the Minister, the Honourable Ms. King, if the Board refuses to meet with me. This is a complicated matter that is best attended to initially with an aural presentation. I anticipate that would take up to two hours, and I would invite the Chair of the Board to bring along any CASA personnel that she requires, and I anticipate that would include the person I have made allegations against, being Mr Jonathan Aleck, CASA Executive Manager of Legal, International, and Regultory Affairs.

By making these substantive allegations, it may have an adverse effect on Mr Alecks’ ability to carry out his duties, and on the workplace in general. I appreciate that the CASA Board, and the CASA CEO in consultation with the Minister, will have to consider whether it is appropriate for Mr Aleck to remain in his role throughout the investigation. If my allegations are substantiated there is the potential for that misconduct to have an impact on the safety of aviation. Matters of safety and operational control are the reasons that I am calling for due consideration being made to Mr Aleck being stood aside from operational decision making.

In making that call, I have drawn on The Governments own considerations on these matters and they include.

· Any potential impact on aviation safety i.e., the safety and well-being of Members of the Public, if the conduct was to be proven. i.e., misconduct, and if Mr Aleck remained in his substantive and significant position within Civil Aviation Safety Authority during an investigation.

· Potential for repetition of that behaviour that could potentially impact on other businesses and their employees. Noting that I have been contacted by many in industry that have been similarly impacted by the conduct of this same individual in the past. All have expressed a willingness to come forward and make a submission if the opportunity presented itself and provided the processes can be in place to avoid retribution from CASA.

· Public confidence in CASA. This matter has significant public attention with over 1,000,000 visits to the “thread” on PPRuNe. Glen Buckley and Australian small business -V- CASA - PPRuNe Forums (https://www.pprune.org/australia-new-zealand-pacific/620219-glen-buckley-australian-small-business-v-casa.html)

· The risk that an investigation of the allegation may be compromised by the employee’s continued presence in the workplace. This has been a major concern of mine, and I have raised it in writing on numerous occasions. The Ombudsman’s Office does not interact with individual employees of CASA. It interacts with the individual that represents the agency. That person within CASA, is Mr Aleck, and there is an overwhelming body of evidence that demonstrates his propensity to provide false and misleading information to the Ombudsman’s Office.

· Any risk to the safety of any other employees and their work environment by way of bullying, intimidation, or any other negative behaviours.

· Whether an allegation of misfeasance in Public Office is determined to be a significant enough matter to stand the employee aside on full pay, on the assumption of innocence until an investigation can be completed.

· To what extent is the alleged behaviour within the control of the employee. i.e., was its wilful misconduct, as I am alleging that it most certainly is.

· Relationship between the alleged unlawful act and the employee’s employment.

· Any potential impact on any required security clearances, and access to classified information.

· The significance of the acts, and role of CASA i.e., the safety of aviation in Australia.

· Ability for the Employee to carry out duties safely and effectively during an investigation into their conduct.

· The Seniority of the personnel that allegations are made against and the respective expectations of them in their role.

· The vision for CASA under a new CEO/DAS, and a new Government with associated higher expectations of integrity in Government.

If the CASA Industry Complaints Commissioner determines that he is unable to investigate an allegation of Misfeasance in Public Office, I intend to make a formal request that the Minister appoint someone who is independent and unbiased to conduct an investigation into the alleged misconduct of Mr Aleck. The purpose of that investigation would be to ascertain the lawfulness of the actions and decisions made by him.

I anticipate that this investigation would need to be conducted by a Subject Matter Expert (SME) with the required technical knowledge of the aviation industry, and preferably with experience in the pilot training industry specifically.

My hope is that an investigation would proceed with as little formality and as much expedition as proper consideration of this matter allows. This matter has continued for four years, and it is time now to bring both transparency and resolution to the process.

If my allegations are substantiated, it is reasonable to form the view that Mr Alecks conduct has the potential to impact on the safety of aviation. Any matter that has the potential to impact on the safety of aviation should be considered appropriately, and in timelines commensurate with matters of aviation safety.

I’m confident that the CASA Board will also appreciate the opportunity to bring good governance to the matter in as short a timeline as practical. I am confident that the CASA Board will support such a process. I have made that request of the Board for almost four years. A directive from the relevant Government Minister may expedite that process.
I appreciate that if I raise these allegations it will initiate a multistage process, with the initial stage being identifying behaviour that may amount to suspected misconduct, including receiving allegations of misconduct, followed by deciding how to handle the suspected misconduct, and considering whether it is necessary to suspend the employee and any review of that decision.

I am not making these claims vindictively or vexatiously and they are not without merit. I am someone directly impacted by the conduct of Mr Aleck. I also respect that if I am fully liable in law for my comments that I make, and I am aware of the ramifications if my allegations were found to be without merit.

[glenb]

Post #2235 contains the correspondence that i sent. It is that correspondence that Mr Hanton is responding to.


Hi Glen

Given the nature of the allegations you made in your 2022 ICC complaint, I am emailing to let you know that I will be attending an upcoming meeting between CASA and the Commonwealth Ombudsman’s office.

As you’re aware, no review of your most recent ICC complaint has commenced. That was on the basis set out in my email of 16 August 2022 seeking further information where I noted that if the issues you have raised are still being considered by the Ombudsman in any form then an ICC review may be inappropriate or premature at this stage.

My offer to meet with you and any support person you wish to attend stands.

Regards


Jonathan Hanton

[glenb]

Please note that i will add more tomorrow morning to this section. Cheers. Glen.

1. Introduction/The allegation

2. Misfeasance in Public Office

3. First Element-Holder of Public Office

4. Second Element-Exercising a Public Power that was an incident of that Office

5. Must the Public Officer owe the plaintiff a duty with respect to the exercise of power.

6. Third Element- The Exercise of Authority must be invalid or otherwise lacking lawful authority.

7. Fourth Element- The “Bad Faith” mental Element

8. Can the Commonwealth be vicariously liable for the misfeasance of its employees?

9. Commonwealth liability for ministerial misfeasance?

10. Importance of an early and vigorous assessment of an allegation of misfeasance.

11. Damages

12. Assisting Commonwealth Officers, other than Ministers

13. Assisting Commonwealth Ministers

14. Reducing the risk of misfeasance claims

15. The need to report misfeasance issues as significant claims

16. Preference for CASA to investigate this allegation.

17. Considerations of Mr Aleck remaining in the role.

18. Summary/conclusion





DAMAGES

It is important that I convey what it is that CASA did that caused so much harm,

Limited surety of operations

CASA issued a number of short-term interim approvals to operate on the entire business. This applied to all bases that CASA had previously formally approved.

These “interim approvals to operate created significant organisational instability

These “interim approvals to operate” were as little as a minute-by-minute approval, but never longer than 90 days. This continued on for 8 months.

Initially CASAs argument was that my entire structure was illegal and needed to be dismantled.

In the initial notification sent by CASA in October 2018, the last paragraph states that "……. within 7 days, whereupon CASA will make a final determination”. As the business owner that terminology left me in little doubt that my business of more than a decade, only has 7 days surety of operations. That surety of operations expired 7 days later on 30/10/18. I had absolutely no prior indication from any one in CASA including my newly allocated CASA Certificate Management Team (CMT), that there were any concerns at all. I was shocked and devastated. It was more bizarre because CASA already held the contracts that they were calling for. Initially CASA denied this, but then after I showed irrefutable evidence that the contracts had been provided to CASA on multiple occasions over previous years, CASA reluctantly concurred.

I think this point is significant. Once CASA realised that they already held the contracts, and that the “oversight” was in fact CASAs oversight, the trading restrictions should have been immediately lifted, had good faith prevailed.

On the expiry of that approval on 23/10/19, my business was permitted to continue to operate on a minute-by-minute verbal approval. Still there were no allegations of and safety concerns or regulatory breaches. After operating for three months on a minute-by-minute approval, CASA issued another interim approval to operate.

On 25/01/19 CASA provided a letter to me stating "CASA could consider interim arrangements to allow the APTA business model to continue in the short term up to three months “(CASA underlining). The key words here being “could” and “up to three months”.

There was absolutely no doubt in my mind that CASAs intention was to shut down the entire operation, as they eventually went on to do anyway.

On 12/02/19 provide further correspondence dated permitting me to continue operations for up to three months until 13/05/19.

Approximately one week before the interim approval to operate expired, CASA issued another notice for interim approval to operate. On 03/05/19 I receive correspondence permitting an extension to our operations until 01/07/19. Another short-term approval to operate. This was to be the last interim approval issued prior to CASA shutting down the business and forcing all customers to leave.

Shortly after CASA issued the final interim approval to operate, the CEO of CASA at the time, Mr Carmody writes to me on 6th June 2018 and at the end of that correspondence states, “ To be absolutely clear, if CASA does not have the evidence we require i.e. contracts in hand by 1st July 2019, we will have no choice but to consider what further action we may need to take in relation to the flight training operations in which APTA and its affiliates are engaging.

Shortly afterwards, Mr Aleck stood by his initial decision, determined the structure unlawful, and forced all customers to leave, effectively shutting down the business.

There were never any safety allegations raised by CASA. CASA never identified any deficiencies at all against any quality outcomes. CASA never alleged that we breached any of our fully approved procedures in our CASA approved Exposition (operations manual).

This entire issue was simply some wording in our commercial contracts. CASA never suggested any changes to any of our policies or procedures, they simply wanted some additional wording in the commercial contracts

Implications of “interim approvals to operate”

Consider the implications of these short-term interim approvals on any organisation in any industry.

Organisational instability and impact on employees.

The most immediate impact was the impact on employees. I had an experienced team of highly professional employees, many who had been with me for many years, and in a number of cases more than ten years. Immediately every single one of them now has concerns about their ongoing job security. Despite their professionalism and loyalty to me and the business, like any employee in any industry, they will have concerns. It would be expected that they would be pursuing other options, to ensure their continuing employment. They are distracted from their work, insecure and concerned. They work in a highly regulated environment, and CASA has determined that the business is suddenly unlawful and operating on a minute by minute CASA approval. I do not need to attend to this in detail, as the ramifications are obvious. Had the “interim approval” not been placed on the business there would be no issue at all amongst the employees.

Impact on existing students who were currently undergoing training.

Consider the students that are enrolled in a course of pilot training, typically of 18 months as they work towards the issue of their Diploma in Aviation through the flight training school, which is also a Registered Training Organisation (RTO 22508). Without any prior notice at all their education provider has been declared an unauthorised operation by CASA and will likely be subject to regulatory action. Furthermore, that school has only 7 days surety of operations. The students is now forced to find another flight training provider and leave their current flight training provider. Despite my pleas to the students, I respect and understand their concerns. The natural assumption is that there must be significant safety concerns or regulatory breaches if CASA has taken this prompt and substantive action. That is not the case, I was dealing only with a change of opinion by someone within CASA. Irrespective, the school has only 7 days certainty, they have no option. The students are compelled to transfer to another school. Students intending to travel from overseas, put their plans on hold, and understandably search for an alternative Registered Training Organisation. As the matter dragged on for many months, those students that initially elected to remain with the school drift away as the matter seems increasingly unlikely to be resolved. The students incur additional costs as they transfer and have their training interrupted. Many must undergo additional training to learn a new aircraft type at a new education provider, incurring significant additional costs, often running into many thousands of dollars. As you will appreciate this also caused enormous stress and anxiety for me. I had personally dealt with each and every one of these students, and now with no prior warning it appeared that I was not going to be able to meet my promises and commitments to them. Despite me using my savings and funds from the sale of my home, I was sadly unable to reimburse all students.

Impact on the bases preparing to open, and the reasons why significant investment was required by those respective organisations.

In this matter I refer specifically to two bases that were perhaps most impacted. Those bases were our APTA-Whitestar Aviation in Ballina and APTA-Simjet base in Brisbane.

Whitestar was a new facility that was to open in Ballina and bring a unique capability to this fast-growing regional area by joining APTA. We intended to open with a staff of 4 pilots, with rapid growth anticipated. We had secured an impressive state of the art facility and aircraft, and a team of highly capable and experienced instructors, with our Senior Base Pilot on site being an ex CASA Flight Operations Inspector (FOI) with expertise gained in CASA,in safety and regulatory compliance. This was also the same individual that had developed APTAs industry leading Flight School Management System (FSM) that we used. This System was one of the only products designed here in Australia for the Australian Regulatory environment. Other operators traditionally used an overseas designed product and had to make it fit the Australian Regulatory environment. The FSM system was designed here in Australia specifically for APTA to ensure the highest levels of operational control could be maintained. You will recall that to further ensure CASA was satisfied with the high levels of operational control being maintained, we were the first flight training organisation in Australia to provide CASA full internet access 24/7 from anywhere in Australia to our full FSM system. This gave CASA real time access to every aspect of all flight operations including student training records, syllabi, pilot fatigue management system, maintenance status and predictive maintenance, all internal staff communications, safety department, etc.

This provided CASA a unique opportunity to audit our systems 24/7 from anywhere in Australia, to supplement the CASA practice of less than one audit per year of an industry standard, largely paper based system that needed to be audited on site. By having the designer of the FSM system as our Senior Base Pilot at the Ballina base, it provided a unique opportunity to implement a continuous improvement program to ensure our systems could remain at the forefront of the industry. His experience as an ex-CASA Flight Operations Inspector (FOI) was invaluable. The Flight School Management system was industry leading and designed specifically for our operation.

The loss of this school to APTA as a result of the notification by CASA that the application would be rejected, and the base forced into closure was devastating news for the staff at the base as so much time, money and commitment had been put into fully preparing for the CASA inspection. APTA had also incurred significant expenses in sending an APTA team of 6 personnel to Ballina for 4 days to ensure we were fully satisfied that we had full operational control, and that all personnel were fully inducted into APTA procedures. A full audit of the facility and safety training were also completed.

Simjet was a business that would have bought a unique capability to the APTA with its high-end Simulation facility that would allow Airline standard training up to and including the Boeing 737. The resources and expertise that Simjet bought to APTA was world leading and at the cutting edge of the industry. It would have attracted significant international opportunities. The Senior Base Pilot that was to be our senior person on site at the base was an ex-RAAF pilot and Airline Pilot, with a passion for the role of advanced flight simulators in flight training and safety training, including Crew Resource Management (CRM) and Multi Crew Co-operation (MCC) training.

The intention being that by adding this substantive capability to the final stages of training, we would attract International Students to commence the initial year of training in our Regional APTA bases. The opportunities to attract large volumes of International Pilot Training were very real. No other organisation in Australia would have had the capability that APTA now had. The potential for growth in APTA and particularly in regional areas would have been significant. The significant group capability that would have existed was unrivalled in Australia. APTA a fully Australian owned venture could now compete against the large foreign owned companies in Australia, that now delivered more than 50% of Australias flight training. We could now approach AUSTRADE to assist us in developing opportunities in export markets for pilot training with foreign airlines.

Both our APTA-Ballina and APTA Brisbane bases and Whitestar found the burdensome legislative requirements, and associated costs too onerous and could not “go it alone”. By joining APTA they also had access to the largest funded safety department of any flying school in Australia. They could focus on delivering quality training and APTA would manage their safety, regulatory compliance, continuous improvement, syllabi development, whilst accepting full responsibility as the Authorisation Holder, in accordance with APTAs CASA approved procedures.

Importantly, the CASA requirement was that all bases are fully setup with facilities, staff, aircraft, and required support services i.e., classrooms, internet, phone systems etc, prior to CASA conducting the inspection of the base, and deciding whether to approve that base or not. The respective investment in these bases was significant as you can imagine. The rejection of these bases by CASA was a major blow for the people involved.

Both the APTA Brisbane and APTA Ballina bases made this investment with the following considerations in mind when electing to join APTA.

1. APTA (previously known as MFT) had over a decade’s experience doing exactly this i.e., providing Air Operator Certificate (AOC) coverage to multiple operators which had been fully sanctioned by CASA.

2. APTA had invested hundreds of thousands of dollars and worked side by side with 10 CASA personnel over a two-year period, to redesign APTA to improve all systems and procedures to ensure they were industry leading and met CASA requirements. I have obtained the checklist that CASA used under Freedom of Information, and this matter cannot be in dispute. More than 600 CASA stipulated requirements were attended to, as we worked with CASA to develop our manuals.

3. CASA had fully revalidated APTA in April 2017 in what was referred to by CASA as “the transition”, and fully approved APTA in April 2017 to keep doing what it had already been doing for over a decade. This system was fully CASA approved. Every single procedure had been overhauled, redesigned, and CASA approved. There was no reason that either of these new bases could have anticipated that CASA would reject their application.

4. CASA had already approved multiple bases under the APTA system, so it was reasonable for these new bases to assume that they would also be approved. Obviously, the systems and procedures that APTA had designed in conjunction with CASA, met all CASA requirements, and those requirements had been met.

5. CASA records will demonstrate that the Company had an industry leading record of safety and regulatory compliance achieved over more than a decade of operations. The brand names of MFT and APTA and the quality of the personnel associated with those businesses provided assurance of the “good intent”.

6. CASA personnel had in fact recommended operators to join APTA, and those operators have confirmed that. This CASA recommendation further assured the bases that APTA provided a CASA accepted system.

7. The APTA model had been operating for 6 months after its CASA reapproval in April 2017. In November 2017, APTA had undergone the highest-level audit that CASA conduct, being a Level 1 audit. No concerns about APTAs structure were raised because of that Level 1 audit.



Suppliers

Any owner of a flying school will tell you how tight the margins are in running a flight training organisation. There are significant fixed costs involved. Cash flow is critical. Quite simply there is not enough “fat” for things to go wrong. Once the restrictions were placed on the business, and cashflow dried up it became increasingly difficult to operate. Up until the restrictions placed on APTA by CASA in October 2018, the business had a decade of impeccable payment terms with its Suppliers, and a reputation in the industry as a “good payer”. The business had a good relationship with all its Suppliers, all of whom I also considered friends.

Every one of those Suppliers stood behind me, and provided me with generous trading terms, in anticipation of this matter being promptly resolved, as it should have been. No one could have anticipated the matter would drag on for 8 months until the business could no longer trade.

Throughout the first six months I held some hope that the matter would be resolved, I could have the restrictions lifted, and would have some hope of returning to business as usual and finalise my increasing debts to the Suppliers.

On early April almost 6 months after this started, I began to realise that this matter was never going to be resolved. CASA had already contacted all of my customers, advised them that were operating unlawfully, and was forcing them to leave APTA.

By now Suppliers had become frustrated with me. For 6 months I had been assuring them that a return to Business as usual was imminent. Their support to date had been exceptional, and I am still highly appreciative of that support. However, CASA never lifted the restrictions. The suppliers couldn’t understand why I could resolve this. The business ceased trading.

After I had given APTA away, I wrote to all Suppliers on 20/08/19, and copy of that correspondence is below

“To All Suppliers of MFT. 20/08/19

I am in a very difficult situation.

CASA placed several restrictions on my parent company, APTA and its ability to conduct business in October of 2018. This lead to the sale of APTA recently, and it’s now under new ownership.

Importantly, at no stage was the CASA action based on any allegations of safety concerns. Also, at no stage have there been any allegations of regulatory breaches that CASA has been prepared to substantiate.

The fact is, there have been no regulatory or safety breaches. None!

CASA actions,
· Reduced our “surety of operations”, to never more than 90 days into the future.
· Prevented me marketing · Prevented me enrolling new customers
· Prevented me renewing approvals as they expired.
· Prevented me adding new approvals.

In October 2018, I identified to CASA that those restrictions on my business, would cost me at least $10,000 per week, to sustain operations until the CASA imposed restrictions were lifted.

Over the last 9 months, I have had to call on MFT to financially support APTA operations, as I had several other operators also depending on APTA for their own continuing operations. It was anticipated that CASA would resolve their confusion in a matter of weeks. I could not possibly have imagined it would continue for over 9 months, and still be unresolved. Those restrictions on my ability to trade have continued throughout the last 9 months, as has the associated stress on both me and the business. I now find myself in the current situation.

CASA has insisted on something they call “direct operational control” and this has required me to transfer all MFT operations to APTA, with the associated income going to APTA (under new ownership) and not to MFT (which I still own). This makes resolution of my current situation almost impossible, but I have called on CASA to define, “direct operational control”. Once I have that defined, it may be possible that MFT can continue, and I can derive revenue from MFT. At this stage there is much uncertainty.

Moving forward

The reality is that I have exhausted everything in fighting with CASA to maintain APTA. I have been left with nothing. No home, no business, no savings and no job, so I cannot promise an easy resolution.

I can assure you, there is not a higher level of shame, guilt and embarrassment that a human being can have, than to owe money, to friends and people that have supported him. I do not have a solution to put to you at this stage. I have no intention of running away or hiding from my responsibilities. I will be working for as long as it takes in an endeavour to ensure that every one of you is paid 100%. No haggling, and no discounting. It is a big call, and that is why I need your input.

As suppliers you have the right to act against me and have me declared bankrupt. I respect that, and can accept, and understand that stance. To be frank, to be declared bankrupt, and go and start a simpler life and concentrate on looking after my family is the easier path, and in the interests of my health, probably the sensible path.But I will head down the path of resolution, and as the saying goes. A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.

I want to meet face to face wherever possible and call on those engagements to be respectful. I appreciate that several people are seriously affected, and not just myself. With the restructure in APTA, I don’t have the admin support that I had previously, and as you will appreciate, I have a lot going on. If you have an invoice for MFT, or are a staff member with an entitlement, could you please resend it through to a new email that I have created; [email protected] With the significant change of personnel in the office I need to collate this information accurately in the one spot.

Could I also call for a meeting at 4PM on Friday 30th August. I will advise a venue, but it will be at Moorabbin Airport. If someone cannot attend on site, please let me know, and I will arrange video-conference facilities. Please RSVP by text 0418772013, if you can attend. I will provide light refreshments (bread and water is all I can promise at this stage, but will swing past Aldi for any cakes approaching their "best before")

At that meeting I would like to:
· Stand in front of you;
· Introduce you to each other;
· Assess priority suppliers. i.e. I would call on bigger businesses to help me prioritise any individuals or smaller businesses for payment ahead of them wherever practical;
· Place several options to you for consideration;
· Have a robust, truthful and well-intentioned respectful discussion.

I genuinely want to get money where it belongs (the people I owe money to) and not in the hands of lawyers and accountants; I feel we can hopefully resolve this.

Thank you for your consideration, and more importantly, your support to date.For those that have a deeper interest in my issues please follow the following link https://www.pprune.org/pacific-general-aviation-questions/620219-australian-small-business-v-casa.html (https://www.pprune.org/!620219!https:/www.pprune.org/pacific-general-aviation-questions/620219-australian-small-business-v-casa.html)

Respectfully, Glen.

Impact on the bases that had already been fully approved by approved by CASA under APTA

These bases had previously applied to join APTA, the APTA procedures had been diligently followed and CASA had approved the bases. They had absolutely no reason at all to believe that they would have their approvals reversed. These bases included my own flying school of more than a decade that was now declared an unauthorised operation by CASA with only 7 days certainty of operations. The other bases were now confronted with an uncertain future as they had no certainty of operations. Understandably they directed a high level of frustration towards me. I had assured them that the structure we adopted was fully CASA approved, and had been for many years, as it was. They felt that I had mislead them as to whether I had CASA approval or not. They thought that I had possibly been deceptive and misleading. Understandably this caused me great sadness and personal reputational damage.

None of these bases can enrol students into courses while these interim approvals to operate are in place. It is illegal as an RTO, and unethical to be enrolling students into courses of 18 months duration that you have significant doubt ascto your ability to deliver that course. Each of the bases are effectively being prevented from taking on new customers/students.

[Sandy Reith]

I have not met Glen Buckley, but hope to at some future point.

My wish is to express my thanks in person for his courage and determination to see wrong righted.

We all benefit from Glen Buckley’s remarkable fight for justice in ways which cannot be detailed. We can be sure the notoriety generated will have certainly influenced the attitudes and actions of bureaucracy by giving caution as to how the General Aviation community is treated.

CASA has become used to a submissive response from an understandably cowed GA community, GA needs all the help it can find.

[glenb]

20/10/22

Dear Ms Spence,

I acknowledge that you had a period away from the Office and that would impact on your response times.

I wrote to you on the 19th of September 2022 and followed up on the 6th of October 2022.

The purpose of that correspondence was to seek clarification as to the date that CASA first became fully aware of the specific nature of my operation. As you are aware CASA has led the Ombudsman’s office to be of the view that it was just prior to October 2018, when CASA imposed the crippling trading restrictions on the business. I claim that it was in fact, many years prior.

Irrespective of whether it was at least six years prior as I claim, or it was “just prior to October 2018”, as CASA claimed, there must be a specific date that CASA first became fully aware of the structure. There must have been some documentation submitted, a meeting with a CASA employee, an approval granted, a base approved, an audit, a report, a Part 141/142 approval, or something that triggered CASAs awareness as to the specific nature of my operation.

You will appreciate my point. There must be a date attached to an occurrence that caused CASA to first become fully aware of the specific nature of my operation. That being the operation that CASA incorrectly declared to be unlawful and unauthorised. We have since found out that my operation was in fact both lawful and authorised by CASA.

To date, I have not received an acknowledgement or a response. Whilst I am prepared to wait for a lengthier and considered response, can I respectfully request an acknowledgement that you have at least received and viewed the email of 19th September.

My understanding is that CASA is meeting with the Ombudsman, and I would like to have a clear understanding of CASAs position prior to that meeting proceeding. In fact, I believe it is incumbent that you should clearly identify CASAs position prior to that meeting, to maintain the integrity of CASAs position.

CASA must already “know” the date that they claim they first became aware of the specific nature of my operation. You will appreciate that the meeting with the Ombudsman, could provide an opportunity for CASA to “see what they can get away with”, so by publicly identifying that date that CASA first became fully aware of the specific nature of my operation, prior to meeting with the Ombudsman, that would bring integrity to CASAs position.

I’m sure you will agree, that as the person impacted by this matter, It would seem entirely reasonable that you clearly identify to me, the same information that you are presenting to the Ombudsman’s office. That being the date that CASA claim they first became fully aware of the specific nature of my operation, and that there should be no reason that CASA would not be prepared to identify that date to me prior to that meeting.

At this stage may I request a confirmation that you have received my correspondence of 19th September 2022.

As an aside, I would like to make a request to the Ombudsman’s Office that I attend that meeting between CASA and the Ombudsman. This would bring transparency and present the opportunity to put “everything on the table”. I am confident that such an approach would expedite timelines and ensure a fair outcome.

Thank you, Glen Buckley



Correspondence previously sent to Ms Spence, and referred to here can be accessed via the following link at Posts # 2376 and 2377. Glen Buckley and Australian small business -V- CASA - Page 119 - PPRuNe Forums (https://www.pprune.org/pacific-general-aviation-questions/620219-glen-buckley-australian-small-business-v-casa-119.html)

[glenb]

14th October CASA ICC wrote to me:Hi Glen

Given the nature of the allegations you made in your 2022 ICC complaint, I am emailing to let you know that I will be attending an upcoming meeting between CASA and the Commonwealth Ombudsman’s office.

As you’re aware, no review of your most recent ICC complaint has commenced. That was on the basis set out in my email of 16 August 2022 seeking further information where I noted that if the issues you have raised are still being considered by the Ombudsman in any form then an ICC review may be inappropriate or premature at this stage.

My offer to meet with you and any support person you wish to attend stands.

Regards

Jonathan Hanton


20/10/22 My response

Dear Jonathan Hanton,

Thank you for your correspondence, and I understand that no review has yet commenced. I have written to my local MP, Ms. Carina Garland seeking her input and I await her response. Pending her response, I would appreciate the opportunity to meet with you once I have established contact with her.

Are you able to advise me the date of the meeting with the Ombudsman’s Office.

I would like to put forward a proposal that CASA permit me to attend that meeting with the Ombudsman, and I would have to write to the Ombudsman with that request subject to CASAs response.

Obviously I would be professional and respectful at that meeting. Such a meeting would provide the opportunity for a frank and honest discussion that would promptly bring clarity to the entire matter. This would only enhance outcomes and bring a prompter resolution.

Is this a request that CASA would support,

Respectfully, Glen Buckley

[Sandy Reith]

Glen’s request should fall under CASA Board Chair Mr. Binskin’s declaration of transparency as being a desirable characteristic of CASA’s dealings with the public.

in particular the General Aviation community are heavily invested in the whole saga because the proper function of CASA is of prime importance.

Proper function being a fervent wish and hope.

We’ve not seen proper function from CASA since its inception because the ‘independent’ model of governance is wrong.

it was far from perfect under Ministerial control but it was workable. I should know, I developed my flying school, charter and RPT services before the advent of the monopoly corporate style of governance that was introduced by Labor Minister for Transport Gareth Evans. A move made to remove himself from Ministerial responsibility, a responsibility that is a cornerstone of our democratic system. The current PM when Minister of Transport in 2009 did the same to the ATSB.

[Sunfish]

GA is dead. No one but an idiot will invest in private sector GA given the regulatory risk to their capital that CASA poses, as demonstrated by Glen Buckley. All Spence and Binskin are doing is what is termed palliative care - the future is electric multi copters and drones don't you know.. There will be the appearance of reform but it will have no substance, well, not enough to convince investors anyway.

[glenb]

In post #2410 i had written to the CASA ICC. That correspondence being a request to attend a meeting between CASA and the Ombudsmans office.

20/10/22Good morning Glen



Thanks for your email.



The meeting with the Ombudsman has already taken place. The primary purpose of the meeting was to discuss what further material CASA may be able to provide to assist the Ombudsman in the investigation of your complaint to that Office. I anticipate that as a result of the meeting, a further request for information will be made to CASA.



Regards



Jonathan Hanton

[glenb]

21/10/22

Good morning, Mr. Hanton,



Thank you for the notification that the meeting has occurred. Am I able to be advised as to who attended that meeting from CASA apart from yourself obviously?



Cheers. Glen

[Sandy Reith]

I’m sure we’d all like to know who attended the meeting, and what was the outcome of their discussions.

Public servants and their activities should be transparent, just as said by CASA Chair Mr. Binskin.

In the circumstances, and the enormity of Glen’s case concerns the whole of the General Aviation industry, it would be fitting to have a full run down of the proceedings.

This would be in the spirit of the Government’s model litigant requirements, fairness and displaying a willingness to address any wrongful treatment of Glen Buckley.

[glenb]

Dear Mr Buckley



I apologise for the delay in responding, but as you have observed I have been travelling.



As I have consistently indicated, I am awaiting advice from the Ombudsman as they complete their review of their original investigation. Once that process has been finalised, I will be happy to meet with you and discuss their findings.



That said, there are some points that I do need to clarify.



The first is that I have no reason to doubt the accuracy of the information that CASA provided to the Ombudsman.



The second is that I have now asked the Ombudsman’s office to address their correspondence to me rather than Dr Aleck. This is not because I have concerns about him or the role that he has played, but because I think it is appropriate in light of the issues that you are raising about Dr Aleck’s role.



In terms of your questions about the meeting between CASA and the Ombudsman, as Mr Hanton has already advised the primary purpose of the meeting was to discuss what further material CASA may be able to provide to assist the Ombudsman in its investigation.



Your sincerely



Pip

[Sunfish]

Sounds to me like they are going to stand on the letter of the law - that there has been no wrongdoing. They have simply relied on language that says “ ‘CASA must. be satisfied” somewhere in the legislation..

‘’That’s the trouble with nominatives. What today is satisfactory tomorrow is “Unsatisfactory “. What gets me is how anything SOAR did was satisfactory on any level..


‘’If you are lucky, you might get a without prejudice ex gratis payment but I wouldn’t hold my breath.

‘’If that argument is what CASA rely on, then it’s welcome to the third world. The essence of government corruption is having to “satisfy” officials.

[AnotherFSO]

FWIW, regarding taking on a government entity, there's an article in the Sydney Morning Herald this afternoon about rorting of the Medicare system, with commentary from an opthamologist who says he made a simple mistake over something and has been almost ruined by it:

-------------------

As one of the only full-time resident ophthalmologists in Rockhampton, a region servicing more than 250,000 people, [Dr David] Kitchen delivered more Medicare services than 99 per cent of his peers. He had opened the Central Queensland Cataract Centre, which offered bulk-billed services and no gap surgery, and his claims spiked.

“A lot of patients, especially uninsured pensioners, are unable to afford cataract surgery, so I set up this centre at affordable prices for patients to get cataracts done. The patients were paying just under $1500 per eye, walk in, walk out. And elsewhere in Queensland they will be paying $5000 per eye, or more. So that saw my numbers of cataracts go up substantially,” he said.

During the audit he realised he had made an error with one Medicare item number and voluntarily paid it back. But the PSR went after him and failed to listen to his explanations or his evidence, which it is legally required to do.

He challenged the PSR in the Federal Court and won in February 2021.

“I fought it because I’ve done nothing wrong,” he said.

But he said it cost him $3 million and nearly destroyed his life, “for what in the PSR’s own words was a $20,000 claim”.

In July this year he decided to sue the former PSR director for malfeasance in public office. The Department of Health is defending the case.

“I’m out of pocket a lot of money for something which should never happen in the first place. And to try to recover some costs, and also because the PSR needs to be held accountable.

“It’s a fundamentally flawed, secretive government regulatory agency,” he said.
https://www.smh.com.au/national/distressed-and-appalled-eye-doctor-sees-red-at-overcharging-by-peers-20221025-p5bsmp.html

[Sandy Reith]

The bureaucracy of Canberra is becoming ever more aggressive and intransigent. It’s been given, in many cases, such excessive powers that it finds no difficulty in exceeding those powers that the Parliament enacted. Sometimes the powers are given believing that commonsense will ameliorate excessive use of power.
It’s easy to exceed the expectations of Parliament, easy because there’s rarely anyone that’s willing to risk their time and money, and putting the authority offside, the same authority that regulates, and at times persecutes the said individuals.

[havick]

The bureaucracy of Canberra is becoming ever more aggressive and intransigent. It’s been given, in many cases, such excessive powers that it finds no difficulty in exceeding those powers that the Parliament enacted. Sometimes the powers are given believing that commonsense will ameliorate excessive use of power.
It’s easy to exceed the expectations of Parliament, easy because there’s rarely anyone that’s willing to risk their time and money, and putting the authority offside, the same authority that regulates, and at times persecutes the said individuals.

Should come as no surprise when pilots/operators elect to simply ignore casa.

[Sandy Reith]

“Should come as no surprise when pilots/operators elect to simply ignore casa.

Quite so, a partial system breakdown is the real result of the CASA modus operandi.

[glenb]

In Post #2406 I was notified of a meeting between CASA and the Ombudsmans office.
Post #2413, I was notified that the meeting had occurred.
Post #2414 I wrote to the ICC asking who the atendees were.

I have today received this response. My expectation was that someone more senior to Mr Aleck would have attended.


28/10/22Good morning Glen



CASA’s participants at the meeting were myself and Dr Aleck. Dr Aleck attended given his greater familiarity with what material existed in relation to the exchanges between CASA and APTA in early 2019 in relation how APTA’s contracts with its affiliates could demonstrate operational control.



Thanks



Jonathan

[Lead Balloon]

I find the content of the ICC’s response to be disturbing (but sadly unsurprising) Glen. The essence of your complaint in relation to CASA’s interactions with the Ombudsman is that CASA was bull****ting when it told the Ombudsman that CASA didn’t become fully aware of the specific nature of APTA’s operations until 2018.

CASA knew that applications submitted by APTA prior to 2018 for variations to its AOC to cover flying training operations would involve, for example, instructors who weren’t APTA’s employees. CASA also knew that the contractual arrangements put in place between APTA and anyone else did not contain provisions to the effect demanded by CASA in March 2019. CASA nonetheless approved those variations. Doesn’t make any difference what Dr A knew about any of that.

I suppose ‘CASA’ could try to pretend that it ‘just assumed’ that the operations covered by the approved variations would involve only personnel employed by APTA, utilising only premises and aircraft owned by APTA. I suppose ‘CASA’ could also try to pretend that it ‘just assumed’ that to the extent that the operations covered by the approved variations would utilise personnel not employed by APTA and premises and aircraft not owned by APTA, the arrangements would be covered by detailed contract provisions ensuring effective operational control. And I suppose ‘CASA’ could also try to pretend that ‘CASA’ woke up in October 2018 and slapped a palm on its forehead when the truth finally dawned on it. But those would be bald-faced lies.

My experience with the CASA ICC and Ombudsman on matters CASA is that they are not good at dealing with circumstances in which CASA is caught with its pants down, having behaved unlawfully and tried unsuccessfully to bull**** its way out of it. That’s a sad manifestation of the steadily weakening fabric of government institutions.

[Squawk7700]

Agreed, that final sentence is very specific and specifically answers a question that you didn’t ask and as such, makes it clear as to where they are headed.

[Sunfish]

CASA’s participants at the meeting were myself and Dr Aleck. Dr Aleck attended given his greater familiarity with what material existed in relation to the exchanges between CASA and APTA in early 2019 in relation how APTA’s contracts with its affiliates could demonstrate operational control.


If I understand the ombudsmans position correctly, what that means is that the Ombudsman accepts CASA's argument that it is allowed. if not commanded, to make very, very fine distinctions between pilots and operators situations, unwritten distinctions, when applying the law and associated regulations. This making of fine distinctions in regulating anyone, is the very essence of corrupt behaviour because the process is highly subjective as it occurs in the brain of a regulator and is therefore not subject to logical, rational analysis for example comparisons with simple objective criteria.

To explain that last point, if the subject of "operational control" was central to the issue of an AOC, then straight forward written, legislated requirements would have to exist for what constitutes "operational control" that Glen Buckley could have complied with in a heartbeat. According to him, he pleaded with CASA for such direction but was fobbed off on each occasion. In effect he was sent off by CASA each time to search for a Unicorn or a perfect Shiraz, while CASA sat back in their overstuffed armchairs pontificating upon his efforts while idly watching the clock to see how long his business would last with no cashflow.

For the avoidance of doubt, If the regulator was genuine, this matter would have been fixed by the usual Australian device of : "This is how you do it mate, now write it up that way so I can sign it off and get rid of you!". Instead , Glen Buckley got the death of a thousand cuts.

I say again; by this action, the Ombusdman is giving permission to all bureaucrats to make highly subjective decisions that are normally only the province of judges and juries. This is utterly corrupt because what it means is that it is ultimately legal in the ombudsmans eyes for a bureaucrat to distinguish between for example, Avmed medical decisions, AOC applications or investigation outcomes as if they are distinguishing between two fine Shiraz wines instead of applying bjective criteria.

If this stands, then CASA and its regulations are corrupt in the full sense of the word in that it can do anything it likes on a whim. There is thus no way that potential investors in Australian aviation can manage regulatory risk and they will act accordingly.

[Sandy Reith]

Quoting Sunfish:- “There is thus no way that potential investors in Australian aviation can manage regulatory risk and they will act accordingly.”

It’s blindingly clear that this true because in two ways they have, and are, already acting in the manner described.

Firstly, the dearth of new General Aviation businesses is the more noticeable by those that have gone out of business, and Government’s deliberate airport policy of favouring non aviation uses compounds the disincentive to invest in GA.

Secondly, for those who are still picking over the bones of GA, some have developed the means to survive. Rather like the first hominid to make a spear was foiled by the maker of a shield.

As an added thought to the main topic of this thread, the CASA objection to operational control via the APTA model seems to completely overlook the stringencies and legal compulsion of its own colossal suite of criminal sanctions for even the most minor deviation from its practically impossible concept of GA training perfection, while it ignores the growing thousands learning to fly under RAAUS. This is extreme humbug, perpetrating a fraud on all of us.

All the arguments of CASA are really specious, and the Hanton advice about the meeting with the Ombudsman is beyond a polite response. The degradation of what is supposed to be the Public Service is patently obvious. They are in it for themselves, at our our expense, and against the National interest.

[Lead Balloon]

If you want some insight into the extent to which the Ombudsman’s office has been compromised, you might recall its 2017 report into Centrelink’s automated debt raising and recovery system (commonly known as ‘RoboDebt’). At today’s hearing of the RoboDebt Royal Commission, internal legal advices provided to the agency were tendered. Those advices were to the effect that it was not lawful to use ‘averaged’ ATO income information as the sole and conclusive basis on which to calculate and pursue debts. But that’s precisely what the ‘online compliance intervention’ system did (unless the victim was able to battle the inadequate Centrelink communications system – the first witness today described having to send a 71 page fax of bank statements, twice (you remember faxes?) after conversations with ‘someone’ in Centrelink, which faxes were then ‘lost’ by Centrelink).

The Ombudsman didn’t bother to ask whether Centrelink had sought and obtained legal advice about the lawfulness of the ‘online compliance intervention’ system. The Ombudsman did say this in his report, though:We asked DHS whether it had done modelling on how many debts were likely to be over-calculated as opposed to under-calculated. DHS advised no such modelling was done. In our view the risk of over-recovering debts from social security recipients should be the subject of more thorough research and analysis.That’s some special genius, right there.

Maybe there should be some kind of government ‘watchdog’ with power to look into whether a government agency is pursuing powerless individuals for alleged debts that don’t exist. Let’s call that ‘watchdog’ the ‘Ombudsman’. And let’s appoint as ‘Ombudsman’ someone who understands that ‘over-recovering debts’ is a euphemism for taking money off people when they don’t actually owe it. After all, a drover’s dog knows that it’s unlawful and immoral to take money off people when they don’t actually owe it and hopefully there are candidates out there with the smarts and integrity of a drover’s dog.

[b]Correction added 2 Nov 22: According to proceedings today at the Royal Commission, the Ombudsman did ask for legal advices about the use of 'averaged' income data as the sole basis for calculating and pursuing debts. There followed an internal Departmental discussion about whether to provide to the Ombudsman the late 2014 advice as well as a January 2017 advice that appeared to be inconsistent with the former, but the latter - according to the lawyer who provided the advice (today's witness) - was an answer to a different and specific and highly hypothetical scenario. The author of the 2017 advice did not know whether the 2014 advice - which had been 'second counselled' by the author of the 2017 advice, was ever given to the Ombudsman. I can't find any reference to that request or what the Ombudsman did about the response, in the Ombudsman's report. In any event, I stand by my overarching view that ‘over-recovering debts’ is a euphemism for taking money off people when they don’t actually owe it, and that should have rung alarm bells, long and loud, in the Ombudsman's Office.

[Sandy Reith]

LB has illustrated the woeful inadequacies of yet another of our myriad ‘independent’ government agencies.

Undoubtably we could enhance our government with a new and accountable means of investigating and overseeing the machinations of the mighty juggernaut that’s known as the Public Sector (once was the Public Service).

Here’s a suggestion, we vote for representatives who will pursue our particular concerns on our behalf. We could have them come together in a place of speaking together and call it Parliament. They would have to understand that they not only made law but they were also responsible to their individual constituents.

[Lead Balloon]

In fairness, I should say that I’ve had considerable success in complaining to the Commonwealth Ombudsman’s Office about bureaucrats who were labouring under the misconception that their compliance with the law was optional. Strong and effective action by the Ombudsman’s Office recalibrated the bureaucrats and I was consequently paid money to which I was entitled. But that was over two decades ago.

Since then the Commonwealth Ombudsman has also become:

- the Postal Industry Ombudsman

- the Overseas Students Ombudsman

- the Private Health Insurance Ombudsman, and

- the VET Student Loans Ombudsman.

You (Sandy) have identified elsewhere the annual budget of the Commonwealth Ombudsman. My view is that the budget would have to be ten times that in order for the Ombudsman to do, properly, all of the jobs the Commonwealth Ombudsman's Office is now supposed to do.

All of the phaffing around on Glen's matter indicate to me an organisation which is, at best, out of its depth. It's not that hard to work out what CASA knew - constructively if not actually - about APTA's legal relationship with and operational control of the people, premises and aircraft to be engaged in operations the subject of each application for a variation to APTA's AOC to cover those operations. As I've said before, that was (and remains) the very purpose of an AOC variation process.

[glenb]

03/11/22





To the Board of CASA,



As you will be aware I believe some members of the most senior levels of CASAs management have been responsible for providing substantially false and misleading information to the Commonwealth Ombudsman’s investigation into the closure of my business by CASA. The regulations and advisories that I was allegedly in breach of that were used by CASA as the basis to close my business were.




CASR 141.050
The Aviation Ruling
CAA s29

For clarity there were no allegations ever made against any safety matters or any quality outcomes. It was initially identified as regulatory breach only, noting CASAs narrative has changed overtime.



As you are aware I totally refute that I was in breach of any of those regulations, however that is not the specific purpose of this correspondence.



As you are also aware, I am fully satisfied that at least one CASA Executive has provided, or been responsible for providing, substantially false and misleading information to the Ombudsman investigation into the closure of my business, on multiple topics and on multiple occasions. My reasonable assumption is that it was provided by the CASA Executive to pervert the outcome of that investigation.



The reason that I am seeking to have this matter resolved is because of the two very different alternating narratives that are emanating from within CASA, that support my allegation of misconduct by Mr Aleck, by way of providing false and misleading information to the Ombudsman.



I made multiple requests of CASA over the last 18 months that Mr Aleck be removed as the primary and sole point of contact in dealings with the Ombudsman’s office because of my concerns with his integrity. The CASA CEO chose to leave him in that position for reasons known only to her. My concerns were that he would attempt to pervert the findings of the Ombudsman Office to cover up his misconduct. Mr Aleck was the decision maker that wrongfully declared it unlawful.



Evidence of Mr Alecks “influence” on perverting the findings of the Ombudsman investigation can be found in these two significantly different CASA narratives based on the same facts.



21st July 2021 Ombudsman writes to me advising that they will not be investigating the matter because CASA had provided us with a reasonable explanation for its view that it was not fully aware of the specific nature of APTA’s operations until just prior to issuing the notice in October 2018.”



However over two years prior on 12th April 2019, CASAs own Industry Complaints Commissioner had come to a completely different conclusion when he stated; “I don’t consider CASA treated APTA fairly when its approach changed on 23 October 2018. That’s because collectively as an organisation, CASA had an awareness of the APTA business model for a significant period of time prior to its compliance with regulation being called into question. In changing its position so drastically, the circumstances were such that CASA’s actions weren’t fair, given APTA’s likely to have relied on CASA’s failure to highlight any concerns when conducting its operations and planning.



When the CASA Industry Complaints Commissioner says “a significant period of time prior” I assume that to be when CASA approved our second base in Darwin 8 years prior. As you are aware I have maintained that CASA was fully aware of the specific nature of my business model and its structure for many years, and the ICC findings would seem to support that.



As you are aware, I wrote to the CASA CEO Ms. Spence requesting clarification as to the date that CASA first became fully aware of the specific nature of my operation. A response to this question is fundamental to my entire matter. Despite my requests, Ms Spence has chosen not to reveal that date. My next step is to approach the CASA Board directly, in the hope that CASA is prepared to provide me with that information, hence this correspondence to the Board.



If the Board is not prepared to provide me with that information, my intention will be petitioning the Minister compelling CASA to reveal that date. My intention is to gather 5000 signatures from within the electorate of Chisholm and submit that petition to my local MP, Ms. Carina Garland seeking the assistance of the Minister. My hope is that additional step is not necessary, but I will continue to pursue this matter. I only advise you of that because my intention is not to “broadside” anybody, although it is important that there are clear expectations. I have included both respective offices in this correspondence to ensure there is awareness at Ministerial level.



Obviously, my strong preference and hope is that truthfulness and integrity prevail on this matter, and that I can obtain a response, therefore finalising this matter at Board Level.



Once the ICC made his determination on 12/04/19 that CASA had an awareness of my business model for a “significant time prior” that should then have become the official position that CASA adopts from the time of that finding and should have been the CASA position presented to the Ombudsman investigation.



I am concerned that two years later the Commonwealth Ombudsman produces a finding that contradicts the previous finding of the ICC. That can only occur if Mr Aleck is pursuing a narrative that differs substantially to that of the CASA ICC. For clarity, the Ombudsman has arrived at a finding based on based on false and misleading information provided by Mr Aleck to the Ombudsman.



As the family that has been significantly impacted by this matter, we think that it is fair and reasonable that CASA clearly nominate the date that they first became fully aware of the specific nature of the operation. As outlined in my correspondence previously, there by necessity, must be an occurrence that occurred on a specific date, in layman’s terms the date that CASA woke up and slapped a palm on its forehead.



This really is a very fair and reasonable request, and I think my family is fully entitled to that date, and most especially because of the discrepancy between the CASA ICC position and that of Mr Alecks.



If I can respectfully request a straightforward, well intentioned, and honest response. As you are aware I have a forum on this topic that has over 1,000,000 views. A copy of the correspondence previously sent to Ms Spence can be accessed via Posts #2376 and Post #2377 on that forum. It contains information that may be pertinent to the Boards response. Glen Buckley and Australian small business -V- CASA - Page 119 - PPRuNe Forums (https://aus01.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.pprune.org%2Fpacific-general-aviation-questions%2F620219-glen-buckley-australian-small-business-v-casa-119.html&data=05%7C01%7CPip.Spence%40casa.gov.au%7C92cf71af3a2a491059 f208dab20c70dc%7C70a593b6906447f5992539d2dc35261c%7C0%7C0%7C 638018063768487032%7CUnknown%7CTWFpbGZsb3d8eyJWIjoiMC4wLjAwM DAiLCJQIjoiV2luMzIiLCJBTiI6Ik1haWwiLCJXVCI6Mn0%3D%7C3000%7C% 7C%7C&sdata=gkSmqOnv1nizOWV2G9aBSqs0TH1gSp09SIckY8Cetjg%3D&reserved=0)



Respectfully, Glen Buckley

[mcoates]

Because you are relying on the forum and the number of views to put some weight on your case including all of the offers of support etc. I would try and find some way to download an archive of this subject within the Forum in case it just magically goes missing one day and you lose access to everything (unless you have already done this)

I lost something once and thought I could recover it from web archive but unfortunately it missed the back update and it was gone forever

[glenb]

Good morning Mr Buckley,



I have taken your email below dated 28 October 2022 as a request for us to close our review file and take no further action in your matter. In line with this request, I will now finalise the review (2019-713831-R). We would usually advise both a complainant and an agency of our decision when finalising a complaint and the reasons for the decision under section 12 of the Ombudsman Act 1976. Please let me know whether you would like me to provide my review findings to you in writing, or not.



By way of update and an indication of next steps, I was intending to request some further limited information from CASA to be in a position to reach my final conclusions on a couple of issues raised in the course of your original complaint before finalising your matter, hopefully before the end of the year. I may still request the additional information from CASA for the purpose of bringing the final issues to conclusion for our internal records, even though I will finalise your review matter.



I would like to acknowledge the significant length of time I have held this complaint, and I am sorry I have not been able to provide my conclusions to you earlier. In this matter there has been a substantial amount of information received from both yourself and CASA, and it has taken me longer than anticipated to consider the conclusions reached by Mike and then Mark in your complaint against the information you provided to us both during the complaint process itself and during this review. In doing this, I have also considered a lot of information that CASA has given us about its engagement with you. In short, I do not agree with you that CASA has misled the Ombudsman’s Office. I intended to address this issue in more detail in my review decision to demonstrate why I do not think our office has been misled and can provide this information to you, if you’d like me to.



Finally, I would encourage you to reach out for support in relation to your mental health concerns. If you don’t have support in place already, I suggest you contact Lifeline (13 11 14 or https://www.lifeline.org.au/), Beyond Blue (1300 224 636 or https://www.beyondblue.org.au/) or your GP for assistance and support. You could also contact Financial Counselling Australia (FCA) if you would like to talk to a phone financial counsellor from anywhere in Australia. You can reach FCA by ringing 1800 007 007 (minimum opening hours are 9.30 am – 4.30 pm Monday to Friday). This number will automatically switch through to the service in the State or Territory closest to you.



While I acknowledge your request not to provide the findings of my review, if you would like them, please let me know.



Yours sincerely,

[Lead Balloon]

Errrrm, did you send an email dated 28 Oct 22 to the Ombudsman’s Office? If you posted a copy in this thread, I must have missed it.

[Sunfish]

Glen, in my opinion, it’s over and you lost. Unless you have a knight in armor in reserve or can galvanize public support, there’s nothing you can do. You have been branded as a nutcase by CASA and the Ombudsman has accepted that. Do you need me or someone to spell it out ?

The response of the DAS and Board is now predictable and negative. Unless you can immediately generate considerable industry support or have a judges opinion in your favor it seems to me that you should cut your losses and look after your mental health. There is life after aviation. Get help.

[glenb]

I concur

[glenb]

I fully recognize that i am stumbling back in the ring uncontrollably, leaning backwards at about 45 degrees, each desperate step back trying to keep myself upright. Its hard to see out the two swollen eyes, with blood pooling in the sockets, the head is thumping, and i can feel the drool pooling and spilling out the right side of my mouth which seems to have a rather large gash. I can feel my white boxing shorts clinging to my bum, but still have enough awareness to hope it's only sweat, as i feel the camera flashes going off behind me, and the crowd gasping. It really doesn't look pretty, and ohhhh that smell.

Whilst the fight isnt completely over here, no. doubt it looks lost. Let the record state that boxer Buckley's fighting career dragged out over four years, and he only had the one fight, but it was against a couple of weight classes above him. He got well and truly whipped but my goodness. The man went down swinging.

There is only a short time to go on this match, but you've all invested so much in the front row seats. Please hang around until i crash down into the ring, obviously not to get back up again till the bell rings. If my eyes appear to be rolling in different directions whilst I'm down there don't be too concerned, I'm merely trying to look around and acknowledge you all. Whilst not the victor I will muster everything i can to raise my hand and acknowledge you all, when i stagger back up on my feet, and I'm going to make dam sure my butt is directed to the opponents' supporters.

Very very very appreciative of everyone's comments and support throughout the four-year boxing career. It is over. Hope you'll stay to the presentation at the end which isn't too much longer.

What "akido' you say, whats that all about? What color is the uniform?

[Squawk7700]

Glen, in my opinion, it’s over and you lost. Unless you have a knight in armor in reserve or can galvanize public support, there’s nothing you can do. You have been branded as a nutcase by CASA and the Ombudsman has accepted that. Do you need me or someone to spell it out ?

The response of the DAS and Board is now predictable and negative. Unless you can immediately generate considerable industry support or have a judges opinion in your favor it seems to me that you should cut your losses and look after your mental health. There is life after aviation. Get help.

Sunfish, I’m glad you’re not a psychologist or anyone that deals with people for that matter.

[Sunfish]

I have to consider the possibility that I have been taken in by a master storyteller. The question is which one of the protagonists is it? CASA or Glen?

The last. time I became mentally invested in a contest such as this it cost the company two hundred thousand and me about two years of hard work supporting a guy who told a good story.

‘I have had enough, let. me know what happens in the end.

​​​​​​……….and Sqwawk, it doesn’t take much to make a case in the public service that some client is a nutcase; it’s a common way of dealing with the very aggrieved. Now if Glen had complained of something important like sexual harassment for example, the Board and DAS would be moving heaven and earth to help him.

[Lead Balloon]

Errrrm, did you send an email dated 28 Oct 22 to the Ombudsman’s Office, Glen? If you posted a copy in this thread, I must have missed it.

[Arm out the window]

I have to consider the possibility that I have been taken in by a master storyteller. The question is which one of the protagonists is it? CASA or Glen?

I believe we have all been bogged down in a "can't see the woods for the trees" mindset for most of this saga. The real, aviation-critical issue at stake is whether what Glen was doing was good for flying training, and therefore the future of aviation in this country, or not.

CASA's involvement in this, as far as I can tell, has been a narrow application of so-called franchised AOC provisions, with the whole argument hinging on legal interpretation. But was the business plan going to work effectively and safely? I say yes, as a concept, so CASA should've been supportive, not the opposite.

I don't know anything about the inner workings of Glen's business dealings or his ambitions, but a multi-tiered flying training enterprise with sound standardisation, shared documentation and effective oversight procedures (as the plan definitely appears to have been) sounds bloody good! Whoever in CASA has roadblocked this idea should be publicly shamed, unless they have real, concrete, verifiable evidence of wrongdoing.

[snoop doggy dog]

Errrrm, did you send an email dated 28 Oct 22 to the Ombudsman’s Office, Glen? If you posted a copy in this thread, I must have missed it.

As we all did...

[Lead Balloon]

I believe we have all been bogged down in a "can't see the woods for the trees" mindset for most of this saga. The real, aviation-critical issue at stake is whether what Glen was doing was good for flying training, and therefore the future of aviation in this country, or not.

CASA's involvement in this, as far as I can tell, has been a narrow application of so-called franchised AOC provisions, with the whole argument hinging on legal interpretation. But was the business plan going to work effectively and safely? I say yes, as a concept, so CASA should've been supportive, not the opposite.

I don't know anything about the inner workings of Glen's business dealings or his ambitions, but a multi-tiered flying training enterprise with sound standardisation, shared documentation and effective oversight procedures (as the plan definitely appears to have been) sounds bloody good! Whoever in CASA has roadblocked this idea should be publicly shamed, unless they have real, concrete, verifiable evidence of wrongdoing.All valid and sensible points, AOTW.

CASA was, in fact, supportive. Until it wasn’t. That’s the travesty.

Glen was encouraged by CASA to believe APTA could continue to obtain AOC variations to cover operations in which people who weren’t APTA’s employees would be engaged, utilising premises of which APTA was not owner or lessee and aircraft of which APTA was not the registered operator. CASA did that by approving the variations. If CASA did not know those specific details of the structure, CASA was on notice of them because that is very purpose of CASA’s assessment of the application for the variation.

And if the 2019 demand by CASA for evidence of the way in which APTA would exercise legal and effective control of all of these moving parts was valid in 2019, that demand should have been made on each and every occasion on which APTA applied for a variation to cover more operations in which people who weren’t APTA’s employees would be engaged, utilising premises of which APTA was not owner or lessee and aircraft of which APTA was not the registered operator. On each and every occasion. That way, Glen would have been in a position to address that demand or discontinue the plan before he literally committed his (and much of his family’s) wealth and blood sweat and tears into building what was subsequently destroyed when CASA drove Glen to despair.

[LAME2]

Needs to go to the law courts. Big dollars though.

[glenb]

Dear Mr Buckley,



I take all of your allegations very seriously, which is why I am supporting a full and independent investigation by the Ombudsman.



I do not want to pre-empt the independence of the Ombudsman’s consideration and findings, nor is it appropriate for me to circumvent that process; however, I do want to be assured that the Ombudsman has all the relevant information to finalise that consideration as soon as possible. To that end, I have directed the ICC to ensure the Ombudsman has been provided all the information he considered when making his 2019 findings and any additional relevant information that he may have accessed since 2019, regardless of whether this may have been previously provided.



Yours sincerely,



Mark

[Lead Balloon]

That’s ostensibly positive. But…

Who decides what’s ‘relevant’ in the sense used in the Chairman’s response? Not the Board.

And do you get to see what information CASA has provided to the Ombudsman, so that you get an opportunity to say: “What CASA didn’t tell you is….”, or “That allegation against me was baseless, which is why no action was taken about it”, or ….? If not, it’s just another opaque process which shouldn’t be opaque.

What’s emerging from the Robodebt Royal Commission is that the Ombudsman’s Office was misled by the agencies concerned. Nonetheless, the Ombudsman’s Office should have had the competence and integrity to be dubious about and test, for itself, what it was being told by those agencies.

Keep your chin up, Glen. There are lots of people who want to see you be properly compensated.

[glenb]

Got a telephone call from someone within CASA today.

Interesting that one large school has discontinued operations due to a lack of key personnel. Another school has stepped in and the two schools are delivering under the one AOC. Apparently, a lot of integration issues, and each employee getting paid by their respective organizations.
Interesting.........

[Sandy Reith]

About Glen’s phone call from “within” CASA. sounds like some insider there has a conscience and sense of morality.
Very good to hear, and good evidence of CASA’s unsustainable AOC model quite apart from the obvious contradiction in terms of the treatment of Glen Buckley.

[AerialPerspective]

About Glen’s phone call from “within” CASA. sounds like some insider there has a conscience and sense of morality.
Very good to hear, and good evidence of CASA’s unsustainable AOC model quite apart from the obvious contradiction in terms of the treatment of Glen Buckley.

That was exactly what I thought Sandy, I've always suspected there are some decent people in CASA who don't approve of the way things are done. As Glen said, 'very interesting'.

On another entirely unrelated matter, my sincere condolences on the loss of your brother. To lose a close family member is a difficult time for anyone and goes beyond whatever political disagreements we may or may not have as humans which pale into insignificance at such times. Again, my condolences to you and your family.

[barleyhi]

That was exactly what I thought Sandy, I've always suspected there are some decent people in CASA who don't approve of the way things are done. As Glen said, 'very interesting'.

On another entirely unrelated matter, my sincere condolences on the loss of your brother. To lose a close family member is a difficult time for anyone and goes beyond whatever political disagreements we may or may not have as humans which pale into insignificance at such times. Again, my condolences to you and your family.
Here here. Also my condolences too, Sandy

[barleyhi]

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-11-11/josh-hoch-pilot-accused-of-chartering-flights-illegally/101644104

The comparison of CASA’s knowledge of this would be interesting too.

[Squawk7700]

Meanwhile, Uber continues to operate freely.

[Sunfish]

GlenB: Interesting that one large school has discontinued operations due to a lack of key personnel. Another school has stepped in and the two schools are delivering under the one AOC. Apparently, a lot of integration issues, and each employee getting paid by their respective organizations.
Interesting.........


..........and perhaps CASA is using expertise, busines models, procedures and other intellectual property developed at great cost by Glen for APTA.

In other words, I wonder if some intellectual property is being pirated?

[Sandy Reith]

Firstly, thank you gentlemen for your condolences.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-11-11/josh-hoch-pilot-accused-of-chartering-flights-illegally/101644104

The comparison of CASA’s knowledge of this would be interesting too.

Reminds one of my friend the legendary Tasmanian Billy Vincent OAM (Dec) who held a charter licence and had some 20,000 hours, but only held a private licence. Billy intended to do his CPL with me but was too busy.

https://m.facebook.com/justtassiebooks/posts/1260725060622846

As usual the official line from CASA will indicate to the uninformed lay person that this corporate body has a severe case of myopia coupled with severe memory loss (Alzheimer’s disease).

[tossbag]

Firstly, thank you gentlemen for your condolences.

Yes, condolences, one of the few politicians who did what he said he was going to do.

[Alpha Whiskey Bravo]

APTA is in Liquidation apparently. The employees arrived on Monday to receive an email letting them know. CASA finally won! Even though it was a very different beast to what we built, it is still sad to see another flying training school close and many lose their jobs. Sorry it turned out this way Glen.
AWB

[Sunfish]

Who has the rights to the IP including the manuals, software and source code??????? That stuff is very very valuable and probably irreplaceable without huge investment. Hopefully Glen owns it or has rights to it.

You can replicate APTA if you have the IP.

[Asturias56]

sickening outcome....................

[Squawk7700]

Who has the rights to the IP including the manuals, software and source code??????? That stuff is very very valuable and probably irreplaceable without huge investment. Hopefully Glen owns it or has rights to it.

You can replicate APTA if you have the IP.

From the sounds of it, why on earth would you want to???

[glenb]

This is my draft letter to my local MP and Ms Spence CASA CEO21/11/22



To: The Honourable Ms Carina Garland, MP for the Electorate of Chisholm,

Firstly, on behalf of my family, who have been significantly impacted by this matter, I just wanted to express my appreciation to you for facilitating a meeting in your Electorate Office on Wednesday 16/11/22.

I had tried throughout the tenure of the previous local MP, Ms Gladys Liu, to obtain a meeting. During her entire term she steadfastly refused to meet with me or offer me any assistance at all. Your change of approach was much appreciated.

The fact that you were prepared to meet with me was an important gesture and gives me confidence that the Electorate has a far more effective advocate and representative than we have had with the previous incumbent, Ms Gladys Liu. Thankyou.

At our meeting I had the opportunity to provide you with a brief overview of what is a complicated and technical matter. I advised you that I would provide you with two magazine articles from Australian Flying Magazine. I have titled them “APTA before CASA action” and “APTA after CASA action”. They provide an excellent overview of APTA. Whilst they do not cover the matter in its entirety, they do provide the best initial overview.

I don’t expect you to read through it in its entirety, but I also draw your attention to a forum on my matter that has attracted over 1,000,000 views and thousands of comments, on an aviation forum. A sampling of the comments will provide the “vibe” of industry’s view on this matter. For your reference, I post on there as “Glenb”. If one assumes that “where there is smoke, there is fire”, the forum suggests that this is a significant matter. The forum can be accessed via here: Glen Buckley and Australian small business -V- CASA - PPRuNe Forums (https://www.pprune.org/pacific-general-aviation-questions/620219-glen-buckley-australian-small-business-v-casa.html)

I raised my concerns with you regarding the potential misconduct of Mr Aleck, CASAs Executive Manager of Legal, International and Regulatory Affairs I will address that in more detail at a later stage via a formal submission that I intend to make, but I did suggest that you could contact Senator Sterle to ascertain his own experience with Mr Aleck in his dealings with Mr Aleck in the Senate. Whilst I have no insight into Senator Sterles opinion of Mr Aleck, Senator Sterle would be well placed to provide you with his thoughts, as he has had experience dealing with him. The reason that Mr Aleck is so relevant to this matter is because he was the sole decision maker in my matter. It was his decision that I was operating unlawfully, and it was he that closed my business.

I outlined to you the impact of Mr Alecks decision making and how I had lost my home, my two businesses, and my life savings, and that this entire matter has taken a significant toll on my mental, and physical health. Our families situation is that we have negligible superannuation, as our family business was intended to provide for our retirement, and that business was closed down by CASA. We have total life savings remaining of $6000 and should my wife or I stop working for more than six weeks, we would be facing homelessness. I also raised my concerns with you about the impact this has had on my poor wife, who has had five, possibly six days, free of work in the last 1500 days that this matter has dragged on so unnecessarily since October 2018. My wife is extremely anxious about our future housing situation, as I am. It is inevitable that at some stage in our future, one of us will be unable to work for a period of at least six weeks. The prospect of needing housing assistance at some stage is inevitable.

I was very appreciative of your offer of assistance in seeking options to assist us with housing, and that is something that I most definitely will need to approach you on, early in the New Year.

I did also raise my intention of seeking an “Act of Grace” payment to rectify the totally unnecessary harm caused to so many. Act of Grace Payments | Department of Finance (https://www.finance.gov.au/individuals/act-grace-payments-waiver-debts-commonwealth-compensation-detriment-caused-defective-administration-cdda/act-grace-payments)

I do intend to pursue an Act of Grace Payment and will contact you regarding that at the appropriate time.

I have since drafted a letter to Ms Pip Spence the CEO of CASA that puts forward some of the key issues that I feel need to be addressed, and that is included below. I have made multiple requests to have these specific queries addressed at CEO and Board Level within CASA. The steadfast refusal to respond to these very reasonable requests, suggests to me that there is an attempt at the very highest levels within CASA to cover up this matter, and that has been very much my personal experience.

If Ms Spence is prepared to be truthful on these matters, the responses will be revealing. There is no valid reason that CASA should not provide me with responses to these very fair and reasonable requests.

With no prior warning I had my business of more than a decade closed down. I am fully entitled to truthful responses.

I will be extremely appreciative of any assistance that you can offer to have these queries addressed in a clear and concise manner.

I have copied you in on the correspondence to Ms Spence the CASA CEO, as well as including the Ministers Office, and the CASA Board to ensure there is a widespread awareness of my matter.

I have made multiple requests over time to meet with the CASA CEO, Ms Spence, although she refuses to meet with me.

Any assistance you can offer in obtaining clear and concise responses to my queries that follow, would be appreciated. Most of them are matters that I covered briefly in our meeting yesterday.

Once again, on behalf of my family, we thank you in anticipation of your ongoing assistance and support. My letter to Ms Spence the CEO of CASA follows.

Respectfully, Glen Buckley.



----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------



21/11/22



Dear Ms Spence, CEO of CASA

I refer you to a recent post on the long running forum on this matter, and refer you specifically to two posts which can be accessed via the following link, and specifically post #2440 and post #2442 Glen Buckley and Australian small business -V- CASA - Page 122 - PPRuNe Forums (https://www.pprune.org/pacific-general-aviation-questions/620219-glen-buckley-australian-small-business-v-casa-122.html)

These posts raised a valid point, and that is, that CASA has made a rather simple matter, incredibly complex, and far more complex than it needs to be.

The purpose of this correspondence is to bring some clarity and simplicity back to the entire matter as to the reason CASA closed my business.

Consider the following statement:

If Glen Buckley had utilised his own “employees” at each of the respective APTA bases, CASA would never have declared his business unlawful and closed it down.”

As simple as that sounds, that is the root cause of the entire issue. It was a determination by Mr Aleck that because I utilised personnel that were not my employees, I was operating unlawfully, and the business was closed down.

Consider the email on 20/06/2019, eight months after CASA put trading restrictions in place on the business, CASA was still maintaining the position that all personnel operating under my CASA issued authorisation had to be employees of the me as the Authorization Holder.

In the correspondence on 20/06/19 eight months after the trading restrictions were put in place, Mr Martin from CASA wrote to me and again reiterated that all personnel engaged by me and operating under the AOC, also had to paid directly by me, as their Employer. He wrote to me and stated:“For the avoidance of doubt, this would allow flight training to be conducted by APTA employees only-not employees of affiliates.”

That was the entire single issue. If all personnel were also my employees absolutely none of this harm would have been caused.

Mr Aleck determined that by me utilising personnel at my bases that were not directly employed by me, I was allegedly in breach of the following two legislative requirements and an Advisory

1. CASR 141.050

2. Civil Aviation Act s29

3. The Aviation Ruling.

My understanding, and how it was always explained to me by CASA was that my business was closed down because I was in breach of those regulations.

I robustly maintain that.

· I was not in breach of CASR 141.050.

· I was not in breach of Civil Aviation Act s29

· I was not in breach of the Aviation Ruling. (Since repealed by CASA, once the Ombudsman determined it was not valid)

Of concern to me is that CASA has failed to provide one single piece of supporting evidence to substantiate those allegations.

Over time CASA has diverted from that original narrative of “lawfulness or not’, to one of, “quality or not”. This alternating narrative has been able to be developed from within CASA because of the very clear breaches of Administrative Law, Procedural Fairness, and Natural justice.

CASA has clearly defined procedures in its Enforcement Manual that should have been followed by Mr Aleck when CASA “cancel, vary or suspend an AOC”. These procedures were never followed by him, denying me my rights under Administrative Law and Procedural fairness. The procedures that CASA was compelled to follow are outlined in CASAs Enforcement Manual, particularly Chapter 6, which can be accessed here. CASA Enforcement Manual.pdf (file:///C:/Users/61418/Dropbox/PC%20(2)/Desktop/Glen/CASA%20Enforcement%20Manual.pdf)

At no stage since CASA initiated the trading restrictions in October 2018 through until Mr Aleck stood by his original opinion and closed the business in mid-2019 was I ever provided anything that gives me a right of review or appeal or identifies to me what it is that I did “wrong”.

My best understanding is that I utilised personnel that were not directly employed by me, and that is the reason I was closed down. There was never any safety allegation, or allegation that I had breached any of my procedures in my CASA approved Operations Manual/Exposition. It was an allegation of two regulatory breaches.

Had all personnel operating under my approval, also been my employees, I would never have heard from CASA.

Consider the first alleged breach of CASR 141.050 which states that “a person commits an offence if the person conducts flight training and they don’t hold the certificate or approval to conduct the training’

If this was used as the basis to close my business, surely CASA must be able to nominate who that “person” is. Who is the person that conducted flight training without the approval. Surely there must be a date, a flight, the name of a pilot/s, and aircraft. It is absurd that CASA can allege that I breached CASR 141.050 and be totally unable to name the person/s involved and provide not one single piece of supporting evidence.

CASA took a safe and compliant business and shut it down with the Owner of that business, being me, having no appeal or review process available to me. I had no way to have the trading restrictions lifted. It seems totally unreasonable that a safe and compliant business of ten years is shut down, and those procedures that CASA is compelled to follow when they close down a business are completely bypassed.

Because of this failure to provide the initial Show Cause Notice (SCN) or the final “Decision”, not only did I have no appeal process available to me, but I also still to this day don’t understand the reasoning behind CASAs decision to close my business, and by not providing me that notification it has given Mr Aleck the opportunity to run an alternating narrative and mislead the Ombudsman Office and others as to the reason that CASA closed my business.

Therefore, can I formally request that CASA, both provide me with the SCN and the “decision”, that should have been provided to me at the time of initiating the action (SCN) and when the decision was finally made to force all customers to leave.

I want to know why CASA closed my business down. Was it a breach of the regulations or was it a quality control issue?

I think this is critical, and particularly so in light of some recent developments at Moorabbin Airport.

It appears that CASA has facilitated and approved a business utilising the exact same structure that I did. As you know I have asserted to the Ombudsman that CASA always permitted this exact structure that I adopted, and that in fact it was widespread industry practice. Mr Alecks blatantly false and misleading assertion was that CASA had not and did not ever permit the structure that I adopted.

I felt it was ludicrous that Mr Aleck would peddle such a blatant lie, nevertheless he did, and he did it convincingly.

You will appreciate how interested I was to receive a telephone call from a well-intentioned CASA employee, that despite CASA closing my business down, CASA had approved another Operator to do exactly what I had been doing. If this information from the CASA employee is correct, and I have no reason to doubt it, I believe it will raise concerns as to the conduct of Mr Aleck and his decision making. As you are aware, I believe I was targeted by Mr Aleck.

In fact, if CASA has actively facilitated another Operator to do exactly what I was doing, yet closed me down, that would surely indicate some type of targeted malice, and most certainly requires an explanation from CASA, and as the person affected, I feel I am fully entitled to one. It also is an indicator as to the falsehoods propagated from within CASA, as Mr Aleck maintains that this structure was never adopted in the industry and was never permitted by CASA.

If what Mr Aleck says is true, then this would be the first time in Australia that this structure has been formally approved by CASA, and that will facilitate a comparative analysis as to why this is now permitted but my business was shut down.

The current serving CASA Employee has advised me that at Moorabbin Airport as of today there are two completely separate flying schools with different owners, they are competitors in fact. To distinguish those flying schools, I will call them Flying School “Alpha” and flying school “Foxtrot.”

· Flying School “Foxtrot” has run into operational difficulty, and no longer has a CASA mandated Head of Operations (HOO) being one of the required Key Personnel. The exact reason that Ballarat Aero Club and Latrobe Valley aero Club wanted to join APTA.

· Flying School “Foxtrot” is not permitted by legislation to continue operations without those CASA required Key Personnel, and was therefore compelled to cease operations without those required Key Personnel.

· CASA promptly facilitated for Flying school “Foxtrot” to continue operations under another flying schools Authorisation/AOC being Flying School “Alphas” Authorisation/AOC. This entire process was finalised in a matter of days, whilst I could not achieve this after 8 months.

· This is the exact same business model that I adopted, noting that mine was purpose built for this situation.

· CASA closed my business down because it was “unlawful”, and the structure I adopted “had never been done before”, when the truth is it is widespread CASA sanctioned and approved practice, always was and obviously continues to be.

· Flying school “Alphas” Authorisation is being used by Flying School “Foxtrot”, with CASAs full and formal approval.

· Flying School “Foxtrot” continues using its own building, its own aircraft, its own simulator, and perhaps most significantly Flying School “Foxtrot” is using its own employees, all under Flying school “Alphas” approval

· This is the exact same structure that I adopted.

You will understand my concern. If this CASA employees information is correct, it raises so many questions.

Why was my business shut own with no prior notice, yet CASA formally approves and offers assistance for another Operator to do exactly the same thing?

Why couldn’t I resolve the matter of content of commercial agreements for 8 months, yet another Operator could resolve the contracts issue in a matter of a couple of days?

As the CASA employee suggested to me, he/she does not believe that CASA even stipulated any contracts, and to the best of his/her knowledge CASA does not hold a copy of the commercial agreement, because its not a requirement stipulated on this Operator, although it was on me. If CASA does hold a copy of a contract, why were the requirements on this Operator so much less onerous than my requirements? Surely all Operators would be required to operate to the same requirements of Mr Aleck.

What is it that is different between the two operations that makes this arrangement compliant with the regulations but mine was in breach of the regulations? Surely if Mr Aleck was acting in good faith, he could clearly identify why that is.

I advised the Ombudsman that CASA had always, and on every occasion throughout my 25 years in the industry, permitted the structure that I had adopted.

Mr Aleck asserted to the Ombudsman that CASA never permitted it, that raises the question as to who is being truthful, Mr Aleck or I?

This most recent approval by CASA of the two operators coming together with full CASA support and approval clearly indicates the level of deceit propagated by Members of CASAs most senior Executive.

If Mr Aleck was being truthful then CASA should be able to clearly state that this most recent approval at Moorabbin Airport of Flying School Alpha and Foxtrot operating together as two entities under the one Authorisation/AOC must be the first time in Australia that CASA has approved this arrangement, Recall that CASA stated that the structure that I had adopted was not permitted, yet here it is agin clearly permitted for someone other than Glen Buckley

I could go on listing dozens of questions, but it should not be necessary.

If the information provided to me is correct, then to be frank that exposes this entire matter, and provides irrefutable evidence that CASA has provided false and misleading information to the Ombudsman investigation as you are aware.

Please note that I have included Ms Carina Garland my local MP, and I have also included the Ministers Office.

On 16/11/22 I had the opportunity to meet with Ms Garland, and Ms Garland explained to me that she has already initiated requests for information both from CASA and the Ministers office, of which I am very appreciative. Ms Garlands office has been included in this correspondence, and this correspondence will provide Ms. Garland with clear guidance on what I am seeking.

[glenb]

Request One- Does CASA maintain Mr Alecks original opinion that I was operating in breach of the regulations that CASA used to close my business.

CASA advised me that I was in breach of CASR 141.050, Civil Aviation Act s29, and the Aviation Ruling in October 2018. CASA placed restrictions on my business that prevented me from taking on new customers. This continued for eight months until mid when CASA stood by Mr Alecks opinion and closed my business by forcing all remaining customers, including my own flying school of ten years to discontinue operations.

There were never any safety concerns raised by CASA. There were no identified deficiencies identified by CASA. CASA never requested any changes at all to any of our procedures. It was not a “quality control” matter it was a “legal” matter.

My understanding was that it was those breaches that were used as the basis to close my business down.

I absolutely reject that I was in breach of those regulations. The first stage of the Ombudsman investigation also clearly supports my position and confirmed CASA had erred when the Ombudsman found;

“As of October 2016, no Australian legislation prohibited 'franchising' of an AOC, subject only to the exclusivity of the AOC holder’s operational control, and that remained the case as of 25 March 2020.”

It is fair and reasonable that as the person impacted by this matter that CASA now very clearly state their position.

The response to these questions, only requires a “yes” or a “no.”

1. As of November 2022, does CASA still maintain that there was a breach of CASR 141.050

2. As of November 2022, does CASA still maintain that there was a breach of Civil Aviation Act s29,

3. As of November 2022, does CASA still maintain that I was in breach of the Aviation Ruling.

As the person impacted, I feel a response to that request is fair and reasonable, and most especially as these breaches were the basis for closing my business of more than a decade, which was where I derived my livelihood.

If CASA cannot clearly state that as of November 2022, the CASA position is, that I was in breach of those regulations, then I question the legality and validity of this matter in its entirety.

There is absolutely no reason that CASA should not respond to this request, and my expectation is that CASA will stand behind those allegations of regulatory breaches. It would be concerning if somehow a breach of regulations in October 2018 was a breach, but four years later it is not a breach. If that were the case, and there had been no change to the legislation that would require an explanation.

The response from CASA should be brief. A response of more than one word is not required and is totally unnecessary. I request only a single word response to each of the three alleged breaches. A yes or a no.

This is something that can be promptly attended to, and for clarity of this matter I have a very strong preference for a single word response. A regulatory breach is a relatively black and white issue, the law was either broken or the law was not broken.

You alleged it was broken in October of 2018, can CASA clearly and concisely articulate whether I was in breach of those regulations, or in fact any regulation at all.

I simply want to know what I did wrong, and if I did in fact breach any regulations.



Request Two- Can CASA explain why it did not follow its own procedures when it varied my AOC/Authorisation , and therefore denied me my right to procedural fairness?

CASA breached its obligations to me under Administrative Law.

I say that because CASA completely bypassed its own procedures stipulated in its own Enforcement Manual. CASA Enforcement Manual.pdf (file:///C:/Users/61418/Dropbox/PC%20(2)/Desktop/Glen/CASA%20Enforcement%20Manual.pdf)

There are clearly outlined procedures when CASA cancel, vary, or suspend a CASA issued AOC/Authorisation, or shut down a business of ten years as they did with mine.

By placing an “interim approval to operate” on my AOC/Authorisation of as little as 7 days surety of operations, CASA should have followed those procedures stipulated in its own manual when CASA cancel, vary or suspend an AOC/Authorisation.

By ignoring these procedures, I was never provided anything that gave me any right of appeal to Mr Alecks decision making, and the associated trading restrictions that were put in place.

This has resulted in confusion because there is no reference document that identifies what I did wrong. I should have received a Show Cause Notice (SCN) when the trading restrictions were first put in place, and a “Decision” from CASA as the basis for closing the business in mid-2019. Because I was never provided with these, it has facilitated CASA running an alternating narrative.

There is no doubt in my mind at all that the narrative Mr Aleck is providing to the Commonwealth Ombudsman is substantially different to the narrative that CASA provided me.

Despite the passage of time, I feel it is a fair and reasonable request of CASA that as the family who has had their life significantly impacted by the matter, CASA provide us with the “SCN” and the “Decision” that CASA made as the basis of forcing all customers to leave my business, and closing it.

I do have upcoming court matters in the Supreme Court as a defendant, and as I don’t know what I did wrong, provision of this would assist me in those legal proceedings and give me the best opportunity to defend myself.

I am requesting a “SCN” and a “Decision.” as should have been provided to me in accordance with CASAs own procedures in October 2018 (SCN) and mid 2019 when the final decision was made.

There is no valid reason that CASA would not provide me with these documents. I am fully entitled to them and should have been at the time, as part of CASAs obligations under Procedural fairness.





Request Three- Requesting a confirmation that CASA maintains that I was the first and only Operator to adopt this structure

Mr Aleck asserted to the Ombudsman that CASA never permitted the identical structure that I adopted. He led the Ombudsman to believe that my structure was an “industry first”, and I was the sole operator utilising this structure, when in fact I was not.

I maintained that CASA had always, and on every occasion, permitted and formally approved the identical structure that I adopted for multiple other operators, and on regular occasions throughout my 25 years in the industry.

For complete clarity. This structure was industry standard practice and was fully and formally approved by CASA. Mr Aleck and any other CASA Executive that suggest the structure that the exact structure I adopted was never previously approved by CASA is being blatantly deceptive.

After four years of an unnecessarily lengthy Ombudsman investigation, I have obtained the impression that the Ombudsman had accepted the view perpetuated by Mr Aleck to the Ombudsman’s Office. i.e. that the structure was not and had not ever been permitted by CASA.

As evidence that CASA is acting in a false and misleading manner. I put this to you.

CASA has recently approved two Operators at Moorabbin Airport to conduct operations under the one AOC/Authorisation. This is EXACTLY the structure that I adopted.

Not all personnel are directly employed by the AOC/Authorisation Holder. This is the exact structure that I adopted.

CASA has promptly facilitated and approved this Operator to conduct operations in this manner. This Operator is located approximately 100 metres away on the same Airport, from where I was operating the same structure but mine was determined to be illegal.

As this is exactly the same structure that I adopted, I feel that I am entitled to a clear and concise explanation as to why CASA facilitated another operator to operate in the same structure as I did, yet CASA closed my business down. As you are aware, I believe that I was a victim of targeted malice by Mr Aleck. A satisfactory explanation to this would go some way to allaying my concerns that Mr Aleck targeted me personally.

This requires a clear and concise response.

If Ms. Spence can provide a valid explanation as to what is different in the structure of the currently permitted operation at Moorabbin Airport compared to mine that would go some way to “watering down” my allegation that Mr Aleck targeted me. I suggest to you that there are in fact no differences at all, and that you will be unable to address this question.

For clarity, I am asking that you clearly identify the differences between my operation that was closed down, and the most recent operation that CASA has facilitated.



Request Four- CASA should nominate the date that they first became fully aware of the specific nature of my operation.

Mr Alecks position is that CASA only became fully aware of the specific nature of APTAs operations in October 2018, when CASA placed the trading restrictions in place, and that is what he led the Ombudsman to believe.

I know that because the Ombudsman wrote to me on July 21st, 2021, advising that they will not be investigating my matter because Mr Aleck had provided the Ombudsman’s Office with; “a reasonable explanation of CASAs view that it was not fully aware of the specific nature of APTA’s operations until just prior to issuing the notice in October 2018.”

As you are aware I have maintained that CASA was fully aware of the specific nature of my operations for at least 8 years prior to the date that Mr Aleck asserts.

My concern stems from the fact that over two years prior on 12th April 2019, CASAs own Industry Complaints Commissioner (ICC) had come to a completely different conclusion to that of Mr Aleck and the line that Mr Aleck peddled to the Ombudsman. The Ombudsman forming their view not on information provided by the CASA ICC but provided by Mr Aleck.

Unfortunately the Ombudsman engages with Mr Aleck as the sole Agency Representative of CASA and not the CASA Industry Complaints Commissioner.

Two years earlier, CASAs own ICC stated, “I don’t consider CASA treated APTA fairly when its approach changed on 23 October 2018. That’s because collectively as an organisation, CASA had an awareness of the APTA business model for a significant period of time prior to its compliance with regulation being called into question. In changing its position so drastically, the circumstances were such that CASA’s actions weren’t fair, given APTA’s likely to have relied on CASA’s failure to highlight any concerns when conducting its operations and planning.

As you will appreciate, I am confused. In mid-2019 the CASA ICC admits that CASA knew of my structure for a significant period of time prior, but two years later, Mr Aleck has convinced the Ombudsman to discontinue the investigation because CASA now somehow didn’t have an awareness of the structure until just prior to October 2018, despite me having operated in that structure for over eight years, and CASAs ICC acknowledging that.

My expectation is that when the CASA Industry Complaints Commissioner came to that determination in April 2019, that would become CASAs official wider position on the matter. It is inexplicable that Mr Aleck would subsequently run an alternating narrative two years later, and one that is so different, unless perhaps he was trying to mislead the Ombudsman and cover up his misconduct.

To remove all confusion and noting that it is a fair and reasonable request, as the family impacted by the closure of our business, I request that the CASA nominate the date that CASA claim that they first became fully aware of the specific nature of my operation.

There must be a specific date that CASA will admit to, and it would be somewhere between eight years prior when they approved the first base through until October 2018, being the date that Mr Aleck claims that CASA first became fully aware of the specific nature of my operation.

Obviously, this query, also only requires a short response, and could be promptly attended to. It is simply a nomination of the date that I am seeking. I am not seeking any further information other than the date that CASA concedes that it “first became fully aware of the specific nature of my operation”. The nature of that operation being the standard structure that CASA had always permitted with other operators and continues to do so today.

As an interesting side note I refer you to the first of the two articles supplied, “APTA before CASA action”. This magazine was released in January 2018. This is 10 months before Mr Aleck claimed to the Ombudsman inquiry that CASA first became fully aware of the specific nature of my operations. If one reads the article, it is plainly obvious as to what the structure of my business is. If CASA hadn’t become aware of my structure during the eight years that I operated in that structure with CASA approval, or during the two year revalidation project where CASA fully revalidated my entire structure culminating in its approval as one of Australia’s first part 141/142 organisations in April of 2017, or at the CASA level one audit of my organisation in November 2017, or when they formally approved new members to join, then surely by early 2018 someone in CASA must have read that article and become aware, even if every single one of CASAs own internal procedures had failed. It is just not feasible that CASA first became fully aware of the structure that I had adopted.

I had invested many hundreds of thousands of dollars investing in systems and procedures to revalidate my entire structure to the new regulatory structure being introduced in September 2017. I worked side by side with ten CASA employees over a two year period during 2015,2016 and 2017. This was the largest project undertaken by CASA to date with a flight training organisation and the hours allocated to the task on CASA records would clearly support that contention, and that is exactly what CASA personnel advised me CASA formally revalidated my exact structure to the new regulations in April 2017. To suggest that CASA was not fully aware of the exact structure of my operation is ludicrous, mischievous, and not credible, as you will be fully aware.

Ex CASA employees heavily involved in the project have offered to provide Statutory Declarations. I hold off on accepting those offers at this stage. In principle, it should be entirely unnecessary because it only requires the CASA CEO to be truthful, which is the opportunity that I am presenting here.

Depending on Ms Garlands success or not in assisting me in obtaining a response to this question, my next step will be to submit two Statutory Declarations from ex CASA Employees who could be considered Subject Matter Experts (SMEs). They will provide a comprehgensive response that clearly identifies the level of false and misleading information regarding Mr Alecks assertion that CASA first became fully aware of the specific nature of my operation only in October 2018.

For clarity, this requires only a very short response, as I am only requesting the date that CASA concedes that “CASA” first became fully aware of the structure that I had adopted.

Whilst it is only the date that I am after, please feel free to indicate the occurrence that made CASA become aware, if you feel that is pertinent, although I emphasise that I am only after the date.

I appreciate that there will be reluctance by CASA to nominate the date, but there must be a date, and it is entirely reasonable that CASA nominate that date and advise me of that date.

[glenb]

Request Five- CASA asserts that personnel operating under an AOC must also be employees to ensure operational control. Is this valid?

This entire matter of the closure of my business has the potential to have significant impact on the entire aviation industry because it deals very much with the relationship between the “personnel” operating under an Air Operator Certificate (AOC) as opposed to “employees” operating under an AOC.

This was the basis that CASA used to close my business down.

Recall that my business would never have been approached by CASA and would never have been closed down by CASA if all the “personnel” operating under my AOC were also my “employees.”

Despite all the other narratives running in the background, it really was a single-issue matter.

The business was not closed down by Mr Aleck against any quality outcome. It was closed down because the structure utilised personnel that were not my “employees”, and because I utilised some personnel that were not my employees but the employees of another entity such as Ballarat Aero Club, Mr Aleck from his office in Canberra determined that my business structure was illegal, and that “operational control” was compromised because of that arrangement.

If there is any doubt about CASAs position on this, I would also refer you to the email from Craig Martin the CASA Executive Manager of Regulatory Services and Surveillance, at the time, where he stated, ‘For the avoidance of doubt, this would allow flight training to be conducted by APTA employees only – not employees of affiliates.” This was in late June of 2019, eight months after this matter began.

Mr Alecks position was that all personnel must be employees of the Authorisation Holder because that is the only way to ensure operational control.

In fact CASA used this as the basis to close down my flying school of ten years, Melbourne Flight Training because CASA claimed that not only did they have to be my personnel, they also had to be employees of the AOC Holder only.

For complete clarity. I am fully satisfied that CASA had absolutely no valid lawful basis to do this.

It really was a single-issue matter. The Commonwealth Ombudsman has been led to believe that there were concerns about “operational control”. I believe that the Ombudsman has formed the view that our systems, procedures etc may have been deficient when that is clearly not the case. Mr Alecks entire argument was that if the personnel operating under my AOC were not directly employed by me, then I must not have operational control.

The proposition by Mr Aleck, and its use to close down my business is ludicrous as you can appreciate. I put to you that every Authorisation Holder in the Country utilises personnel that are not employees of the Authorisation Holder, and that is in fact the very purpose of the CASA issued AOC, and as I pointed out earlier, it continues at Moorabbin Airport today.

By its very nature, aviation operations are complicated with many Entities coming together to deliver the service. That will include aircraft providers, maintenance organisations, fuel suppliers, pilots, catering, cabin crew etc. It just wouldn’t be practical that CASA makes each of those entities responsible to CASA, and that is the very reason for the CASA issued single Authorisation or AOC.

Everything comes together in a single point of accountability being the Authorisation Holder/AOC legislation stating the responsibilities of the Authorisation Holder and the CASA approved Key Personnel that are responsible for safe and compliant operations.

The root cause of this entire matter, as far as Mr Aleck was concerned was that not all personnel operating under my Authorisation were employed directly by me. Seriously Ms Spence, consider that. Had all of those personnel been directly employed by me, CASA would never have taken the action it did that has caused so much harm and trauma not only to my family but also to many others. Really Ms Spence. Stop, pause and consider the strength and reality of that statement.

There is no disputing the fact that APTA utilised some personnel at each of those bases that were not my “employees.” It would be fair to go one step further and say that in fact, most of the personnel at each of the respective bases were not directly employed by me. That was the exact business model that was designed in conjunction with CASA and approved by CASA.

That was CASAs single issue and is fact the primary issue that needs to be addressed and bought to a conclusion. Not only for me, but in fact for the entire industry. As you will appreciate almost every AOC/Authorisation Holder in the Country would utilise personnel under its AOC that are not directly employed by the Authorisation Holder, and I include QANTAS, the RAAF, and almost every flying school in the Country.

Mr Aleck has made an issue out of something that is not an issue. He has made something that is completely conventional, appear unconventional.

The decisions made by CASA need to be explained to avoid any other business being put in the same situation as mine i.e., shut down on the basis that utilising personnel that are not directly employed by the Operator is a breach of CASR 141.050 and CAA S29.

For complete clarity, and for the information of the wider industry, I am asking CASA to clarify their position on this matter.

Do the personnel operating under an AOC also have to be employees? If somebody is not an employee i.e. a contractor or a person flying for a charity event and not drawing an income, are they exempt from the obligations to operate in accordance with the AOC? Are the Key Personnel responsible for all personnel, or only employees? Does CASA expect an operator to have a higher level of operational control over an employee compared to a contractor, or are they in fact all “personnel”

As you will appreciate this is a significant departure from the current legislative environment and in fact the legislation deals only with the “personnel” rather than the “employee” for the reasons that I have mentioned. The legislation refers to “personnel” not employees because of the wider accountability that extends far beyond employees only.

Its important here to refer to CASAs own definition of personnel.

personnel, for a Part 142 operator, includes any of the following persons who have duties or responsibilities that relate to the safe conduct of the operator’s authorised Part 142 activities:

(a) an employee of the operator;

(b) a person engaged by the operator (whether by contract or other arrangement) to provide services to the operator;

(c) an employee of a person mentioned in paragraph (b).



According to CASAs own definition, the personnel operating under my AOC very clearly do not have to also be “employees”.

My question would be. If all personnel had of been employed by me, would CASA still have closed my business?

I think it entirely reasonable that CASA comprehensively address this matter because of the industry wide ramifications for almost all operators across Australia, and because this appears to be a significant diversion from previous CASA set industry precedent.

I understand that because if the wider industry ramifications this query will require a more comprehensive response.



Request Six

As the person impacted it was obvious to me that once Mr Aleck realised that he had acted unlawfully in early 2019, he should have lifted the trading restrictions, and allowed me to return to business as usual.

Instead, Mr Aleck chose to leave the trading restrictions in place until he could be satisfied with our “commercial agreements” that we had in place.

CASA was was made fully aware on multiple occasions in writing, that these trading restrictions were depriving me of revenue and causing significant reputational damage. I advised CASA that I was personally having to subsidise operations to the value of at least $10,000 per week, and that once my own funds were exhausted my parents stepped in and subsidised operations for several months to the value of $300,000.

Mr Aleck advised that he would lift the trading restrictions on the business, only when he was fully satisfied with the wording in our commercial agreements with Members.

This is quite significant. There was no change to any systems or procedures requested by CASA. There was not a single change requested to our operations manual/Exposition. There was absolutely no requirement in any way regarding “how” we did things. There was no change in responsibilities or accountabilities.

We simply needed to describe what we were already doing into our “commercial agreements”.

Whilst I queston the validity of CASAs actions, I was completely willing to comply, in fact much more than that, I was desperately trying to comply. My business was being decimated every week that this matter carried on, costing me hundreds of thousands of dollars. I was under enormous duress, of course I would be desperately trying to meet Mr Alecks requirements. I was prepared to sign anything that CASA wanted so I could have the trading restrictions lifted.

I have maintained that this entire matter could have been completely resolved in under four hours, and in fact placing the trading restrictions on the business, and I refer to the most damaging restriction. That restriction being given only short-term interim approvals to cointinueoperatinf of as little as 7 days

CASA never required any changes to anything at all that we did. There were no changes to any of our systems or procedures. Not a single word had to be changed in our operations manual/Exposition. There were no changes to accountabilities or responsibilities. There were no changes at all requested. It would not have cost me one single cent to implement that changes that Mr Aleck required, it did however require his guidance, as it was his personal requirements that needed to be met.

This is an important point to understand. If in fact there were any concerns at all about any of our systems, procedures, compliance, supervision, mentoring, training standards, safety etc, CASA would have required us to implement some sort of change. Some deficiency would have been identified.

It was a simple matter of adding an additional paragraph or two into our Commercial agreements, that would personally satisfy Mr Aleck. That paragraph was intended to describe what we were already doing and would continue to do. It did not require any change, and would cost me nothing to embed it into the contract.

Mr Aleck simply had to give me sufficient guidance to write the paragraph or two that were required, and he could have lifted the trading restrictions immediately. The trading restrictions remained in place for eight months with the matter unresolved, although CASA managed to resolve it in a matter of hours with the current arrangement at Moorabbin Airport, with a different Operator.

This was an entirely new industry requirement that CASA stipulate matters of safety and operational control outside of the Exposition/Operations manual, and within commercial agreements. To be honest I thought it had no valid legal basis. Matters of safety, operational control etc are all embedded in the Operations Manual/exposition.

It was bizarre that CASA would not want to put this into the Exposition but instead wanted to put it into a commercial agreement that CASA was not prepared to be a signatory to.

Consider that CASA had placed trading restrictions on the business that were costing my family in excess of $10,000 a week to maintain operations. CASA had placed me under significant pressure to do whatever they wanted. Importantly there was no resistance from me at all.

I maintain that this entire matter could have been fully resolved in a matter of hours. Can CASA explain why this matter could not have been immediately resolved considering the simplicity of it, and that every single legislative requirement had already been met in our CASA approved Exposition/ Operations manual.

It was entirely unnecessary to place trading restrictions on the business that caused so much harm. They served no other purpose than to cause harm. They cannot be justified o n the basis of safety, and not for such a protracted period of eight months.

The question is; Can CASA explain why this matter could not have been fully resolved on the spot in less than four hours as I assert. Why did it still remain unresolved after eight months.



Request Seven- Why did CASA approve the first base eight years prior?

There is no disputing that CASA formally approved me to conduct operations at a Darwin base over 8 years prior. That base was our Darwin AV8 base.

Over the following eight years, CASA formally approved me to conduct operations at other bases, including the ARC base at Moorabbin, the LTF base at Moorabbin, the TVSA base at Bacchus Marsh etc.

In October 2018, CASA rejected applications for the additional bases of the Ballarat Aero Club and the Latrobe Valley Aero Club.

CASA then went one step further and determined the entire structure illegal and closed down the business.

CASA should be able to clearly and concisely explain why the first base and subsequent bases were formally approved by CASA, but in October 2018, the entire operation was determined to be unlawful.

CASA did formally approve us to conduct operations at Darwin over 8 years prior adopting this same structure. In October 2018, CASA rejected the applications for the new bases. CASA should be able to clearly identify what it was that changed.



Conclusion.Conclusion.

Had all of those personnel operating under my AOC/Authorisation also been my employees, my business would never have been closed down.

This was not a quality control issue, and CASA never suggested any changes at all to any of my procedures, systems, responsibilities, lines of reporting etc contained within our Exposition. If it was a quality control issue, CASA would have suggested some changes or sent some notification of a deficiency via formal processes, none were ever raised.

It was a determination by CASA that the structure that I had adopted for over 8 years was suddenly declared unlawful in October 2018, when CASA placed restrictions on the businesses ability to trade, that prevented the business taking on any new customers.

In mid 2019 with the crippling trading restrictions in place CASA made a determination that the structure was unlawful and forced all customers to leave, including my own flying school of ten years.

This entire process from notifying me that my business of ten years was now unlawful in October 2018 all the way through until CASA forced all customers to leave in mid-2019, and totally destroying my business, my livelihood, my future security, my well-being and that of my family, by causing businesses dependant on me to close down, to having staff losing entitlements and jobs, and for all the harm and additional expense incurred to my many students.

All of that done using methods that completely deny me any right of appeal or review.

To seriously lead the Ombudsman to be of the view that CASA wasn’t fully aware of my structure until you notified me that I was operating unlawfully in October 2018, is clearly false and misleading, and completely ignores my frequent meetings with CASA in 2015 about expanding on the structure that I was already operating to prepare it for the entirely new regulatory structure. It disregards the hundreds of thousands of dollars that I invested in systems and procedures as me and my management team worked side by side and often across the table in the same room with 10 CASA personnel designing every system and procedure to do exactly what we were already doing, but to significantly improve on it.

At the end of that Project the result was an Exposition that outlined thousands of pages of procedures to ensure the highest levels of operational control over this exact structure that CASA was fully aware of because CASA assessed over 600 procedures and policies as part of the process. The CASA team that I had worked with then sent those policies and procedures further up CASA for a “peer review” before final approval.

Throughout this process I was already operating in that multi entity, multi base, single Authorisation model for many years. So all of these new procedures had to be designed for exactly that, or I would not have been able to continue in that operating structure, as I had for many years previously.

CASA formally revalidated this in April of 2017, being 18 months before CASA claim they first became aware. I could go on and on with so many other examples or alternatively seek Statutory Declarations from the ex CASA employees that have offered to come forward and tell the truth.

The entire matter is ludicrous, APTA was designed to bring Australian Owned flying schools together to work collaboratively, professionally, in a safe and compliant manner. It demonstrably improved safety by allowing lateral sharing of safety information between 10 schools that previously would not have done so. It bought expertise to flying schools that a single school alone would not have been able to access. It made CASAs job easier because instead of auditing 10 schools with 10 different systems it delivered 1 school with 1 system across ten bases. It bought capability and opportunity to regional schools that previously they would not have had. It provided opportunities to access large international contracts because of the ability to manage large groups of international students across multiple bases. All of this was delivered with industry leading systems of operational control, a large and highly experienced management team drawn from CASA, Airlines and the Military, and I’m proud to say we had the largest safety department of any flight training organisation in the Country made possible by the structure that we adopted. We had an impeccable audit record with ASQA because we had been a Registered Training Organisation, and as a CRICOS approved school delivering training to International Students, we were one of only handful of schools never to have had any complint lodged by an International Student.

You will understand how offensive it is that CASA worked so diligently to crush my operation but permitted other Operators i.e. SOAR aviation to continue for years with a demonstrably poor safety record. Despite all the protestations to CASA from so many industry stakeholders, CASA did nothing and that Operator was finally shut down not by CASA but by the students approaching ASQA out of frustration.

There were never any safety concerns raised by CASA, there were never any breaches of any of our procedures outlined in our Exposition/Operations Manuals, CASA never asked or suggested any changes at all to the way we did anything. There were no incidents or accidents to raise concerns within CASA, and in fact there was never any change requested to anything at all that we did. It was not a quality issue. Throughout this entire matter, CASA has never put forward a single piece of evidence to suggest that my operation was deficient in any way at all. None. If there was a deficiency against anything at all, CASA would be able to identify it, or have at least one single piece of evidence to support that claim.

Until recently, I thought that this entire matter was a fairly black and white issue about the legality or not of the operation. My engagement with the Ombudsman leads me to believe that Mr Aleck may have led the Ombudsman to be of the view that in fact it was a quality control issue i.e. that procedures were deficient or in need of change, when that very clearly wasn’t the case, or at least that is not how it was ever presented to me. If the narrative has in fact changed then I hope you would clearly identify that to me.

The entire issue was because I utilised personnel that were not also my employees.

Flight Training Organisations utilising buildings that are not their own is entirely standard practice in the industry, it always has been.

Flight Training Organisations utilising aircraft that they are not the owner or Registered Operator of is entirely standard practice in the industry, it always has been

and if CASA were to be truthful on this entire matter, you would be fully aware that in fact every Authorisation Holder in the Country most likely utilises personnel under its Authorisation that are not employees of the Authorisation Holder.

The point being that really Mr Aleck has made an issue of something that need not be an issue.

CASA closed my business.

CASA has stated that they have to be satisfied that an operation is safe and compliant, and of course I fully agree with that. CASA does have to be satisfied that an operation is safe and compliant. Of course, they do.

My matter is an entirely different matter. I was an operating business that had delivered industry leading levels of safety and compliance for over a decade. I was close down by CASA.

CASA had been satisfied for may years but for some reason CASA became unsatisfied. CASA should be able to clearly identify what changed them from being satisfied with my operation to becoming unsatisfied with my operation, and so unsatisfied that they had no option other than to close my business.

This was much more than a rejection of a new application. It was a reversal of a previously given CASA approval. CASA closed down an entire business. Something caused CASA to reverse its previously given approval and close the business down.

Because I utilised personnel that were not directly employed by me, and had done since the Company commenced operations in 2006, with full CASA knowledge, formal approval, I truly felt that I was operating lawfully, and particularly so as the structure had been approved, audited and revalidated by CASA on multiple occasions during the decade prior to CASA determining it unlawful.

I really don’t believe that I did anything wrong. I am only seeking an honest, well-intentioned explanation to my queries.

Over the last four years, CASA has used the ongoing Ombudsman investigation as an excuse to avoid responding to me. This correspondence is unrelated to the Ombudsman investigation.

I am asking for CASA responses, not the Ombudsman’s. There is no reason that you would not respond. You have previously advised that you don’t want to respond because you don’t want to interfere with the Ombudsman’s Office investigation. I don’t accept that. The truth is the truth. Whatever CASA is saying to any other Party about me, is something that I am entitled to know and be able to defend myself against.

A failure to respond clearly and concisely to my requests is not something I anticipate, and my hope is that Ms Garland can assist me in achieving that.

Thanking you in anticipation of a truthful and well-intentioned response,

Respectfully

Glen Buckley

[glenb]

I have edited and slightly altered the conclusion in the previous post. The correspondence has been sent to
Carina Garland MP for Chisholm
Ms Pip Spence
CASA Board
Senator Sterle
the Minister Catherine King
Cheers. Glen

[AerialPerspective]

From the sounds of it, why on earth would you want to???

APTA was unique in that it was I believe, the first operator awarded a CASR Part 142 AOC. This occurred before CASA had detailed guidance material, etc. so it was very much created by a thorough and months (years!!) long review of the Regulations and discussion with CASA about what they meant and how they were to be implemented. Later operators benefitted from more guidance material, etc. although I believe CASA state something along the lines of, or at least allude to, the notion that if you follow their guidance they are 'obliged' to accept your procedures, etc. This is not always the case though as they always reserve the right to ask for additional procedures, etc. if they deem it necessary in relation to the nature of the actual business.

I only mention this because it indicates the extensive level of detail that was entered into in getting APTA's Part 142 approval. It was no 'cookie cutter' template but arrived at after thousands of person-hours of discussion, negotiation and deliberation on both sides.

Apart from anything else in Glen's case, it astounds me that someone could just walk in and decide they don't like the way it was set up. From a regulatory perspective it stinks like a whore-house at low tide to borrow a phrase from the late, great Sean Connery in the movie 'The Untouchables' (and yes, 'Untouchables' is pun intended).

[Arm out the window]

months (years!!) long review of the Regulations and discussion with CASA about what they meant and how they were to be implemented.

Dead right, Aerial Perspective. Glen's case is a long and complex saga, but it really boils down to CASA not having clear regulations in the first place, and making them worse rather than better with so-called reform.

Parts 141 and 142, their MOS, and the associated AMC/GM material, are prominent examples of everything that's been wrong with CASA's regulatory development process. The individuals responsible for proposing, drafting and releasing these regs are so self-evidently not right for the job it's not funny. It reminds me of the Simpsons episode where Homer gets to design a new car for his long-lost brother's car manufacturing company and bankrupts the business with his incompetence.

Most operators have bent over and taken the pineapple, by changing their ops manuals and training syllabuses into huge unreadable tracts of gumph no instructor, or indeed CASA inspector, could practically use, just to be 'compliant' with the MOS. The focus is so much on the paperwork and box-ticking that there's lamentably little room for the practical, honest, effective, realistic discussion of instructional technique and methods.

I've said before that an organisation like Glen's, which aimed to promote standardisation and effective flying training while reducing the administrative burden for the individual branches, is to my mind a really great idea, and CASA should have fostered it.
CASA appears to be locked into a long-standing mode of creating more, rather than less, legislation. The oft-touted statement that the new CASRs have 'simplified' the regulatory landscape is laughable, yet various CEOs have quoted it as some kind of key indicator of how well they've been doing.

The CASA employees who have produced and promoted the new flying training regs (and most of the other new stuff, for that matter) don't have to work under them, and it shows! Don't even mention CAR 217 and how it's supposed to fit in with Parts 141 and 142, nobody really knows that either. But I digress!

[Lead Balloon]

An apt analogy, AOTW.

Australia’s civil aviation rules: The regulatory equivalent of The Homer.

https://youtu.be/Pw9gaEiQAxY

[tossbag]

I'm wondering how much of Glen's intellectual property has been fed to industry through CASA. I remember when 142 was being introduced, Glen was schooling CASA on it.

[Global Aviator]

I have edited and slightly altered the conclusion in the previous post. The correspondence has been sent to
Carina Garland MP for Chisholm
Ms Pip Spence
CASA Board
Senator Sterle
the Minister Catherine King
Cheers. Glen

Glen is it time to fire up the go fund me again and drop a stack of money in your lawyers lap and say go hard?

You have the industry support.

I would imagine you would raise 100k fairly quickly, no it would not go far but I would imagine it would start the ball rolling. Fighting fire with fire seems to be the only way now.

[glenb]

Thanks for the taking the time to comment and follow the story.

Regarding the GoFundMe. It is most certainly an option. One that I am keen to avoid. It should not be necessary.

In the not-too-distant future, I will be writing to Ms. Spence and basically presenting the two options to Ms. Spence and let her decide. Litigation or well-intentioned discussion. The choice will be very clearly put before her.

In the background, a journalist has been editing and formatting my allegation of misfeasance, and I must say its looking very "snappy" and business like. I look forward to posting it, although I suggest it is still a couple of weeks away.

As you will be aware the allegation is against Mr. aleck, although I must say Ms. Spence may well get an honorable mention. After all, she just needs to get on the phone, call the FOI whose details have been provided to her previously and put the questions to that CASA FOI. She could quickly ascertain the truth.

She either chooses not to, or chooses to cover up the truth. Both approaches demonstrsate a lack of integrity and intent. She is the CEO, she could act. She could have initiated an investigation, but she chose not to.

[Sunfish]

Glen, to be fair to Pip Spence and her Board. they are walking a tightrope. They are stuck with the whole "procedural fairness/ natural justice" thing. If they don't navigate that correctly, they may be paying you AND Dr. Aleck many millions each or perhaps worse from a public perspective, millions to Dr. Aleck and nothing for you.

It is difficult to see how CASA can get anything out of this but lose / lose.

Your actions, understandable though they are in publishing everything, implies that there can be no "off the record' discussions of a settlement, assuming CASA wanted to make one.

Yes, I know you didn't get procedural fairness etc.

[Squawk7700]

Your actions, understandable though they are in publishing everything, implies that there can be no "off the record' discussions of a settlement, assuming CASA wanted to make one.


Why would you say that? Ever heard of an NDA? How do you come up with this stuff Sunfish?

[glenb]

In Posts #2459 I sent follow up correspondence to my Local MP, Ms Carina Garland after our meeting. I received this response from her office today.Dear Glen,

Thank you for your email and thank you also for coming to the Chisholm Electorate Office to meet with me and Carina last week.

I am writing to let you know that I have contacted Minister King’s Ministerial Office. I will get back in touch you as soon as I hear back from them to give you an update.

Best, Ghariza

[Squawk7700]

Through long and sometimes bitter experience.

I dont think you mean an NDA anyway because those are about IP (and useless). What you mean is a confidentiality agreement or confidentiality clause in a settlement which is a different animal.

Anyway, its a bit late for that unless CASA wants to discuss terms and offers Glen a heads of agreement.

Bush law at its finest right there peeps.

You could have the worlds most public court case and still have a confidential settlement.

An NDA (also known as a confidentiality agreement) is a legal contract, which should be used when sensitive information needs to be shared between two parties. It ensures that the person or organisation who gains access to sensitive information doesn't disclose it to a third party.

[Lead Balloon]

I think you’re a bit confused, Sunfish. Deeds of settlement in legal claims and potential legal claims often include non-disclosure obligations as to the amount of the settlement and sometimes an acknowledgement that no liability was admitted. That can and does happen even if the circumstances that led to legal claim or potential legal claim have all been made public.

[Lead Balloon]

You continue to conflate your narrow experience in amateur commercial arrangements for the general practise of professionals in settling legal proceedings or threatened legal proceedings.

But I agree: Best to get back to trying to support Glen.

[Global Aviator]

So Strayan you both say back to Glen B and both keep dishen out bush law.

I could also add some factual ****e from personal experience but not here.

Glen I really do admire you continuing to go it alone. If CASA were going to back down they would have already one would think. I do love your style and tenacity and trying to get to that point and I really hope you do.

If not then the only option is going to be to throw silly money at the legal system, I would never advocate using your own money for this as fighting a government body you are always against it. This is where go fund me is brilliant. We all donate knowing dam well that it is a tough cause, but a few hundred or more from many doesn’t hurt the individual. No doubt you have been in touch with some strong very wealthy independent aviators who may also back yo to a degree.

CAA/CASA the dirty ****e they have gotten away with over the years does border on……

Good luck and do not give up.

[Flaming galah]

So Strayan you both say back to Glen B and both keep dishen out bush law.



I’m led to believe LB is an actual (rather than bush) lawyer who once worked for CASA. So in my eyes his advice has legitimacy and shouldn’t be disregarded. But hey, SF has paid legal bills so has probably forgotten more jurisprudence than any HCA Justice ever knew.

[AerialPerspective]

Dead right, Aerial Perspective. Glen's case is a long and complex saga, but it really boils down to CASA not having clear regulations in the first place, and making them worse rather than better with so-called reform.

Parts 141 and 142, their MOS, and the associated AMC/GM material, are prominent examples of everything that's been wrong with CASA's regulatory development process. The individuals responsible for proposing, drafting and releasing these regs are so self-evidently not right for the job it's not funny. It reminds me of the Simpsons episode where Homer gets to design a new car for his long-lost brother's car manufacturing company and bankrupts the business with his incompetence.

Most operators have bent over and taken the pineapple, by changing their ops manuals and training syllabuses into huge unreadable tracts of gumph no instructor, or indeed CASA inspector, could practically use, just to be 'compliant' with the MOS. The focus is so much on the paperwork and box-ticking that there's lamentably little room for the practical, honest, effective, realistic discussion of instructional technique and methods.

I've said before that an organisation like Glen's, which aimed to promote standardisation and effective flying training while reducing the administrative burden for the individual branches, is to my mind a really great idea, and CASA should have fostered it.
CASA appears to be locked into a long-standing mode of creating more, rather than less, legislation. The oft-touted statement that the new CASRs have 'simplified' the regulatory landscape is laughable, yet various CEOs have quoted it as some kind of key indicator of how well they've been doing.

The CASA employees who have produced and promoted the new flying training regs (and most of the other new stuff, for that matter) don't have to work under them, and it shows! Don't even mention CAR 217 and how it's supposed to fit in with Parts 141 and 142, nobody really knows that either. But I digress!

Sadly, CASA did foster it and encourage it, Glen anted up the funds to make it happen, then CASA change its collective mind.

[glenb]

Only because i hate to see you guys arguing. It like being at a BBQ and a couple of your friends not getting along with each other.

[Sunfish]

I apologize for polluting your thread Glen. I’ve deleted my comments on the subject of confidentiality agreements.

[glenb]

In post #2459 I had posted my correspondence to Ms Spence. Her reply follows:Dear Mr Buckley

Thank you for copying me into your correspondence with Ms Garland. As I have advised you on a number of occasions, I am very happy to meet with you once the ombudsman has completed its review of its original decision. I can assure you CASA is committed to full co-operating with the ombudsman’s review and is working openly and transparently with the ombudsman. I would also like to be informed by the findings of the ombudsman’s review before responding to your questions.

Finally, and again as I have advised you, I have asked the Ombudsman’s office to address their correspondence to me rather than Dr Aleck. This is not because I have concerns about him or the role that he has played, but because I think it is appropriate in light of the issues that you are raising about Dr Aleck’s role.

Yours sincerely

Pip

[The Zenith]

CASA seems to be going after the Crocodile Hunter, accused of tampering with evidence at a crash site. Could your's and previous CASA defendants' experiences of CASA interference be pooled to assist Mr Wright in his defence?

[tossbag]

Are you serious mate?? Have you seen the evidence tampering allegations against the cop? His resignation and intention to plead guilty asap?

[glenb]

In Posts # 2459 to #2461 I posted my letter to my local MP and Ms. Spence CASA CEO.
In Post #2471 was the correspondence from my Local MP.
In Post #2480 was the response from Ms. Spence,

My correspondence to Ms. Spence 02/12/22


Dear Ms.Spence,

I have contacted the Commonwealth Ombudsman's Office and fully withdrawn my Complaint to that Office.

I am fully satisfied that Mr Jonathan Aleck the CASA Executive Manager of Legal International and Regulatory Services has provided clearly false and misleading information to the Commonwealth Ombudsman's investigation.

There is a substantial body of evidence already presented to you that would indicate that my allegation may have some merit. You are readily able to avail yourself of the truth.You choose not to.

Over the last four years CASA has used the ongoing Ombudsman's investigation as a reason not to respond to my questions.

There is now no Ombudsman's investigation, so that cannot be used as an excuse, as it should not have been anyway.

I am calling on you in your role as the CEO of CASA to act in accordance with obligations placed on you by both CASAs Regulatory Philosophy and the obligations placed on CASA when they choose to close down a business as they did with mine, and as outlined in CASA s own Enforcement Manual.

As you are aware, I walked into my business of a decade at 8am on 23rd October 2018, having no idea that by the end of the day I would receive notification from CASA that the structure I had adopted for the last decade was now declared unlawful, and my business had only 7 days to continue operating. CASA placed a restriction on the business that prevented it taking on customers. This continued for 8 months until CASA stood by its original decision and forced all remaining customers to leave the business.

CASA did this entire process from that initial notification in October 2018 when the trading restrictions were put in place, through to closing my business in mid 2019, with me having no appeal process being provided to me at all.

How can that possibly be that the owner of a business in Australia has his business closed down, his life decimated, and no reason is provided in writing, there is no appeal process open to him, CASA does this without making a "decision" that can be appealed. Its not reasonable.

The truth is that CASA erred, and despite your best efforts, that cannot be covered up. CASA bypassed its own procedures.

I have never been provided with any correspondence that advises me what I did wrong.

In October 2018, I should have been provided a Show Cause Notice (SCN) that clearly outlined what the allegations were. That was never provided.

In mid 2019, CASA stood by its original determination, and forced all remaining customers to leave. I should have been provided with a copy of a "Decision" in writing rather than the process being verbal and unwritten.

As the family who have had their lives decimated by the sudden closure of their business, my request for a very clear written "decision" outlining very clearly what I did wrong, and why you closed my business down.

I will be frank. I believe you will continue to deflect, and not provide a response to my very fair and reasonable request, and that is why I have sought the assistance of my Local MP, Ms.Carina Garland. I need this not only for my own mental health, but I have taxation office issues that are related to the closure of my businesses, and I am required to provide an explanation. Because of this matter, I also have an upcoming case in the Supreme Court and I need to know why my business closed down, in order to defend myself.

It's also important reputationally for me. I want to know what I did wrong, so I can explain it to people.

Seriously Ms. Spence there is no reason that you would not provide me that document, I am fully entitled to it under procedural fairness. I find your deflection to the Ombudsman concerning. I am not interested in what the Ombudsman thinks at this stage. It was not the Ombudsman that closed my business, It was CASA. CASA must have had a reason. CASA should be able to explain that on its own, and is totally independent of the now terminated investigation.

.

Respectfully, Glen Buckley

[Sunfish]

IANAL but it seems to me that having exhausted the available arbitration processes, you are now ready to go to Court. No one can say you haven't tried.

I'm not sure that a new Court action might stay the ATO in the Supreme Court.

[Sunfish]

By coincidence, it appears that the Ombudsman’s Office is being questioned at the Robodebt Royal Commission. The line of questioning apparently implying that their opinion might have been skewed.

‘I have no idea what the current reputation of the OO may be.

​​​​​​​spokesperson for the Ombudsman said the body regularly sent drafts to agencies for them to make comments on, however, the “form of a published report is a matter for the Ombudsman to decide.”

Appearing before former Queensland Supreme Court justice Catherine Holmes in Brisbane, McNamara was shown correspondence that included DHS proposing rewrites of findings and recommendations in Ombudsman draft reports, including a proposal the watchdog strike out wording that “inaccurate debts” were raised.

“Our legal division didn’t like that at all,” McNamara said. “They didn’t agree with it as a matter of law that it was an inaccurate debt, so they didn’t want that in the report.”

The suggested amendments also removed findings that debt notices didn’t provide a clear “warning that using averaged data may result in an incorrect debt”, and inserted language that cast the department in a better light.

It was put to McNamara that extensive negotiation with the Ombudsman’s office took place over the report, to which he replied, “yeah, they were open to change.”



https://www.theage.com.au/politics/federal/bureaucrat-boasted-he-shaped-watchdog-s-report-on-robo-debt-20221205-p5c3sd.html

[Lead Balloon]

I have no idea what the current reputation of the OO may be.What is being revealed during the proceedings of the ‘Robodebt’ Royal Commission is consistent with some other matters in which the Ombudsman has been involved recently, of which matters I am personally aware and in which I have a personal interest. The consistent feature of these matters is the Ombudsman’s acceptance of assertions made by government agencies without any independent verification by the Ombudsman of the accuracy of what is asserted nor analysis of the relevance of what is asserted, even if accurate.

In the case of ‘Robodebt’, the hearings of the Royal Commission so far reveal some things that disturb me about the way in which the Ombudsman’s office went about its ‘own motion’ inquiry into the scheme and resultant report in 2017. So far we have learnt that the Ombudsman simply accepted, at face value, assertions that the way in which debts were ‘raised’ against Robodebt’s victims – given the Orwellian label “customers” - was lawful, and that the Ombudsman’s report was ‘co-written’ with personnel from the Department whose administration was the subject of the inquiry.

As to the substance of the report, it said, among other things:

We asked DHS whether it had done modelling on how many debts were likely to be over-calculated as opposed to under-calculated. DHS advised no such modelling was done. In our view the risk of over-recovering debts from social security recipients should be the subject of more thorough research and analysis.

My moral compass points in the opposite direction to any possible risk of “over-recovering debts” from people who are usually poor and usually powerless. But here we see that the DHS and the Ombudsman knew that the risk existed and the Ombudsman took the view that the appropriate response was for someone to do some “modelling” while the robot continued to spit out debt letters like confetti.

And when I contemplate the concept of “over-recovering debts”, I immediately think to myself: How could that possibly be lawful? An average second year law student could work out that the Commonwealth engaging in the practise of “over-recovering debts” from a person would either constitute an acquisition of their property on other than just terms, be a tax requiring separate taxation legislation or otherwise be the subject of specific legislation in the unlikely event the compulsory exaction was not a tax. Remember: The ‘robot’ sent debt letters to people who did not, in fact, have the income on the basis of which the ‘debt’ was calculated.

As it turns out, a qualified lawyer in DSS (in 2014), qualified lawyers in Clayton Utz (whose advice DSS requested be left in draft so that DSS could pretend the advice had not been given) and the Commonwealth Solicitor-General all came to the view that the basis on which debts were “raised” against Robodebt’s victims was unlawful. Cue the taxpayer to fork out around $1.8billion in compensation.

If only the Ombudsman had been a little more sceptical and had dug a little deeper in 2017, guided by a moral compass and aided by an average second year law student. Perhaps some of the damage done by the Robodebt juggernaut, including the suicides, would have been avoided.

This is all the product of what I call the weakening of the fabric of government institutions. The Commonwealth Ombudsman used to do a pretty good job as moral compass and fiercely independent investigator of government administration. It helped me a couple of times a few decades ago to take on and win against a mega-department. It’s now a shadow of what it used to be. On what planet would a supposedly independent investigator think it appropriate to invite the agency administering the circumstances under investigation to ‘co-write’ the investigation report? (It seems to me that CASA, Airservices and ATSB have become a mutual protection racket, particularly on airspace matters). Fortunately the current Commonwealth Auditor-General and ANAO continue to defend and maintain true independence, but unfortunately the nature of their audits does not go to these kinds of matters. It’s part of the reason for the collapse of Australians’ trust in democracy and governments. It’s why the calls for a Commonwealth corruption commission could no longer be ignored by the major political parties.

[glenb]

09/12/22



To the Minister responsible for CASA, the Honourable Ms. Catherine King MP;



Please accept my formal allegation against two CASA employees. The allegation is that:



Mr Jonathan Aleck, CASA Executive Manager of Legal, International and Regulatory Affairs has provided false and misleading information to a Commonwealth Ombudsman’s Office investigation on five occasions.



Ms Pip Spence CEO of CASA has facilitated the provision of false and misleading information to a Commonwealth Office investigation on each of those five occasions.



The false and misleading information has been provided on five different matters, and each is substantive in nature.



In this correspondence I will attend to the first of the five pieces of disinformation only.



Over coming months, I will send you the additional allegations, of which there are four more to follow.



I apologize that there will be five pieces of correspondence, each raising a separate allegation. I have adopted this approach for two reasons.





The first being that the impact of this matter has had a substantial impact on my health. A lengthier single piece of correspondence covering all five allegations is not something that I am able to attend to at the moment.



Secondly, it should not be necessary. If you are able to promptly clarify this single occasion alone, I feel you will be compelled to act, and most especially because of the seniority of their respective positions, and the responsibility of the Department that they lead, i.e. the Nations aviation safety regulator, CASA.



In order to promptly attend to this matter, I understand that the first stage will require you to establish contact with the Commonwealth Ombudsman’s office and clarify the “understanding” of the Ombudsman’s Office.



In order to maximize the effectiveness of your approach to that Office, can I propose that the following question be put to that office?



Question to Ombudsman’s Office,



Has either Ms. Pip Spence as the CEO of CASA with expert knowledge on this matter, or Mr. Jonathan Aleck, CASA Executive Manager of Legal, International and Regulatory Affairs, acting as the sole representative of CASA in communications with the Ombudsman as part of that investigation led the Ombudsman’s investigation to be of the view that the structure Glen Buckley had adopted in his business was not permitted and had never been permitted by previously by CASA. It was something unique and something that he was doing for the first time. He was doing something that was not standard industry practice.



Glen Buckley asserts that CASA had always and on every occasion throughout his 25 years in the industry approved the identical structure that he adopted, and I emphasize identical. If there are any differences CASA should be promptly able to advise those differences. Glen Buckley asserts that CASA consistently throughout the last 25 years approved multiple operators to do exactly what he was doing. It was completely standard industry practice throughout the industry with full and formal CASA approval on every occasion. In fact, over recent weeks CASA has just approved two operators at Moorabbin airport to adopt the identical structure that they closed my business for.



I am confident that the Ombudsman’s office will advise you that they have formed the opinion that the structure I had adopted was never permitted by CASA, previously.



The truth is that it was always permitted by CASA. Mr Aleck has led the Ombudsman to be of the view that what I was doing was not standard industry practice, when in fact it very clearly was and he is fully aware of that.



I have 25 years’ experience in the flight training industry as Grade One Multi engine IFR instructor (the most senior), I have ten years’ experience as a CASA approved Chief Flying Instructor (CFI), and three years’ experience as a CASA approved Head of Operations (HOO), and CASA approved CEO. I am a Subject Matter Expert on the flight training industry, and what I am telling you is the truth.



I am fully satisfied that both Mr Aleck and Ms Spence are providing false and misleading information to the Commonwealth Ombudsman’s investigation for the purposes of perverting the findings of that investigation.



I have previously provided the CASA Board with the details of two individuals who will promptly be able to advise you of the truth. One being a current serving CASA employee who has offered simply to “tell the truth”. The second being an ex CASA employee with impeccable credentials as a pilot in the RAAF, Airlines and CASA, who would appreciate the opportunity to tell the truth. In fact, I suggest that any serving CASA employee in the position of Flight Operations Inspector (FOI) of which there are dozens within CASA will quickly be able to advise you of the truth provided appropriate protections are in place for those individuals.



My considerations are to approach the Federal Police or the Attorney General's Office, although I am seeking specific guidance from your Office before proceeding.



The Ombudsman’s Office is not the appropriate forum in my opinion, I feel that these substantive allegations need to be assessed at the highest level, and I request consideration that this matter be addressed to the new anti-corruption body.



Thank you for your consideration of my matter, and whilst I don’t require a lengthy response at this stage could I request an acknowledgement from both the Ministers Office, and the Board Secretariat for CASA that this correspondence has reached the intended recipients.



I have included other recipients in this correspondence including the Honorable Ms. Carina Garland as my local MP, and who is assisting me with this matter.

I fully understand that I could be subject to prosecution if I was found to be raising these claims in a vindictive or vexatious manner.

Respectfully,

Glen Buckley

[Squawk7700]

FWIW, I doubt any current CASA employee would speak out on this due to the government whistleblower policies.

https://amp.theguardian.com/law/2022/oct/06/whistleblower-richard-boyle-feared-ato-tactics-would-cause-suicide-in-community-court-hears

[pcx]

I can’t see how it would be whistleblowing if the Ministers office was to ask a current CASA employee a question regarding this matter.

Wether any current employee would be prepared to give an accurate and honest answer is another matter as Mr Aleck is obviously a very senior manager and a vindictive person.

It’s interesting to me that, with all of the very public allegations Glen is making, none of these employees have threatened, or taken, any legal action against Glen. I suspect that they do not want to be exposed to being dragged into the light of day in a courtroom, and are desperately hoping that Glen will continue to try to resolve this without court action and in a well intentioned manner as he has stated on many occasions.

[Asturias56]

"It’s interesting to me that, with all of the very public allegations Glen is making, none of these employees have threatened, or taken, any legal action against Glen. "

Exactly - in a witness box, on oath, with criminal sanctions for not telling the truth................ tells you all you need to know IMHO

[thunderbird five]

The letter writing has been going on for three and a half years now. Obviously it has had no effect.
Definition of insanity - doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result?
Is it not time change to change tack completely?

[Squawk7700]

I can’t see how it would be whistleblowing if the Ministers office was to ask a current CASA employee a question regarding this matter.


”Speaking out” is very different to providing evidence in a trial.

I’ve chosen to not quote where you stated that a certain individual is vindictive. That’s bordering on defamation unless you have your own personal evidence.

[Lead Balloon]

The letter writing has been going on for three and a half years now. Obviously it has had no effect.
Definition of insanity - doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result?
Is it not time change to change tack completely?
Yep.

As we have already seen from the Robodebt Royal Commission hearings so far, the only thing that eventually stopped the unlawful juggernaut was litigation commenced by victims. Up until that point, the bureaucracy actively avoided opportunities to bring on litigation to have the lawfulness of the scheme tested in court. That's because all of the bureaucracy's legal advice was to the effect that the methodology used for 'raising' the 'debts' was unlawful (other than an advice that was deliberately sought on the basis of a number of assumptions that were not valid, to get the answer they wanted).

That's how the bureaucracy works. CASA is part of the bureacracy.

Everyone knows that Glen was led up the garden path by CASA through its approval of variations of APTA's AOC to cover numerous 'bases'. CASA's claim that some fundamentally new information about the structure of which it was not aware came to CASA's attention in 2018 is a convenient invention to confuse folks like the Ombudsman and Ms Spence. If that information was actually relevant, CASA should have found out about it during the earlier variation assessment processes.

I suspect the claim is about the "complete control of your business" statement on APTA's website. However, if there were no financial viability issues and APTA had control over matters determining regulator regulatory compliance - both of which issues should have been assessed by CASA during each and every variation process - the way in which money moved around and business decisions within the structure are irrelevant to regulatory compliance. And CASA's statement about Parts 141 and 142 being drafted on the basis that all of an operator's personnel would be in all respects agents of the operator is wrong on the face of the legislation and in general agency law.

But CASA's not going to admit to any of that, unless dragged before a court. Glen would have to be the purest of purest optimists to believe that any bureaucracy is going to 'do the right thing' without being forced to do so. It's no longer in the bureaucracy's DNA.

[Lead Balloon]

Hmmmm, dunno about that. It took years to bring Robodebt down, despite lots of 'bad press'. Aussies are notoriously apathetic about things that don't affect them personally.

When the first Federal Court claim was brought by a victim, the alleged 'debt' was magicked away, rendering the proceedings to have no utility. Typical trick of the bureaucracy. But the second Federal Court claim finally brought things to a head. In the mean time, AAT decisions against the bureaucracy, on the basis that the averaging methodology was not a valid way on which to 'raise' a 'debt', were waved away by the bureaucracy on the basis that each AAT decision was applicable only to its specific facts.

A while ago I watched bureaucrats in front of a Senate Committee say, with a straight face, that an AAT decision in favour of Senator Rex Patrick, to the effect that the 'National Cabinet' is not a Cabinet of the Commonwealth executive and, therefore, its records are not exempt from FOI access on the ground of 'Cabinet in Confidence' claims, was a decision unique to the circumstances. The bureaucracy continued to claim 'Cabinet in Confidence' over the records of the 'National Cabinet'.

These people have no shame. Some headlines are like water off a duck's back.

[Bend alot]

At this time of year Glen, I would like to wish you and your loving wife and family the best this festive season.

As you have worked out over these last years, we love and support you and have/are/will feel the pain "they can" inflict and often with glee.

Would love to sit with you one day and enjoy a beer and old days of what were fun years in the game - long since gone.

I will still support your fight if you step it up - many of us will.

Take good care my stranger, but eternal Mate - hope to meet up one day.

Regards Bendy.

[glenb]

Great to have you back Bendalot, its been a long absence, cheers.

[glenb]

The letter writing has been going on for three and a half years now. Obviously it has had no effect.
Definition of insanity - doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result?
Is it not time change to change tack completely?

I concur. Whilst i don't want to make excuses, you are correct. I started this process 4 years ago with the CASA ICC. CASA got somewhat frustrated and pushed it over to the Ombudsman. Soon after COVID kicked in and that did slow things down. For many months i was unable to even call the Ombudsman office.

Im a one finger typer and each piece of correspondence takes me many weeks to send finalise, then it sits with the Ombudsman for many weeks, then CASA respond, the Ombudsman digests and responds to me. It has been a war of attrition, and extremely slow. In my well-intentioned feedback to the Ombudsman i will make mention that a three-way conference with the Ombudsman, a CASA representative, and myself would have had this entire matter resolved in weeks, not years.

Many months have been spent trying to demonstrate that Mr aleck is misleading the Inquiry.

And to be honest, my mental health has impacted. I generally rise at about 4.30am and spend the mornings working on this until the family wake up. There have been periods of many weeks when i have been unable to attend to it.

The delay is basically truthfulness and intent. If CASA were acting in a truthful and well-intentioned manner, this would have been resolved one way or the other many years ago.

Cheers. Glen (typing on the side of the road in sunlight on the way to work. Apologies for any poor editing)

and yes, I am about to change tact.

[glenb]

I wasnt going to publish this, as it is a bit embarrassing and back slapping, nevertheless here it is. I truly believe that CASA has portrayed me as a nutcase (which most certainly was not the case prior to October 2018, this was intended to counteract that. Sadly, i have little confidence in the Ombudsman investigation and intend to depend on my local MP for assistance going forward.

11/12/22

Dear Ms Garland,


I apologise that I am bombarding you with emails. Please note there are other recipients including the CASA Board.

As you are aware CASA closed my two businesses down, and I then obtained employment in the industry until CASA wrote to my Employer, and directed that my continuing employment was no longer tenable based on comments that I was making publicly. I was terminated and left the industry.

After a nervous breakdown and a period of unemployment, I obtained employment as a Youth Justice Worker in a custodial facility with Victoria's most challenged males in the 18 to 21 age group. It's a dangerous but challenging role. It involves many of the same skills I drew on in my aviation career. Sound decision making, good intent, standards, ethics, mentoring, dependability, risk assessments, etc.

The purpose of this correspondence is to inform you that each year a Directors Award is presented to the Youth Justice Worker of the Year. I am proud to be the recipient of this years award, and i quote.

Glen Buckley (YJW1)

Glen has been recognised for his commitment to making a difference in the lives of young people. In particular, Glen’s efforts have been recognised on multiple occasions from young people providing positive feedback through the Independent Visitor Program to which the Commission for Children and Young People appreciate Glen’s efforts. Additionally, the Youth Parole Board have also held Glen in high regard with his support to those young people transitioning back to the community. Glen embodies the values of Youth Justice and his can-do attitude makes him an exceptional role model to others around him.


The purpose of providing that information is as a character reference for myself.

As the person who had his well being decimated by Mr Jonathan Aleck, please be assured there is a very significant story to be told here. I am making a further appeal to you Ms Garland as my local MP. I am a 57 year resident of the electorate, my family desperately needs your assistance. I appreciate that you have limited resources and a high workload, but I thank you for your support to date, and thank you in anticipation of that continuing support.

Please be assured that there is a story to be told here, and if told it will demonstably improve aviation safety in this Country and the industry is watching closely.

Respectfully, Glen Buckley

[PiperCameron]

I wasnt going to publish this, as it is a bit embarrassing and back slapping, nevertheless here it is. I truly believe that CASA has portrayed me as a nutcase (which most certainly was not the case prior to October 2018, this was intended to counteract that. Sadly, i have little confidence in the Ombudsman investigation and intend to depend on my local MP for assistance going forward.

Glen, if it's true then it's not back-slapping and it need not be embarrassing either. One has to find work where one can - and to excel at that is even more praiseworthy.

It sux to fall foul of the monster and I do hope your local member can both see that and help out in some way.

[glenb]

Sandy has been a staunch supporter and does a lot behind the scenes to push my matter. He copied me in on this correspondence to my local MP, Ms. Garland. I hope you dont mind me posting it Sandy,

“ Dear Ms. Garland,

I support Glen Buckley in his pursuit of justice. This case should have never developed and those of us that are familiar with the General Aviation (GA) industry believe that Government must make amends to Mr. Buckley and his family.

My career has been in GA and I’m not unfamiliar with political life being the brother of the late Peter Reith.

I’m sure you understand that being Glen’s representative it’s most important that you assess his case in detail. I, and many others, would be happy to answer any questions you may by way of information of how the system has been working.
Kind regards,

Sandy Reith “