Go Back  PPRuNe Forums > PPRuNe Worldwide > Australia, New Zealand & the Pacific
Reload this Page >

Regulator management of the CASR's

Australia, New Zealand & the Pacific Airline and RPT Rumours & News in Australia, enZed and the Pacific

Regulator management of the CASR's

Old 2nd Jan 2022, 18:53
  #41 (permalink)  
 
Join Date: Oct 2003
Location: Victoria Australia
Age: 82
Posts: 299
Received 76 Likes on 35 Posts
How to win friends and influence people

Originally Posted by Arm out the window
I'm convinced you're spot on. The big and obvious problem is that it's not aviation reality being considered when these regs are drafted and made into law, it's a few people's idea of what 'should' be done, which in many instances is far from what's right and proper in any common sense world.

These people in my opinion are the at root of everything that's wrong with CASA now, and Sandy's photos of FAR vs CASR and the associated piles of waffle eloquently tell the story. Get angry, aviation community, and go direct to the DAS, CASA board director, ministers, senators and anyone else who you think can be of influence. This is bull****, and should never have gotten to its current state of shambolic ridiculousness.
Arm Out is correct what has happened is just plain wrong, but it is Parliament that is responsible. Therefore with respect going directly to CASA and it’s Board might help at the margins in the short term but nothing more because the administrative model is wrong. The idea of administering by an independent Commonwealth corporate with monopoly power is like leaving everything to one’s auto pilot with the wrong coordinates entered. Mount Erebus.

I’d like to make the case for most of our effort being engagement with MPs and the media because only by action in the Parliament can we hope to achieve substantive reform.

In the hurley burly of politics, and a never ending myriad of issues competing for the attention of law makers, only perseverance and real effort can hope to cause change. Griping and gnashing of teeth that we are all prone to (outlets for frustration) is easy but does have an important role. That is by collectively thinking through the problems we are more likely to be unified in our approach to government and with more logical solutions.

Then the hard yakka is making appointments or other means e.g. attending or organising meetings, with purpose to engage with your federal MP and State Senators and media people. Having printed material to give them. All too often slinging off at politicians is an excuse not to follow up with the work of making best use of our elected representatives.
Sandy Reith is offline  
Old 3rd Jan 2022, 02:59
  #42 (permalink)  
 
Join Date: Jan 2001
Location: North Queensland, Australia
Posts: 2,980
Received 14 Likes on 7 Posts
Fair enough, Sandy, but I just don't think MPs and Senators can do that much or are aware of the crux of the issue. It's a group of fairly long-established human roadblocks within the CASA system that are producing this laughable and barely workable regulatory material, and are never properly called to account for it. The politicians are too far removed, and as DASs and board members come and go, these people remain in their positions (or move around Chinese-puzzle style while retaining or improving salary and conditions) and seem to genuinely think they're providing world class regulation, according to them anyway.

While we have a newish DAS and board chair who seem to be approachable and willing to make some attempts at real reform, I think direct communication with them by letter, email and appointment will be at least as productive as getting in the ear of politicians. I would say do both.

That photo you put up of the US vs Aussie regs is a great illustration of exactly what's wrong, and the only person I see with the capability of turfing out the long-'serving' culprits is the DAS. If she is fair dinkum and spends some time honestly considering what it must be like to be a small business owner just trying to understand their legal responsibilities under the new CASR regime, let alone comply, then the only sensible response in my view is to do a serious cull, hire a group of properly experienced non-bull****ters and charge them with the job of getting a simple clear succinct set of regs out in a year, using US, Kiwi, PNG or whatever as the basis if required.

Will it happen? Sadly, probably not, but really, why not? Everyone except vested interests within CASA agree they are doing a **** job by any sensible measure, so a director/CEO with the guts to sack five to ten senior roadblocks and weather the subsequent backlash (and congratulations) needs to get proactive, not wait to be told by the minister.
Arm out the window is offline  
Old 3rd Jan 2022, 03:14
  #43 (permalink)  
 
Join Date: Sep 2007
Location: Sunshine Coast
Posts: 338
Likes: 0
Received 1 Like on 1 Post
Do not confuse the FAR_AIM book with the full suite of FAA regulations. There is a lot more paper in the full regulations and if you wish for the FARs than there is a lot of paper.
Vag277 is offline  
Old 3rd Jan 2022, 03:16
  #44 (permalink)  
 
Join Date: Sep 2007
Location: Sunshine Coast
Posts: 338
Likes: 0
Received 1 Like on 1 Post
https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-14
Vag277 is offline  
Old 3rd Jan 2022, 03:28
  #45 (permalink)  
 
Join Date: Sep 2007
Location: Sunshine Coast
Posts: 338
Likes: 0
Received 1 Like on 1 Post
https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/...l3-part141.pdf 50 pages
https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/...ol2-part61.pdf 137 pages
https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/...ol2-part91.pdf 162pages
Vag277 is offline  
Old 3rd Jan 2022, 04:58
  #46 (permalink)  
 
Join Date: Jan 2001
Location: North Queensland, Australia
Posts: 2,980
Received 14 Likes on 7 Posts
Thanks for the links, Vag277 - noted that there's much more to the FAA regs than one book, but just being able to read through various paragraphs and have them make sense is a very refreshing experience in itself after struggling through our Parts, MOS, AMC/GM etc. and trying to connect the dots.
Arm out the window is offline  
Old 3rd Jan 2022, 05:51
  #47 (permalink)  
 
Join Date: Sep 2007
Location: Sunshine Coast
Posts: 338
Likes: 0
Received 1 Like on 1 Post
Remember, their ACs are taken seriously and the US has a very different legislative environment to Australia, and a media less obsessed with people dying as a result of personal decisions.
Vag277 is offline  
Old 3rd Jan 2022, 10:36
  #48 (permalink)  
 
Join Date: Oct 2003
Location: Victoria Australia
Age: 82
Posts: 299
Received 76 Likes on 35 Posts
Thread: Regulator mismanagement….and what to do.

Quote Arm out the window, “Fair enough, Sandy, but I just don't think MPs and Senators can do that much or are aware of the crux of the issue. It's a group of fairly long-established human roadblocks within the CASA system that are producing this laughable and barely workable regulatory material, and are never properly called to account for it.”

In bold is a point that to my mind is the crux of the problem. No one with any appreciation doubts that the GA scene screams for reform so that leaves the question ‘who can or who will?’

I believe none, other than the Minister and Parliament, who are responsible for the law and hold the power, therefore they are ultimately accountable, our representatives.

Agreed put the case to CASA and the Board but thirty three years of worse and worse tells us that CASA will not reform by itself.

At the first major GA meeting organised by AOPA’s Ben Morgan in Tamworth the then Board chair Jeff Boyd told us all, including Minister Chester and local MP Barnaby Joyce that the regulatory regime was, quote, “a mess.”

Yes lots of roadblocks inside CASA but, if you haven’t already, watch the video of Pip Spence being thrown under a bus by J. Aleck and henchmen during the recent Senate RRAT Committee. Chaired by Senator Susan McDonald the hearing proceeds with Angel Flight’s Marjorie Pagani laying out a slam dunk case that CASA had misled the RRAT Committee. No surprise there but Spence is completely unprepared, obviously not briefed or done her homework. In her embarrassing confusion she fell back to reading a generalised defence of CASA. Her Praetorian Guard, led by the inimitable Dr. Jonathon Aleck, were visibly relieved. You could fairly take it that JA is now the de facto CEO of CASA.

CASA, via it’s $630,000 CEO or it’s Board, will not disembowel itself, the incentives for radical change are simply absent, no percentage.

The reverse being the case, within the senior bureaucratic echelons of the Can’tberra Public Sector (once the Public Service) any threat to the gravy train, most especially from the now numerous ‘independent’ Commonwealth corporate entities, will be regarded as traitorous and therefore career terminating.

There’s some chance with a Minister taking charge, he could issue a detailed Statement of Expectations before introducing new legislation to put aviation administration back where it belongs, into a Westminster style Department. Expecting the CEO of CASA to selflessly serve the best interests of GA, altruistically, at the lowest cost to the industry (pay cuts?) is going against human nature and history.

A ‘60 Minutes’ presentation or Alan Jones beating the drum about Angel Flight being squashed for no good reason and CASA trying to extract, via court costs, some $350,000 from AF might well get the attention of MPs in this upcoming election time. Ring, write contact MPs and the media regularly, something must give.
Sandy Reith is offline  
Old 4th Jan 2022, 01:21
  #49 (permalink)  
 
Join Date: Jan 2001
Location: North Queensland, Australia
Posts: 2,980
Received 14 Likes on 7 Posts
Hi Sandy, I couldn't find the video the RRAT committee session you were referring to, but read the Hansard transcript. That had quite a few words or phrases labelled as 'inaudible', unfortunately, but the gist was certainly there, and as you say, it certainly looked like Marjorie Pagani well and truly put CASA on the spot and their response was lacklustre to say the least. Senators McDonald and Sterle both made their displeasure with CASA very clear - will they really be willing and able to take strong action to punish obfuscation and outright lies? I hope so.
I'll go back and look for the video link - I'm sure the body language and tone of voice will speak just as loudly as the words.
Arm out the window is offline  
Old 4th Jan 2022, 02:15
  #50 (permalink)  
 
Join Date: Nov 2001
Location: Australia/India
Posts: 5,274
Received 411 Likes on 203 Posts
I’m always genuinely grateful when Vag277 posts, because the content usually provides an insight into why the aviation regulatory ‘reform’ program continues to produce ever more complexity which CASA continues to defend.

Australia has a “different legislative environment” than the USA and the USA has “a media less obsessed with people dying as a result of personal decisions”. That may be so, but neither of those circumstances has any causal connection with the objective risks to aviation safety nor the ways in which those risks would objectively be mitigated in a cost-effective way.

More legislation is very rarely the solution to real-world problems, especially in aviation safety where there remain very few circumstances that are not already dealt with by a plethora of rules. And media sensationalism may result in pressure on politicians, but – surely – an independent regulatory authority would ignore such pressure. Surely?

But scratch the surface and what do we see in the wake of e.g. the Mount Gambier Angel Flight tragedy? ‘Somebody’ has to do ‘something’. Some new law ‘must’ be made. Rather than resist, the regulator capitulated. Non-existent safety cases and spun statistics are relied upon to justify further restrictions upon the defenceless. It’s just a political knee-jerk dressed up in safety rhetoric. And the regulator wouldn’t know and couldn’t care less if people who would otherwise have been carried on ‘community service flights’ die in a collision on the road or suffer deteriorating health at home rather than face the long road trips.

To a hammer, ever problem is a nail. To an organisation that makes laws, issues certificates and licences, grants approvals and permissions and exemptions and imposes conditions and restrictions, every problem requires new laws requiring – for a fee of course – a certificate or a licence or an approval or a permission or an exemption or… And it ‘helps’ that endless consultation processes and tapping away at the legislative keyboard keeps the regulator in lucrative busy-work, indefinitely.

If the regulator’s going to succumb to pressure arising from “media obsessed with people dying as a result of personal decisions”, the regulator has forgotten or is ignoring why it was created.
Lead Balloon is offline  
Old 5th Jan 2022, 08:45
  #51 (permalink)  
 
Join Date: Oct 2003
Location: Victoria Australia
Age: 82
Posts: 299
Received 76 Likes on 35 Posts
Video of the infamous senate RRAT hearing re Angel Flight etc

Angel Flight:

CASA:

Channel link:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC_C..._as=subscriber

Hopefully these links work for anyone interested to view the Senate Committee in session with Angel Flight CEO Marjorie Pagani against the CASA.

Note the visible relief of Pip Spence’s ’support’ team of senior CASA managers as she resorts to defense of CASA to cover her embarrassing lack of knowledge and note that J. Aleck refuses to give the costs that he has authorised the court to award against AF.

Truly an astonishing failure of P. Spence to allow this situation to develop and see the smugness behind, from the now de facto CEO.

Worth noting too the disgust of Senators Sterle and the Committee Chair Susan McDonald.

And finally I’m reliably informed that the very poor communications with CASA would be simply incompetence on the part of CASA. I’m afraid it runs through the mind was that that awful feedback might have been deliberate. Oh no of course not.
Sandy Reith is offline  

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off
Trackbacks are Off
Pingbacks are Off
Refbacks are Off


Thread Tools
Search this Thread

Contact Us - Archive - Advertising - Cookie Policy - Privacy Statement - Terms of Service

Copyright © 2024 MH Sub I, LLC dba Internet Brands. All rights reserved. Use of this site indicates your consent to the Terms of Use.