Proof that DAS Skidmore is a new broom
 

I had a meeting with the DAS back in April and amongst other things, I had a big cry about nasty Part 61 and how it is ruining my life.

In particular, it is hard to service mining contracts in small aircraft when (effective last September) the second crew member required by the client is not legally allowed to log any flight time.

DAS Skidmore thought this was a bit silly.

Today the exemption has come through HERE

Thank you CASA for listening, congratulations DAS Skidmore and Jeff Boyd for bringing some sense and experience to the table.

Good to hear he will both listen, and more importantly, act when he sees or is shown a problem.
Credit where it is due.

While it is great that CASA are responding to the industry's concerns hopefully they back this up with an amendment to the formalize the exemption. An exemption should really be a temporary measure to fix an anomaly not a long term solution as the exemption makes understanding the rules much more complicated....

no one,

I am hopeful that will be the outcome - that's how we all make short-term changes to our Ops Manuals etc already, isn't it?

Could it be that they are issuing a raft of exemptions and instruments to get past all the worst of the unintended consequences, so that they might have more time to ensure the subsequent amended legislation doesn't get rushed in and make a new, different mess?

Devil is in the detail?
 

From Schedule 3

How much and how long to achieve this? I presume printing it and putting it in a tab somewhere probably isn't enough....

Folks,
Seriously, don't forget to send a copy of the amendment to the manual to CASA for "acceptance".
I wonder which CASA office will be the first to knock it back??
Tootle pip!!

It is a perfect model for simplification: A one sentence law prohibiting everything, and exemptions granted to the squeaky wheels and well-connected.

Think of it: No regulations, orders or manuals of standards. Just one sentence prohibiting everything, and a benevolent regulator granting exemptions to grovelingly-thankful industry participants.

"Beyond a certain point, complexity is fraud."

Horatio Leafblower,

That would be the hope but CASA do not have a good track record in that regard. For instance take the issue of what markings you need to paint on an aircraft, They issued at least 3 exemptions dating from 2008 allowing an aircraft less than 5700kg and operated within Australia to be operated without marking on the underside of the wings.

CASA EX05/08 - Exemption - display of markings and carriage of identification plates

CASA EX04/12 - Exemption - display of markings and carriage of identification plates

CASA EX16/15 - Exemption — display of markings and carriage of identification plates

The most recent one was in 2015 and is to be in force until the 2015 revision to part 45 comes into force in 2015. 7 years and 3 exemptions to update what is at best a relatively straight forward issue.

Or how about the way that CASA allows builders of experimental amateur built aircraft to do maintenance as an exemption. From time to time it expires and there have been periods when there is no exemption in place.

Hopefully CASA will not be so slow to implement the logging of copilot time in the regulations.

No_One et al,
What would be far better is if Australian pilots were able to log time in accordance with ICAO Annex 1, instead of the "Australian" rules that so disadvantage young Australian pilots, vis a vie their counterparts from other ICAO states, that are vying for the same jobs in the real world.
It would mean going the full circle, until the early 1970s, Australia did comply with Annex 1 (and not by notifying a difference).

Tootle pip!!

Re: "new broom", more a very small brush, really.

I raised this issue 2 years back at one of the CASA part 61 roadshows. The CASA presenter on the day was from their safety team (engineer before joining CASA) and had no idea that some charter companies are required to have 2 crew on certain contracts and the impact Part 61 would have on this.

The whole idea of the new regulations was to get away from the exemptions but CASA is granting more and more every day. So much for knowing what they are doing. :ugh:

Yep 20 odd years of frigging around and we got part 61

Struth :ugh: You reckon that is a good outcome? Honest? An exemption? Mate, you been totally brainwashed by these folk or what? How about telling them how stupid the whole shebang is? How frikking dumb that an exemption is needed after 20 years of writing this ****e.

Your thanking them for making you work harder and having to meet with them? No wonder this industry is faarked.

Credit where it's due Bob.

How much change do you reckon we would have had under the Skull?

I think the thanks is for allowing us to do what we used to do. Minor victory in the grand scheme of part 61.
Without a few people kicking and screaming (yeah, I've bashed my head into brick walls about this too, it isn't fun), we wouldn't get these exemptions.

Seemingly Mark is listening at this point in time. Better than the last bloke. Long way to go yet!
CAO 48 possibly being put back another 12 months is also good for industry.


Yep bob, it's a good outcome. Better than nothing being changed and us poor buggers having to trudge along without anything being fixed.

Ok,
so you can use this exemption, provided its included in your ops manual.

Can you simply insert said document and proceed, or do you need your ops manual reviewed by CASA? Afterall you have made an amendment.

Cheers
Jas

jaz24zzk,
As it seems likely you are aware, all manual amendments have to be forwarded to CASA, hence my previous remarks.
It is not for "review", but acceptance, theoretically not "approval". Sadly, the "acceptance" is all to often "negative acceptance".
Tootle pip!!

How can CASA knock back the insertion of a CASA instrument in a manual?
Sorry Leadsled I just don't have your negative experience in my daily dealings with the dreaded evel empire.

there will be seen to be a new broom when we get in this country....

canadian owner maintenance.
the ability to decertify a commercially built privately owned aircraft and maintain it on a standalone basis.
an experimental- amateur maintenance category for privately owned aircraft.

until then the changes are all just ponypoo, window dressing and more of the same "wee know safety" nutter palaver.

Add the MCC course requirement to that.

Unfortunately Leafblower, my take on what happened to you is this. Permit me to be the devils advocate.

You went cap in hand to a regulator and grovelled. You then received a temporary allowance of something that should have been your right in the first place!

Be aware that each exemption issued is one more noose around your neck. It can be used to strangle you at will and the best part from a bureaucrats point of view is that they literally have to do nothing to terminate your aviation since the exemption "expires" all on its own.

But wait, there is more…… Not being content with merely hanging a new sword over your head, each new exemption creates more work, and thus job security, for the bureaucrats.

You see in the public service, nothing gets done by a decision maker without a brief of advice from a bureaucrat recommending action.

So in the case of your new exemption. To renew it, the following sequence of writings must occur:

1. A statement about the regulation and why the exemption was given in the first place.

2. The experience of CASA of the effect of the exemption over the last Two years - anecdotal or otherwise evidence of what the exemption actually achieved. (Maybe a bit of international comparison as well if that can be parleyed into an overseas study trip.)

3. The regulations as they stand now, especially the impact of any changes during the currency of the exemption.

4. Mature and scholarly discussion of whether the making of a new exemption is in line with current CASA policy as well as real or foreshadowed changes in regulation or regulatory climate. Please note, the viability of your business, your career, industry economics, fairness, equity and natural justice play no part in this discussion because CASA is not bound to consider such matters and has proven time and again that it does not.

5. ..And finally a recommendation to Skidmore: "That you sign the attached exemption". If I can't string that out into Three months work then I'd be a failure.

To put it another way, the very fact that you had to do what you did is an indictment of the whole rotten, corrupt system. I suppose I could have put that more offensively if I tried, bootlicking, etc.

Glad it helps you….but in Two years the anxiety returns again!


On a related note, it appears to me from my own limited research that advances in technology, particularly avionics, are happening far faster that the current regulatory and exemption system can cope with. The strain between what is now available and the associated capabilities and technical environment the regulations were designed for is becoming to great to bridge, even for CASA and its unlimited budget.

For example Dynon Skyview now has data logging, wifi and video hanging off it as well as ADS-B in and out and intelligent radios. None of it is certified, but the price/perfomance gap is eventually going to be unbridgeable.

Horatio, I wish you well in your business and I appreciate your contribution to this forum. No offence meant by my previous post but ...

Amazing work once again, Sunfish, managing to turn a positive into a list of doom-and-gloom laden negatives!

AOTW, I'm reminded of the old joke about the Curates egg: The pastor is having lunch with the lord of the manor. ""I say pastor! I think the egg we gave you is rotten!". "Oh no my Lord!' "Parts of it are excellent!".

Good on Mr. Leafblower for bearding the lion in his den, getting a good hearing and result and even posting it on Pprune for curmudgeons like me to criticise. The difficulty I have is why an exemption was needed in the first place.

The fact remains that exemptions are an abominable short term fix to bad regulation - they create risk and uncertainty and leave an opening to temptation for abuse. They should only be used as a last resort, not the first port of call for a lazy regulator.

Characterising it as "a positive" is merely a manifestation of Stockholm Syndrome.

Sunfish nailed it.

So, sunfish/lead balloon, how has part 61 impacted your operational and/or business running lives?

Has it cost you more money to get exactly the same things done as you did pre part 61 (think having to do an IPC in a metro, a "single pilot type rated aircraft" because the B200 isn't "good enough" to cover it, only because the metro is over 5700kg despite doing proficiency checks in the metro every 6months anyway, or having to sow to IPCs a year if you fly more than two "type rated" [and we aren't talking airliner jets here for type ratings!] aircraft?). What about being legally able to log co pilot time before, but 61 banning it? It's not as if they were sitting their doing nothing, it's all in the ops manuals!

Do any of you do IPCs or any instrument approach currency in a synthetic trainer? Technically, the component you do in the synthetic is not legal for currency/testing etc under part 61, whereas it was before. I'm still battling this. I've won in the short term but the rules need changing.

Yep the system that has been forced on us is problematic. Sorry for fighting and trying to change it.

You got that exemption because it has basically no "safety" implications whatever. Safe for CASA to do. POA. So what are the safety implications of not having your rego painted on the wing that required 3 exemptions? It did however probably generate a mountain of paperwork and possibly justified another CASA employee.

In-spite of all the negative statements on this matter, this exemption maybe the first step in the process of getting this anomaly out of Part 61.

On several occasions we wrote procedures that required exemptions against a Reg or a CAO which were then incorporated into CAOs and then into the re-write of the Regs.

These changes came about because the capabilities of the industry changed and the Regs/CAOs had not kept pace.

There are other examples where exemptions have morphed into the new Regs.

We're on the same side, Car RAMROD.

My point (and I anticipate Sunfish's point) is that when your captors extend the leash a little, that's not a "positive" for which your captors deserve "thanks".

We shouldn't be captive to (and have to pay for) this pointless regulatory nonsense in the first place. It's just a self-licking ice cream of more rules and more exemptions, with zero positive safety or efficiency impacts.

"Beyond a certain point, complexity is fraud."

lead balloon beat me to it.
I was going to discuss an environment with an overreaching and overbearing bully of a regulator and the stockholm syndrome environment that it has created in australian aviation.
lead ballon is on the money.

australian aviation legislation is the greatest assembly of rubbish ever inflicted on an industry.
australia's unique talent is to take the english system of government incompetence and raise it to new levels of stupidity.

what australia has proven beyond doubt is that aeronautical engineering should be preeminent in aviation and that lawyers and the like make no contribution to safety or the development of the technology whatsoever.

CAsA is an enduring farce of clueless bullying.
tallywheel posted a comment a while back that this pox upon us has blown 350million dollars so far.
lead balloon's self licking ice cream has a very large tongue.

Hear Hear W8!

I think credit where it's due. Mark Skidmore didn't implement part 61, his predecessor did. Same person didn't listen to the industry saying it needs changing and as his parting gift to the industry he implemented part 61 and didn't have to deal with the fallout. Mark is listening and yeah, I'll thank him for implementing that change.

I'm cynical, I love a casa bashing (who doesn't?) but I'm not convinced that they issued the original rule and then this exemption just to give us false hope!

Waste of time and money? No doubt. Should have just done the job right to begin with. Whilst I dream of a day that we have better rules to operate under (and easier to comprehend!), I know that the chances of that are remote, so I'll take these small ones happily, it has just made my life a little easier.

And no, I've never been to Stockholm...

That is the problem he is not implementing a change, he is just issuing an exemption.

So there is a problem in making an exemption after industry has complained is there? Did you not read the explanatory statement?

"It is expected that a regulatory amendment to expand the definition ..... will be made in due course, after which time this instrument will no longer be required."

I.e they have issued the exemption because it is quicker than changing the regulation.

If the instrument expires and the regulation doesn't get changed then you will see me get angry about it. For now it is a step in the right direction as opposed to another backwards step.

I've had a lot of dealings with the regulator, some good some not so. They haven't made me as sour as they have evidently made some others!

"It is expected that...."

Oh dear.

I didn't think there'd be anyone so naive left in the aviation industry as to not know what: "it is expected that" means when CASA says it.

Do yourself a favour, Car RAMROD, and do a google search of the terms: "it is expected that" and "CASA".

It's one of the many reasons for the complete distrust of CASA identified in the ASRR Report.

Right I give up, let's have the exemption cancelled right now with no chance of changing the rule and go back yet another step! Let's keep the entire Part 61 in all it's glory and not change a single thing, even by way of exemption!

Like I said, I'll get angry if the rule doesn't get changed. Considering this exemption has actually made my job just one tiny bit easier I'm thankful.

Do not confuse "being naive" with trying to be proactive and at least a little hopeful. Forgive me for not letting the system get me down, obviously some people's will is much more easily broken :)

Rather than pissing and moaning, how about doing something, actually doing something, to try and get rid of some of the bull**** that ties our hands?

Nah - I just whinge on pprune.

My point is this: This would be a "positive" and Mr Skidmore would deserve "thanks" if, instead of adopting all of the vacuous, weasel-worded, misleading rhetoric of his predecessors, he actually made a thing called "a commitment".

"The regulations will be changed so as to achieve X. This change will be made no later than Y."

If he's not willing or able to make commitments of that kind, and he has any integrity, he would direct the organisation of which he is now CEO to stop using the vacuous, weasel-worded, misleading rhetoric that nobody (well, almost nobody) believes any more.

If Skidmore can't admit that there is a problem, he isn't capable of fixing something that seems to him to be non existent.



Exemptions further burden the status quo. In fact to achieve regulatory reform, all exemptions must be written into law or cancelled.



It's taken how long to get to the stage we're at now?

OK here is another example of worlds best practice in regulations.

Yesterdays lucky dip of exemptions includes this one.
CASA 105/15 - Instructions — V.F.R. flights conducted by CGG Aviation (Australia) Pty Ltd

It basically allows a survey company to conduct a vfr flight over water without the requirement to be able to fix their position by visual reference to the ground or water when below 2000ft. The exemption only applies if they have an ifr gps and maintain a higher than otherwise required fuel reserve along with a few other conditions.

Now the difficulties that arise are:
1. The exemption is only valid for 1 year. What happens if they have a contract that goes for longer than a year and CASA are too disorganized to extend the exemption. Not knowing more than a year in advance that you are going to be able to continue what you are doing is no way to run a business. What bank would be willing to lend to a company that's lifeblood can be snuffed out simply if a casa office does not renew an exemption on time?

2. This regulation by exemption also makes it very hard to make any changes to the business. Say this company decides to merge with another company. Do you notice that the exemption only applies to 1 particular named company? If during their merger they decide to change the companies legal name then a new exemption is required. Will it be forthcoming?

3. Exemptions make it hard to set up a competitor. Any company that wants to do the same work has to apply for an exemption too. Will they get this and in what timeframe? While this may sound good for the company it leads to an inefficient sector.

While the requirements are sensible and good airmanship the way it is implemented is a dog breakfast. Interesting to note that in the USA this activity wouldn't require an exemption because it isn't prohibited by their regulations.

It's called evidence- and risk-based regulation. There was evidence of a risk that an activity was occurring without the benefit of regulatory micro-management (for which a fee is payable, naturally, for the 'service'). There is just no way that an operator could work out and implement its own mitigation strategies to deal with the risks of these extraordinarily complex and dangerous over-water survey operations.

And when that exemption expires, it stands to reason that the operator and the operation become dangerous. Why else would the rules prohibit it?

The USA? Pfffft. What would the USA know about aviation regulation.

"No One" neatly details some of the problems with exemptions and raises the issues of "FUD" - Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt. Anyone who has worked with major vendors in the computer industry will be well aware of "FUD".

Strangely though, it seems our regulator also understands the use of these tools to keep an industry in perpetual subjugation and the granting of an "exemption" is a perfect way to do it. String them along year after year.

It appears that some in CASA really subscribe to O'Briens dictum from Orwells 1984


Why for example are experimental aircraft owners perpetually wondering if their ability to maintain their aircraft via an "exemption" will continue?

Why is it not possible to make a once and for all determination regarding aircraft markings on undersides of wings?

Surely simple determinations can be made as they are in every other jurisdiction?

"It is expected" that the exemption will rendered nugatory by regulation! My ass! Why give up a perfectly good tool that causes intense cockpit pain? Look at Dick Smith tying himself in knots over ADS-B. Look at John Quadrio.

CASA seems to take pleasure in the infliction of pain.