He's back! After a self-imposed 10-year sabbatical, Dick Smith is returning to the cauldron of aviation politics. He says that after being gonged with an AC in the Queen's Birthday Honours List, he realised that he'd failed to complete his ambition of reforming aviation in Australia, and so has once again taken up his sword to join the battle. Consequently, we can expect his advocacy to be demanding more controlled airspace in the form of E Class over D towers, competition to Airservices and less VFR traffic on the area frequencies.
He's the sort of character that you're either for or against, and in some cases, for one day and against the next. However, his appearance this week at the Senate RRAT Committee investigating Airservices is likely to garner support over the issue of the ADS-B mandate. According to Dick, the benefits Airservices put in the Regulatory Impact Statement are unlikely to be realised. OK, that last sentence was a shocking understatement, I admit. In reality, my view is that ADS-B can do nothing for general aviation but cost us a swag of money that we just don't have, and all the benefits of that investment will go to the airlines. Did I just read that Qantas made an underlying profit of $975 million last year? More worrying, is that someone at Airservices thought the costings would not be seen through, and that someone at the Department had their eyes closed when they reached for their rubber stamp.
Of course, all would have been rosy had the original plan to use savings from decommissioning en route radars to subsidise ADS-B installation costs actually happened. The savings were never realised as we now have the situation where we'll be blessed with both ADS-B and new radars! The perfect storm for GA cost-wise. Read what your subsidy is now being used for here.
I suppose the funding bubble for Victorian airports had to burst sometime. With a dedicated aviation minister under the previous Coalition government, there was money for upgrades in regional areas. It was probably inevitable that the Labor government would stem the flow of cash once they got into power; aviation is not one of their strong suits. Of course, Spring Street is saying that airports can apply under the new infrastructure programs, but what chance does aviation have against roads, railway lines and ports? We don't bring enough votes with us to be guaranteed a place of importance at the trough. At that goes not only for Victorian airports, but all airports nationally. Even the NSW scheme announced in January was open to only 30 of the state's airports. With so few councils around the country genuinely loving their airports, we can expect only further decay. The saving grace at the moment is the Federal government's Regional Aviation Access Program, but even that is restricted to airports in towns classified as "remote" or "very remote." Mind you, we should be grabbing at any money coming our way!
Matt Hall was relegated to second place again at the Ascot round of the Red Bull Air Race last weekend. A great performance, but one that will no doubt add to his hunger for a win. Before the race he was saying how much he wanted to keep the team's momentum going, and they certainly did that at Ascot. All this energy can only drive them to one place: the top spot on the podium.
May your gauges always be in the green,
Hitch