Employment Archives

Discredited and distrusted: It is time to clip some senior wings at the CAA

November 29, 2021

So far, there has been little sign of anyone in New Zealand General Aviation losing sleep over the Civil Aviation Bill. But it will change the Civil Aviation Act, which governs everyone involved in flight here, and submissions close one minute before midnight on December 2. So, for anyone genuinely interested in changing the status quo, it may be time to burn the midnight …

How confirmation bias at the CAA created a pilot’s five-year nightmare

November 9, 2021

When what looks like a whistle-blower warns our CAA that an airline captain is mentally unstable and could be a suicide-murder risk, alarm bells ring – very loudly. Particularly when the claim, in April 2016, comes soon after pilot Andreas Lubitz flew a Germanwings Airbus A320 with 144 passengers and six crew to oblivion on a mountainside in the French Alps, on 24 March …

What can happen when Human Resources apparatchiks forget about human beings

June 26, 2020

At the GAA, we have a nagging worry about ‘Human Resources’ experts leading the CAA and interacting with real, live aviation professionals. This fear has been strengthened by a cautionary tale, related by someone who was there when it happened… Our CAA’s Australian counterpart CASA did a revamp driven by HR personnel (one of many revamps, possibly carried out under corporate obfuspolicy such as …

It’s officially true: the CAA is toxic. But will it get a detox?

June 14, 2020

Cast your mind back to 2018 and you may recall the Saga of the CAA Client Satisfaction Survey and how the Authority’s leading lights rubbished the results when the GAA ran a customer survey after the CAA refused to do the job. The Director, Graeme Harris, rejected what GAA supporters said about his Authority after our survey of opinion in 2018 and 2019. His …

PPL reform: How the CAA is trying to sneak through radical change (for the worse)

January 2, 2020

The dyed-in-the-wool, antediluvian attitudes within the CAA are becoming unbearable. There seems to be a complete lack of rational thought, logic and common sense applied to the proposal, along with the usual ploy of putting it out for consultation over a holiday period when most people are trying to enjoy time away, or rest from the daily grind. Truly, a cynical and condescending swipe …

Two years of private grief, more disgrace for the CAA, massive expense – for what? Nothing.

September 10, 2019

The case has finally closed on an episode that brought two years of misery to a pilot and piled more shame on a misguided Civil Aviation Authority. The pilot was charged with, and subsequently pleaded guilty to, careless operation of an aircraft. (Among the prosecution evidence in what we’ll call the Go-Pro Case was video footage taken in the cockpit. GAA supporters raised more …

Hats off to the CAA whistleblower

June 25, 2019

The CAA, a place of dysfunction and distrust A whistleblower working in the Civil Aviation Authority has told Newshub that dysfunction and distrust at the CAA is putting the public at risk. The employee decided to speak to Newshub‘s investigations reporter Michael Morrah because, he says, the CAA has repeatedly failed in its regulatory role, and a “toxic” work environment is contributing to the …

Imagine what might happen, if New Zealand had an APPG

March 23, 2019

It stands for an All-Party Parliamentary Group whose members cast aside politics and focus on matters directly affecting real people and their livelihoods. In the UK, this is a long-established concept and its APPG-GA is a group of 203 MPs and members of the House of Lords who, among other things, have succeeded in a campaign to Cut the Red Tape at their Civil …

Flight training and the pilot crisis: A litany of lost opportunities…

January 13, 2019

There is no evidence that any New Zealand government (including the current one) has ever had any interest in writing a strategy for our aviation industry, and a new report from Massey and NZ ALPA gives an indication of some of the consequences. They include: A lost opportunity for this country to capitalise on the training needs for an enormous international shortage of airline …

Why attempts to restrict New Zealand airspace for UAs must be blocked

November 20, 2018

Many folk in and around Alexandra (pop. 5440) were up in arms when a Christchurch-based firm called Skybase sought to restrict more than 500 sq km of Central Otago airspace in which to test unmanned aircraft. We do not know how many untested UAs are owned by Skybase in New Zealand, but we do know that Skybase is backed by US interests. We know …

Category: Employment