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CAA to Slash Red Tape for GA

Honestly, the CAA could start by simply taking the USA 14 CFR and search and replace “United States” for “United Kingdom”.

In the interim, bringing back the paperwork-free validation of all ICAO licences for certified aircraft that used to exist until 2012 or so would be useful.

Although it’s not really the CAA’s bailiwick, it did come up in the Red Tape Challenge (and nothing has been done, even though the Red Tape Challenge recommended it), remove the GAR requirement for the CTA.

Last Edited by alioth at 08 Jan 09:59
Andreas IOM

.bq Also the FIs within French clubs aren’t working for zero; they do get some small money (€10-20/hr according to one I knew) and some are doing a few hundred hours of instructing for free to pay back a loan made by the club to cover the FI’s ground school.

It’s a bit more complex in that for those doing the ENAC (National School of Civil Aviation) FI curriculum have their expenses covered 2/3rds by the region and 1/3rd by the club. The counterpart is the commitment for 300h of pro-bono instruction in the club that sponsored your admission.

The 300h more than compensate the club for their contribution and is more intended as a community-building tool than a financial sponsorship, acting in effect as an indirect subvention from the state to the club.

T28
Switzerland

@Jacko, to change things where?
You see, the biggest amount of money to spend on GA appears to be in the south, around London.
And around London the biggest problem is the airspace structure – if we had something like 0-1000ft AGL/2500ft AMSL – class G, 1000ft AGL/2500ft AMSL – FL50 – TMG/RMG/(Class E may be?), it would have simplified things a LOT for many pilots.
At the moment UK aviation is aimed at two types of traffic:
1. CAT/AoC/Business – they fly above FL200 and all get all the services and listenned to by the authorities.
2. All others: “just scram! Fly somewhere (not around London) and don’t bother us”.
Nothing is aimed at 3. People who want to get from A to B in a small aircraft, non-oxygen.
IMC rating is OK, but not in the south – you can’t enter London TMA with it. Plus most small aerodromes don’t have IAPs or legal means to fly DIY approaches. EASA NPA 2020-02 makes it much better, but that is EASA moving things forward, not UK CAA. What is stopping the UK amending IMC to include enroute and Class A?
PMD? Not helping if you want to fly IFR or abroad
E-conditions? What’s the point? For the majority of homebuilders the cost of a build is higher than the cost of an old PA-28, plus no access abroad.
Sorry, may be just my pessimism.

EGTR

gallois wrote:

Also we have little need for freelance instructors or I should say not ATO attached freelance instructors as we already have them within the club system, many of whom give their time for nothing.

How can they instruct without being attached to a ATO or a DTO?

ESKC (Uppsala/Sundbro), Sweden

Airborne_Again wrote:

How can they instruct without being attached to a ATO or a DTO?

Maybe worth checking this, as far I see it’s only “SEP revalidation” and “variants diff trainings” that can be done outside DTO/ATO
This is problematic for “CBIR/BIR freelance IRI training” but who cares, these are typically not inside FFA aeroclubs

https://www.ffa-aero.fr/SITEFFAPROD_WEB/fichiers_ffa/Espace_Instructeurs/Cle_Instructeur/Newsletter27/Memo-Prerogatives-FIs-2015-01-20-FFA.pdf

Memo_Prerogatives_FIs_2015_01_20_FFA_pdf

Paris/Essex, France/UK, United Kingdom

alioth wrote:

Honestly, the CAA could start by simply taking the USA 14 CFR and search and replace “United States” for “United Kingdom”.

Absolutely.

As I have noted several times over the years, the FAA system of regulating flight training, examination and currency is brilliant. If, as a European pilot, you have not experienced the US system, here are the basics:
1) Flight instructors can operate independently of any club or larger organisation, and most do. So they are incentivised to hustle for new students, and there is a plentiful supply of FIs for prospective pilots to choose from
2) Examination of the theory elements of licenses and ratings takes place on-line and any organisation can offer the online exams in return for a (very reasonable) fee.
3) There is an endless list of exam centres to choose from. The exam can be booked and taken same day, the results are known at the end of the exam. The candidate gets a print out of the result to show his or her examiner for the practical. So simple and quick and marvellously flexible.
4) Licence and rating examiners seem to operate in the same way as FIs. They are independent and freely available.
5) maintenance of licenses and ratings is a simple matter of undertaking a BFR – Biennial Flight Review. It’s not an exam, it’s a training session.

Why oh why can’t we do all that here!!?? It would make a huge difference in the accessibility of flight training.

Upper Harford private strip UK, near EGBJ, United Kingdom

How can they instruct without being attached to a ATO or a DTO?

By the club being an ATO or DTO, presumably

I don’t know about France but freelance towards a PPL or some such has not been possible since roughly the 1970s or early 80s. I read a book by someone who did his PPL that way. Maybe @tumbleweed might remember?

OTOH the ATO/DTO can be physically almost anywhere. There is no reg stating that the student has to ever physically enter the building. The FI merely needs to be associated with it.

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

Buckerfan wrote:

2) Examination of the theory elements of licenses and ratings takes place on-line and any organisation can offer the online exams in return for a (very reasonable) fee.
3) There is an endless list of exam centres to choose from. The exam can be booked and taken same day, the results are known at the end of the exam. The candidate gets a print out of the result to show his or her examiner for the practical. So simple and quick and marvellously flexible.
4) Licence and rating examiners seem to operate in the same way as FIs. They are independent and freely available.
5) maintenance of licenses and ratings is a simple matter of undertaking a BFR – Biennial Flight Review. It’s not an exam, it’s a training session.

All of these are already possible in the EASA system, although they are not mandatory so it is true that some (many?) countries have chosen to organise things differently.

ESKC (Uppsala/Sundbro), Sweden

Peter wrote:

OTOH the ATO/DTO can be physically almost anywhere. There is no reg stating that the student has to ever physically enter the building. The FI merely needs to be associated with it.

Actually, there is. E.g. DTO.GEN.215 and DTO.GEN.250.

DTO.GEN.215 says that the DTO must have suitable office areas for (de)briefing, flight planning, rest etc.
DTO.GEN.250 says that the DTO must have a base for its training. It may have several bases, but all have to be declared.

ESKC (Uppsala/Sundbro), Sweden

Sure, but since there is no mandatory bum-on-seat ground school in the PPL, nothing says the student must enter the school premises. I know I am bending the desired interpretation, but…

Getting back to basics here, the way to approach this is to look at what makes the US system work so well. And then you realise most of the good bits “can’t” be implemented in Europe, because Europe vests trust in organisations, not individuals. That is where one could improve things.

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom
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