[name removed on CAA request] is the guy in charge of infringements, that’s no secret, so talk to him rather than just firing off salvoes about what you think might be happening.
The NDA is there because I know personal details about individual infringers. It’s really, really important that nothing comes from me which could point to any individual. That is not to say that I don’t agree that the CAA should produce stats; I think they should. But it’s not my place to share them when they have been released to me under the overall umbrella of an NDA. It is up to them to take that decision.
If you see something underhand in their unwillingness to release the information, then talk to the horse’s mouth, [name removed on CAA request], who is a nice chap, a pilot, who actually is working very hard to ensure that the CAA response is just and proportionate, and not too draconian, in the face of huge pressure from some parts of some ANSPs to make it so.
Rather than rant and rave from the distance of a keyboard about some eminence grise “them” who are “over there” doing awful things, why not engage with a real live “him” who is a perfectly approachable chap, often to be found at public events, and talk to him like a man.
Graham wrote:
completely dropping the secrecy veil over the fact that despite being a non-radar service they can see you on radar.
I don’t think the “secrecy veil” is as absolute as we may think. I’ve had London Info remind me about controlled airspace unprompted (my route had a dogleg in it, they could obviously only see my predicted track without the dogleg which would otherwise fly into CAS) and I had only Mode-C. There was no pretence, or roundabout to it – he straight up said it.
Better pilot education on transponders, too: turning OFF a transponder for fear of getting done for a bust might actually be a factor in someone busting airspace – because if you’re not transponding, then you aren’t going to get that reminder. If you have Mode-S and use listening squawks then a controller can identify you and call you before it actually becomes a bust.
Timothy wrote:
If you see something underhand in their unwillingness to release the information, then talk to the horse’s mouth, [name removed on CAA request], who is a nice chap, a pilot, who actually is working very hard to ensure that the CAA response is just and proportionate, and not too draconian, in the face of huge pressure from some parts of some ANSPs to make it so.Rather than rant and rave from the distance of a keyboard about some eminence grise “them” who are “over there” doing awful things, why not engage with a real live “him” who is a perfectly approachable chap, often to be found at public events, and talk to him like a man.
I’m sure you’re aware that the man in question got heavily involved in a thread about this on Flyer back in 2017. I’m afraid the ‘transmit only’ nature of his engagement (and subsequent flounce) means that few who recall that thread would have much hope that such a conversation could be productive.
The other issue precluding in-person discussion is that on a subject like this, licence holders are incentivised not to draw attention to themselves. We all try our best with our planning and our flying, but most of us are nothing more than a moment of inattention away from an infringement ourselves. We never know when we might be up before the man and his Tuesday committee, so we feel it best not to have marked ourselves out as having an anti-authority attitude. The concept of contempt of cop exists everywhere, no matter how much you might tell us that these people are brilliant professionals and would never be anything other than totally objective.
It will be interesting to see if the adoption of ADSB technology (assuming the USA is a success, it will only be a matter of short time to be adopted in Europe), will result in more rational controlled airspace in the UK.
I understand some stubs are from days when wheezy Soviet airliners needed them to meet protected OEI flight paths.
Graham wrote:
The other issue precluding in-person discussion is that on a subject like this, licence holders are incentivised not to draw attention to themselves
In which case introduce yourself with an assumed name. It’s not as if [name removed on CAA request] is going to demand to see your photo ID before he has a discussion at some event he’s present (in order to talk to pilots) at!
RobertL18C wrote:
I understand some stubs are from days when wheezy Soviet airliners needed them to meet protected OEI flight paths.
I could be way off the mark, but I’d heard that arguments for lifting various stubs and edges based on modern aircraft performance took something of a hit when airline accountants started to get excited about the fuel savings from de-rated engines?
alioth wrote:
In which case introduce yourself with an assumed name. It’s not as if [name removed on CAA request] is going to demand to see your photo ID before he has a discussion at some event he’s present (in order to talk to pilots) at!
I did think of that, but rather felt it would fail to meet Timothy’s demand that one talks to him ‘like a man’.
I have not set foot in the Flyer Forum for many years, but I can quite understand why [name removed on CAA request] may have found it difficult to engage with people who are determined to believe that there is conspiracy and underhand dealings, and won’t be persuaded otherwise.
You only have to look at some of the stuff spouted in the five pages above to see why anyone could get frustrated, but particularly someone who is personally committed to keeping the touch of the CAA as light as possible in the face of much pressure from some quarters (in CAA and ANSPs) for a much tougher line. (I have heard quite senior ATC Managers demanding that every infringement should be prosecuted, and [name removed on CAA request] is one of the strongest voices arguing for moderation based on communication and education rather than enforcement.)
[name removed on CAA request] is in charge of infringements at the CAA and is a good guy. I have worked with him for years and I know. But anyone but Mother Teresa is likely to fly off the handle and leave the room when faced with a barrage of negativity from people who just will not believe (and I am not sure about her 
.)
My fear is that if [name removed on CAA request] gets too much shit chucked at him, he might just give up being nice and bow to the pressure from people who want to try the draconian way. [name removed on CAA request] needs our support, not our brickbats.
Having said that, we have a meeting in about a month, and I’ll ask then why the CAA is turning down FoI requests. I think that if they published, it would actually look quite reasonable, at least compared to the way it could be.
I have sat, as an observer, in a meeting where the decisions are taken, and my opinion at the time, and remains, that the standard of discussion and decision making was very good (I compared it to a Magistrate’s retiring room discussion) and that every decision was correct, possibly erring on the lenient side.
But some people just want to shout and scream their opinions, despite anything they hear to the contrary. Did anyone else listen to Rory Stewart, who negotiated the WTO rules, trying to reason with the guy who phoned in to today’s World at One who said that Stewart had never negotiated anything in his life and knew nothing about WTO rules? There was nothing to be said, as whatever was said to the caller, he just kept repeating “it’s Project Fear”.
If, whatever [name removed on CAA request] says, he is going to have abuse screamed at him, why should he bother?
You only have to look at some of the stuff spouted in the five pages above
Spouted? I think, Timothy, you spend too much time on other forums, and get them mixed up. You documented your departure from Flyer on UK social media some years ago 
They did you a favour IMHO…
I have heard quite senior ATC Managers demanding that every infringement should be prosecuted
That is normal for NATS presentations; not individual ATCOs but those that do the presentations. I have been to a number of these presentations and they ought to hand out razor blades to all pilots (for slitting their own throats). Light GA is far from the only victim; everybody gets it. Bizjet pilots get slagged off too (they do 2.5x more level busts than big-name airlines)… Only the flag carriers escape untouched. I have already posted about the NATS guy who openly said that anybody setting 7600 will be shot down (by the RAF, presumably, from the context).
So I think this has never really changed. There are different camps out there and always will be. And corporate politics is the same the world over… if a highly political organisation (like NATS, the CAA, etc) puts up a speaker, that person needs to have their shoes shining and their epaulettes properly adjusted. And if the profession is inherently of the “enforcement” type (NATS, CAA, police, etc) then the presentation must be appropriately hard-hitting.
Nobody is “screaming” at anybody at the CAA. All the indications are that there was a big change in policy quite recently, and they are doing all they can to keep it quiet, to avoid a big backlash. My info is that quite a few people are examining this area closely right now…
I don’t think anyone’s screaming abuse, and no-one is saying there is a conspiracy.
You illustrate my point about what’s going wrong when you refer (above) to ‘people who just will not believe’. This is the trouble – that people are expected to just believe in the system. The message he was giving on Flyer was complete transmit-only and he wasn’t open to any feedback that wasn’t fulsome praise. He didn’t flounce because of any abuse (there was none), he flounced because the majority of responses were probing questions that he couldn’t answer – although plenty of the usual suck-ups could be found offering the fulsome praise they offer to anyone in authority.
The message he repeated was that the CAA process is right, just and correct and you must trust us and you don’t need to see the info at all – whether stats on enforcement pathways or the circumstances of individual occurrences in the manner of airprox reports or AAIB reports.
The ‘confidentiality to ensure willing participation in a just culture’ response is just totally disingenuous in this case. If someone is caught infringing, they have no choice but to participate or else face licence suspension. It is not like the authorities are depending on the infringer to tell them that the infringement happened.
What rankles with people above all else is the message they receive that the people running it know best, none of our concerns are really valid, and we should just shut up and have total confidence in the system. A system run by an organisation that is demonstrably pretty bad at most of what it does.
If there is anything approaching suspicion of a conspiracy, it is a suspicion some have formed that nearly all infringers are now getting the £200 course as the standard action taken. The economics for running the courses just don’t stack up unless there is a constant flow of ‘customers’. That’s not flat-earth theorising, that’s making deductions based on limited available information, asking for complete information to improve those deductions and being denied it on spurious grounds – hence suspicion.
