Transport Committee on Feb. 26th, 2007

[Mauril Bélanger, Liberal, Ottawa—Vanier, ON]

I'm referring to testimony we had in our committee by the Airline Pilots Association International, and I'm quoting:

We have been advised by Transport Canada officials that this provision is meant to address only low-risk, non-air-transport areas of the aviation industry. We recommend that the committee obtain, for the record, such an undertaking from the minister.

I've been trying to understand what was meant that, so I'm looking for help.

[Rich Gage]

I'll do my best to put my spin on something that is not completely clear with what was requested here.

I think it's along the line that Mr. Jones had suggested, areas of the industry that perhaps are not directly in the public domain, that can be defined well. The business aviation community might be one such example of that that's easy to define; there's no significant pressures on the profit motive, in terms of the operation. So they're talking about an organization and trying to define an organization and making those organizations being a potential target for some form of—

[Mauril Bélanger, Liberal, Ottawa—Vanier, ON]

Would airports be in that category?

[Rich Gage]

I'll give you my personal opinion. It's only a personal opinion.

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Mr. Carrier.

[Robert Carrier, Bloc, Alfred-Pellan, QC]

Mr. Barone, you suggested some amendments during the course of your presentation. Would it be possible to have copies of your speaking notes in both official languages so that we can read your proposals?

[Sam Barone]

Certainly, Mr. Chairman. The French copy will be available tomorrow.

[Robert Carrier, Bloc, Alfred-Pellan, QC]

And a copy will be made available to the Clerk?

[Sam Barone]

Yes.

[Robert Carrier, Bloc, Alfred-Pellan, QC]

Thank you.

Earlier, you admitted to having to add another level of security to your system. In your opinion, should inspections by federal pilots continue or would it be preferable to simply audit safety management systems?

[Fred Jones]

Mr. Chairman, I'd be happy to start.

Naturally, there would be some shift, it would seem, to airports, from auditing the minutiae of a certificate holder's operation to auditing the safety management system, because now you've imposed an additional level of oversight on the certificate holder, as far as safety is concerned. That wouldn't prevent the minister from taking a closer look if there was something wrong with the system, where there was reason to be concerned about the way the system was functioning, but I think it would be natural, it would seem to us, that inspectors would focus more on the system inside a certificate holder rather than auditing the minutiae of an organization. Auditing the minutiae, make no mistake, it might be very good at spot-checking, but there is simply not the ability of the inspectorate community to audit all of the detail of an operation. All they can do is spot-check.

[Robert Carrier, Bloc, Alfred-Pellan, QC]

Would you agree that there would then be a link between government aircraft inspection oversight and the system that would be put in place? We're talking about relying fully on the system. Our inspectors would therefore not be able to vouch for the soundness of the aircraft.

Are you in favour of this approach, Mr. Barone?

[Sam Barone]

I think we have always committed to audits and will continue to commit to audits through this safety management system. It gives a very disciplined, accountable framework under which safety issues have to be addressed, and they can't be altered. This is something we totally agree with. And as I said earlier in my remarks, it codifies the process. In your terminology of audit and inspections of our carriers, that does not change any aspect of it with SMS; this simply makes it more formalized through legislation, as opposed to actually voluntary.

[Robert Carrier, Bloc, Alfred-Pellan, QC]

Mr. Gage, an important component of this bill relates to designated organizations. Your organization is one such example. Since 2003, you have been awarding licenses to air carriers and conducting safety inspections. Therefore, you've been doing this work for four years.

How often do government inspectors actually carry out inspections of your own aircraft or check you operations? Once a year? Twice a year?

[Rich Gage]

It's a completely different culture from what prescriptive arrangements or organizations would be. First of all, it's not an airline, it's a business aviation community. It's the people who own and operate their own aircraft, principally. This is non-commercial.

We have a system that says every operator must have a safety management system. Those operators are audited on a maximum three-year cycle. The cycle is between one to three years, and the audits are done through other organizations. They're not done directly by the CBAA.

The CBAA is the management and administrative entity. We interrelate with the operator. We also interrelate with Transport Canada, which is the regulatory authority. We're providing a service on behalf of Transport Canada, but we're not working outside of that regulatory structure. The oversight is from Transport Canada to the CBAA, and from the CBAA to the operator.

[Robert Carrier, Bloc, Alfred-Pellan, QC]

Nevertheless, on your website, you claim that you issue licenses related to safety.

Despite the fact that you have taken on this responsibility, have Transport Canada inspectors monitored your work in some way over the past four years?

[Rich Gage]

Transport Canada has oversight and does inspections on airworthiness-related issues and maintenance-related issues. In terms of operational issues—what we're responsible for—we hold that oversight capability.

Each one of these operators has an SMS and has an audit. This is the only country in the world that does this for the business aviation community. No other country has such oversight. No other country is using SMS in our community.

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Mr. Watson.

[Jeff Watson, Conservative, Essex, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

My thanks to the witnesses for appearing.

Boy, listening to the New Democrat member earlier, I almost thought planes were falling out of the sky and the inspectors were getting pink slips.

Bill C-6 is not inventing SMS. I think we can establish that here. It has already been in play or in practice or in development. The bill is codifying it, and I think that allows us to probably assess a few things here.

We keep hearing a number of things. There's almost the suggestion that somehow regulations are going to disappear with SMS. Since we can test that hypothesis against some reality here, have any Transport Canada regulations disappeared yet? Do you know of any that have disappeared?

[Sam Barone]

Mr. Chairman, one of the concerns I have comes when I hear the word “deregulation”. Deregulation of our industry came primarily in terms of exit and entry, in terms of the economic regulation of the airline industry, if you will. That happened in 1986. However, to say that safety has been deregulated is very misleading. If anything, this is yet another enhancement of the regulatory framework affecting aviation safety in this country.

We have not seen any changes in terms of oversight or responsibility from Transport Canada. It is a continuous relationship, and as I stated earlier, Mr. Chairman, as the Canadian aviation industry, we are very proud of our record here in Canada.

[Jeff Watson, Conservative, Essex, ON]

In fact, Transport Canada has more regulations. Is there some fairness to that?

[Sam Barone]

I would say that's a very fair comment, Mr. Chairman.

[Jeff Watson, Conservative, Essex, ON]

Mr. Benson, I'm going to raise the issue, since you said SMS may lead to deregulation or self-regulation. “May” is a pretty squishy word, and I want to invite you to clarify it. Will it or won't it?

[Phil Benson]

Based upon the process I deal with, it's not a question of what's removed; it's what's not added. “Constantly” means this prescriptive notion comes up. That's not part of smart regulations, and it's not part of the new way we're going. For us, looking purely at worker health, safety, and security issues, it's very important that there be rules in place. It's not a matter of leaving it to a company and a bottom line. There are a whole bunch of issues on this, which, again, for the promotion of economy and efficiency in the market place, are fine. There are other areas in which there's an intersection of other laws and policies from the government, which have to be taken into account. Unfortunately, under this framework they will not be taken into account. At least that's our concern.

As far as the deregulation goes, one has to sit at all the meetings and listen. The answer I get back or the feeling I have is that that's precisely what we're going to run into.

[Jeff Watson, Conservative, Essex, ON]

All right.

Earlier questioning by Monsieur Laframboise with respect to this balance between SMS and inspections almost left the impression, at least in terms of the questioning, that the current situation is somehow unbalanced. SMS is already in play. Is the situation currently unbalanced? Is SMS somehow hurting inspections? Is it lessening inspections? Is there an imbalance that exists? Are there fewer inspectors than there were four years ago, for example?

Does anybody want to comment on that?