Transport committee  Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Richards, SMS is not a complete removal of oversight; it is an extra layer. It is the promotion of a corporate culture at all levels, not only on the shop floor, but at very senior levels, strategically, and at CEO levels, to ensure.... But I would s

Transport committee  I can't tell you why it happened, because the minister made his decision based on advice and circumstances and the minister has a right under the Aeronautics Act to--

Transport committee  I can't speak to that. I was not privy to the minister's decision-making process when he made his decision.

Transport committee  I would be speculating to tell you what the right number is. We know that we've had a system that's been working, and in our view, we've had oversight all along. So as for the right number, now that it goes back to Transport Canada, that's for their own organizational requireme

Transport committee  That's correct.

Transport committee  It was 2002. What happened was that the discussions took place and feasibility studies were done.

Transport committee  Yes, Mr. Chairman.

Transport committee  We don't agree with all the conclusions, Mr. Bevington. We will accept working on making sure the safety recommendations go forward to the Minister of Transport, because we are interested in aviation safety first and foremost. It's our business. We are interested in maintaining

Transport committee  For accuracy, we actually have 515 aircraft that are certified under our association. You are correct that the entire corporate aviation sector has about 900 aircraft, but they are commercially operated.

Transport committee  It's approximately 400.

Transport committee  Those are not 400 companies that we audit. It's the operators that.... For example, we're not auditing Corporation XYZ. We're auditing their inflight departments and we certify their aircraft, and according to--

Transport committee  Some of those companies are associate members, and some companies outsource their flying to other management companies, so it's less than that.

Transport committee  The objective of SMS as initiated when the discussions took place in early 2000 was to.... Because of the safety record of the business aviation sector, the intent was to implement SMS in the sector, to recognize the fact that it was a safe sector, and the resources from the gove

Transport committee  Thank you for the question. First of all, in terms of if our position has changed, we've very much complied with government regulatory frameworks, both before the minister had given us this in 2005.... We've always complied with regulatory frameworks of compliance, both required

Transport committee  Thank you for the question. I'm not clear as to what I was misquoted on, but I did write the article that the member refers to. I am being quoted accurately; yes, I did write that. In terms of SMS--that we did nothing--I would contend, Mr. Chair, that SMS was an integral part o