Grant Shapps' statement in the USA that we will withdraw from the EASA at the end of the year continues to reverberate around the aviation industry. I don't think it will come as a complete shock although the trade body ADS (Aerospace, Defence, Security & Space) released a statement which said they were "disappointed that it [the government] has not taken a more ambitious approach". ADS claimed that remaining in the EASA was "the best option to maintain the competitiveness of our £36bn aerospace industry and our access to global export markets".
It cannot have come as surprise to the CAA who are supposed to take responsibility for certification of a whole range of activities in the aviation sector from January.
You might recall that in September 2017, the CEO of the CAA (sorry), Andrew Haines, gave a speech where he said this:
"So we are very uncompromising in our view that we should not be planning for a new independent aviation safety system in the UK. Indeed, we have consciously decided not to do that work as it would be misleading to suggest that’s a viable option".
Interestingly, the page on the CAA website that carried the text of this speech as a pdf has been taken down and replaced with Error 404 Page not found! We can't have Grant Shapps being embarrassed can we? However, there are plenty of web archiving services so you can read the whole thing HERE.
It seems now that the government has consciously decided not only that it IS a viable option, it's the preferred option and it will happen.
Work must have been going on to try as far as possible to replicate the EASA functions in the CAA but it seems out of the question that we will be able to build up capacity in time. I note this morning that Dr North is also quoting Haines from 2017 saying if we did leave the EASA, "we should adopt the existing EASA regulatory system, rather than developing a new framework from scratch". I can't find the quote but I'm sure this is right.
It is indeed the obvious solution and one which may well be repeated in many other sectors. We will simply copy and paste a lot of EU regulations and carry on - perhaps shadowing our continental friends simply because it makes sense. After all, we have now embedded the whole of the acquis communitaire into British law as Retained EU Law, so going one stage further won't make much difference.
I suspect this wouldn't bother too many people in Britain. At The Wheatsheaf, the ins and out of aviation safety regulation doesn't come up very often, although I can't speak for The Grey Horse in Brayton.
In this I am perhaps supported by Mark Wallace, journalist, newspaper columnist and chief executive of the website ConservativeHome. He is also a former campaign director of the TaxPayers' Alliance where Matthew Elliot, CEO of Vote Leave, also worked. He is a Brexiteer and now also writes a column for the i newspaper.
A few days ago he appeared to claim that Brexit has been completely misunderstood by remainers:
"What we all [Brexiteers] have in common is the view that decisions are better taken democratically in the UK than unaccountably in Brussels and that a system where governments and policies can be changed at the ballot box will in time, through trial and error, produce better decisions than any other approach.
"In other words, we were united by a desire to spend the rest of our lives disagreeing and debating in a self-governing democracy.
"That’s why this demand for instant certainty and unity about future policy is bogus. It’s the empty sugar high of political debate, in that it feels good for about 30 seconds but satisfies nobody in the long run. I often come across such attacks – 'What’s the rule on carrot imports going to be? You don’t know! The immigration policy isn’t the precise version you said you wanted, I bet you regret Brexit now!' They shed no light on anything because they involve people talking at completely cross-purposes"
I suspect this wouldn't bother too many people in Britain. At The Wheatsheaf, the ins and out of aviation safety regulation doesn't come up very often, although I can't speak for The Grey Horse in Brayton.
In this I am perhaps supported by Mark Wallace, journalist, newspaper columnist and chief executive of the website ConservativeHome. He is also a former campaign director of the TaxPayers' Alliance where Matthew Elliot, CEO of Vote Leave, also worked. He is a Brexiteer and now also writes a column for the i newspaper.
A few days ago he appeared to claim that Brexit has been completely misunderstood by remainers:
"What we all [Brexiteers] have in common is the view that decisions are better taken democratically in the UK than unaccountably in Brussels and that a system where governments and policies can be changed at the ballot box will in time, through trial and error, produce better decisions than any other approach.
"In other words, we were united by a desire to spend the rest of our lives disagreeing and debating in a self-governing democracy.
"That’s why this demand for instant certainty and unity about future policy is bogus. It’s the empty sugar high of political debate, in that it feels good for about 30 seconds but satisfies nobody in the long run. I often come across such attacks – 'What’s the rule on carrot imports going to be? You don’t know! The immigration policy isn’t the precise version you said you wanted, I bet you regret Brexit now!' They shed no light on anything because they involve people talking at completely cross-purposes"
Of course Wallace may well be yearning for "instant certainty" when it comes to 1st January 2021 and he doesn't know if he will be able to jet off somewhere or buy carrots at Tesco. Workers at Airbus in Chester may well also be looking for something like instant certainty too, but forget that for the moment.
If I understand what he is saying correctly, the EASA decision is what Brexit was all about. We could well decide to follow all the EASA regulatory regime, exactly as Andrew Haines wanted, but the crucial difference is we will have decided to do it ourselves. This rather overlooks the fact that we decided to join the EU, create the EASA and help to set the rules that we used to kick against. Afterwards, we will have the illusion of taking back control but we could be following most of those rules anyway.
The corollary is that Brexit isn't really about improving anything, it's all about being able to say we've taken back control - even in order to relinquish it straightaway. We will be poorer because trade will suffer, we will be weaker outside the EU bloc of 27 nations and less secure without being connected to the EU criminal databases. We'll be using what Wallace calls "trial and error" to muddle onwards in typical British fashion but we'll be in control, won't we?
What this highlights is the folly over the last thirty years of not following debates in Europe about EU regulations, why they're needed, how they're agreed and the democratic process by which they become law. Wallace believes, "decisions are better taken democratically in the UK than unaccountably in Brussels" but as we know they only appear to be unaccountable if you think the UK has not been at the very heart of the decision making process.
As we know this isn't true - but a lot of people think it is thanks to the action of a few press barons.
If I understand what he is saying correctly, the EASA decision is what Brexit was all about. We could well decide to follow all the EASA regulatory regime, exactly as Andrew Haines wanted, but the crucial difference is we will have decided to do it ourselves. This rather overlooks the fact that we decided to join the EU, create the EASA and help to set the rules that we used to kick against. Afterwards, we will have the illusion of taking back control but we could be following most of those rules anyway.
The corollary is that Brexit isn't really about improving anything, it's all about being able to say we've taken back control - even in order to relinquish it straightaway. We will be poorer because trade will suffer, we will be weaker outside the EU bloc of 27 nations and less secure without being connected to the EU criminal databases. We'll be using what Wallace calls "trial and error" to muddle onwards in typical British fashion but we'll be in control, won't we?
What this highlights is the folly over the last thirty years of not following debates in Europe about EU regulations, why they're needed, how they're agreed and the democratic process by which they become law. Wallace believes, "decisions are better taken democratically in the UK than unaccountably in Brussels" but as we know they only appear to be unaccountable if you think the UK has not been at the very heart of the decision making process.
As we know this isn't true - but a lot of people think it is thanks to the action of a few press barons.
