Transport Canada delays new airline-safety system
Sarah Schmidt, Canwest News Service
Published: Sunday, November 29, 2009
OTTAWA -- Transport Canada is delaying the introduction of a controversial safety-inspection system at smaller commercial airlines after being inundated with concerns from its own staff about problems with the oversight regime, according to an internal memorandum.
The approach, called safety management systems (SMS), puts more onus on carriers by requiring them to develop and oversee an in-house system of safety checks tailored to their operations. This regulatory system is a shift away from traditional oversight where government inspectors had a much more hands-on role in monitoring the safety operations.
SMS has already been fully phased in at Canada's large commercial carriers, and was supposed to be in place at smaller operations within months. These include commuter planes carrying fewer than 50 passengers, regional airlines serving smaller communities and air ambulances.
Now, Transport Canada's civil aviation division has decided to postpone the system's implementation at these smaller operations until at least 2011 after departmental experts expressed "common concerns."
"Although I am only part way through my program of meeting staff in the regions and headquarters, it soon became clear that there were some common concerns coming up in the discussions," Martin Eley, Transport Canada's director general of civil aviation, wrote to staff on Nov. 13, 2009.
As a result, "the management team has agreed to make adjustments to the safety management systems regulatory roll out schedule and refine the project plan accordingly. This will allow more time for the industry to prepare for SMS implementation, and for Civil Aviation to refine oversight tools and provide more training for front-line employees.
"For air taxi and commuter operations, that means that the regulation will come into effect, at the earliest, in January 2011," Mr. Eley advised staff.
The correspondence was obtained by the Canadian Federal Pilots Association. The union, which represent pilots working at Transport Canada, the Transportation Safety Board and Nav Canada, has been raising red flags about SMS since it was fully phased in at major carriers in 2005.
The association says the implementation delay is good news, but raises "troubling questions" about the safety of major commercial airlines.
"Transport Canada is to be commended for recognizing there are serious problems with its aviation SMS program. This postponement is absolutely the right thing to do. However, this decision acknowledges that SMS problems are undermining safety of the big airlines. We no longer have confidence the major carriers are compliant with safety regulations," said Daniel Slunder, head of the federal government's pilots union.
After instituting SMS for rail transportation in 2001, the Liberal government at the time expanded the oversight system to civil aviation, to be phased in over time. Both Liberal and Conservative transport ministers have consistently argued SMS doesn't reduce government oversight but rather serves as a proactive tool to compliment the government's inspection regime.
Government officials refer to SMS as an "extra layer of protection to help save lives," one that "expects the company to measure how well the system works."
The transition to SMS in civil aviation has already resulted in the elimination of Transport Canada's national and regional auditing programs of air operations.
"Aviation inspectors spend more time reviewing paper than airplanes under Transport Canada's SMS," said Mr. Slunder, adding surprise audits and inspections must be brought back immediately to ensure proper government oversight and "ensure safety of the major carriers."
News of the postponement of SMS implementation at smaller air operations comes as the House of Commons transport committee on Monday holds hearings to examine Transport Canada's enforcement of air-safety regulations and the implementation of SMS for the aviation industry. NDP transport critic Dennis Bevington called for the review, to which the other parties agreed.
The revelation also comes on the eve of a new regulation coming into effect Tuesday that critics say lays the foundation to extend SMS to Transport Canada's aircraft certification.
Transport Canada in the past had to sign off on any aircraft design, repair or modification. The new regulation introduces the concept of third-party liability.
A group of independent aeronautical engineers say such a step could be disastrous for aviation safety.
"Transport Canada has said in the past, ‘The only people who ever say that this modification or repair meets the regulation is Transport Canada.' What they want to do now is they want somebody else besides Transport Canada to sign a declaration that says, ‘Yes, it does meet the regulatory requirements,'" said John Roberts, an engineer and member the Vancouver Design Approval Representatives.
"This (regulation), from our perspective, is now the foundation for the next program, which will be Aircraft Certification Accountability Framework, otherwise known as ACAF, and ACAF is the next round of regulatory changes where they will be bringing in SMS to aircraft certification."
