AERO CLUBS AND AIR DEFENCE

Dominion, Volume 30, Issue 46, 18 November 1936, Page 10

AERO CLUBS AND AIR DEFENCE

Hope is expressed in the annual report of the New Zealand Aero Club (which embraces all district clubs) that reports from visitingoverseas experts may enable the Government to define a policy for the progress of aviation —-a policy in pursuance of which full, advantage may be taken of the facilities offered by aero clubs in training pilots and ground engineers for defence and for commercial flying. Hitherto a Government subsidy has been paid in respect of a specified annual maximum number of qualifying pilots of military age and fitness, but clubs have received no allowance in respect of ground engineers trained, although .the safety of aircraft in flight and of the men who pilot them depends very largely on the skill and care of the ground staff. However, the justification for subsidies is the defence value of the training given by the chibs, and the Air Force may prefer to train its own engineers. Club-trained pilots, on the other hand, form rhe backbone of the Territorial Air Force, and the present relationship between the clubs and the Defence Department could hardly he improved upon, as far as it goes. The chibs say it does not go far enough. They find plenty of good material offering for training, and could train it faster than they are doing if only they had more machines and more liberal subsidies. The immediate need is not so much to increase the number of new trainees as to provide facilities for flying by those who have trained. Tn part this can be done by giving the clubs new tvpes of machine, and the Government’s decision to buy four Miles Hawk trainers is a valuable first step in that direction Tn larger part it can be done only by increasing the establishment and the equipment of the New Zealand Air Force, permanent and Territorial.