CONTROL OF AVIATION

Evening Post, Volume CXX, Issue 148, 19 December 1935, Page 10

CONTROL OF AVIATION

FOUNDATION FOR FUTURE PROGRESS

(By A.A.H.)

The decision which may be,reached as to the final development of an airport for the Wellington district is of real importance to Wellington, but there is a wider and more vital question for decision; it is the manner in which aviation development as a whole shall, in future be controlled in New Zealand. This country has been long in embarking upon air travel, and has not yet developed anything approaching a real measure of air defence. The far isolation of New Zealand from other countries has been a main reason for the lag in the coming of regular services, but the jumble of departmental control is the reason for the lack of preparation for ihose services, now that they are almost here.

The almost farcical position which has held up till now, as a result of six or seven separate departments all having a hand in the administration of aviation, working in sympathy, in harmony, and, seemingly, sometimes in opposition, has been.more than once referred to in "The Post." Latterly, when the-direct fact of the pending establishment of.air services had to be provided for, there has been—must have been—some straightening out, but such is the leeway that New Zealand is not ready for the operation of commercial services upon the ordered lines which are insisted upon overseas. The people of New Zealand are willing, the companies are willing, but divided control has made it impossible for the really essential concomitants of flying to be made ready. "Nine-tenths of all flying is done on the-ground," said some authority, and by that he meant that the provision of.machines and their actual flying in the, air are the tenth, and ground organisation—aerodromes, meteorological services, radio communication, directional radio beacons, maintenance and inspection of machines, time-table correlation and co-ordination, oversight of all aviation activities—build up the nine-tenths. It is recognised and aßmiUed that the system of divided responsibility for the technically distinct branches •*' grqund organisation will no longer meet the rapidly developing situation, and that these several departments, though continuing their work as departments, will be required to supply the special advice and guidance in which they are expert for correlation in some office of- aviation control, in place of each, as at present, working earnestly to give good service and guidance, each along its own lines and. to its own ideas of what is required. TWO SCHOOLS OF THOUGHT. There are two main' divisions of opinion as to the broad basis upon which correlated control should be brought about. One is that the whole aviation business, defence, commercial flying, aero'club activities, and private flying should be placed under a single guiding hand, under an- Air Ministry, or a portfolio of air, arid the other is that defence is defence and air transport is transport, and, that .being so, that commercial flying should be administered by the Transport Department. But if it is accepted that nine-tenths of. flying, or ..at' any rate the greater part of it, is done on the ground, this defence-transport differentiation in aviation control would still call for a double demand upon departments for technical information, though the greater part of all that technical advice would be common ground to both defence and. commercial work. To a great degree aerodrome construction and'equipment is common ground, the special meteorological services required certainly so, the regular inspection of aircraft essentially so, and radio communication' and directional equipment are:again: common services. There are aspects of r commercial aviation, (timetables, . fares, . company aerodrome buildings, passenger accommodation, etc.)-in which defence is • not concerned, but, balancing these considerations, is the' consideration of the. use and the value of the commercial, aero clubY and private flying, side of.air transport in event of emergency or need of. defence. The basic' idea is true; transport is transport, and defence is defence, but such is the importance of the manysided technical work common to both transport and defence flying that the basic idea breaks down before the necessity of some system of control which is able to draw from specialising departments (without establishing new departments) the advice which it requires for. the. carry ing out of a policy which will utilise weather, communication, inspection, ground equipment, and construction expert advice for the common needs of defence, commercial work, dub activity, and what private flying there may be. . Is aero ■ club flying transport or defence? The-question' is not nearly so . easily answered as put. Aero ■ clubs have commercial licences, but the very purpose of the clubs is to encourage a large number of enthusiasts to learn to fly, against possible emergencies. The aero clubs are not at all happy about the outlook- if- transport is to be re-

garded as transport and defence as defence. Theoretically the control of clubs should 'be halved, transport today, defence tomorrow. REPRESENTATIONS TO BE REPEATED. The New Zealand Aero Club has several times made representations to past Governments that a single control should replace the lack of method which has held in the past, and the club proposes, at as early a date as possible, to approach the present Government with the earnest request that it should give full consideration to some such form of administration as one patterned upon, the British Air Ministry. The Wellington Chamber of Commerce, which has taken an active interest in the development of flying services, has also discussed the question in a general way, and the consensus of opinion is that a unified control of a peculiarly technical activity must' be brought about. The chamber has approached the. Associated Chambers, and thenext step will probably be that all the larger Chambers of "Commerce and business organisations will be circularised and asked to express their views. No doubt later the New Zealand Aero Club and-the chambers will join in representations to the Government. Not all countries,.far more developed in aviation than' New Zealand, have adopted a unified system of control. Australia, for instance, places civil and Air Force aviation under the Department of Defence, but there is apparently a far more-clear-cut policy there, free of the complications resulting from independent action by half a dozen other departments. South Africa, after experimenting with divided control, abandoned it as unsound, and in.most countries where flying has reached any real state of progress the advance has been under unified control. Th.c outstanding exception to this rule has been the United States, where flying has been, under the control of the Army, the Navy, and the Department •■• of Commerce. The enormous amount, of money which this three-fold system has.cost the American taxpayer has been repeatedly the subject of comment in American, and English aviation journals, whicha'lso have dealt with it harshly as an inefficient system. Such a combined heavy outgoing' in administration costs, would have been entirely beyond the ability of any less wealthy country to provide. STARTING RIGHTLY OR WRONGLY. To suggestions which may be made, and probably are being made, .that it is rather absurd.to.make such a fuss about aviation in New Zealand, a very small activity after all compared with what it is in other countries, there is a perfectly sound answer; it is that today (as the step was not taken earlier) the foundations for sound development are being well or unsatisfactorily laid. ; -.-. ■ ■•< - . ■ There is a . second answer; that whether five passenger aircraft or five hundred are running; the weather and difficult country risks' remain constant, and that each- passenger is entitled to the last safeguard that can be afforded, not merely in money outlay in equipment, but in the most efficient application of that equipment and the special technical knowledge without which it cannot give full service. TEN POINTS FOR UNIFIED CONTROL. The general case for a unified control of all flying activity—call it an Air Ministry, a Council of Air, a Portfolio of Air, whatever it may be—as against the separation of civil aviation from the Air Force may be summed up in the following points:— . . (1) The Air Force has no more direct relation to the Army than lias the Navy. Though in actual operation it must coordinate with both Army and Navy, neither.of these arms of defence can co-operate in the greater part of aviation, the highly specialised work of ground organisation, meteorology, communication, etc., which essentially must precede and'continually work in with the actual flying operations. ' (2) Jn the event of emergency, civil aircraft, personnel, and facilities must merge immediately with Air Force activities, and will function effectively under a continued rather than a changed control. (3) To a large degree the Air Force is directly dependent on civil aviation. The ground organisation of both branches is, inseparable without dupli-

overlapping,-and waste. Ground organisation, generally speaking, serves both equally. Inevitably it is expensive, without duplication. .

(4) The placing of civil aviation under a department other than one whose whole function it is to administer aviation means that it will remain ,a sideline of a department, and will therefore still be handicapped as at present. (5) The control of civil aviation requires technical administration; to place it in hands other than technical is to repeat the errors that have been made when .the Air.Force and civil aviation have been under Army control. (6) Civil aviation requires the backing during its developmental stages of a constructive department,- anS not of a purely administrative department that is only capable of- ruling by restrictive regulation. • (7) The most experienced personnel who are retired from the Air Force at a comparatively early age become available for administrative duties in civil aviation. (8) Only a part of the functions of the Air Force are military duties in the accepted sense of the term, the greater part of its work consisting in such civil occupations as inspection of aircraft and equipment, inspection of aerodromes, repair of aircraft, photographic surveys, etc.; for every potential combatant member of the force at least four are' non-combatant. ' (9) To separate the Air Force from civil aviation weakens both, benefits neither, and puts further into the future the time when a single department will' be available to. advise the Government on all air matters. (10) Civil aviation is. highly competitive with all other forms of transport,, and as it. recognises none of the boundaries circumscribing the use of other-forms of transport it cannot be co-ordinated with them without its development being retarded and stultified. . : :