The European Aviation Safety Agency has published its proposals for the future of the aviation regulatory system. These proposals, presented as an ‘EASA Opinion’, are the outcome of consultation with stakeholders which started in September 2014.
Among others, EASA proposes that when national authorities have a lack of resources or expertise, they should be able to delegate some of their oversight functions to other authorities or to EASA, in order to make sure that no safety risks are overlooked. The Agency also proposes that, on a voluntary basis, Member States can decide that their State aircraft (excluding military) can be covered by EASA. The proposals also include the extension of the Agency’s scope of intervention in new domains, such as airport ground handling, RPAS (drones) and security, in order to cover in a comprehensive way all aviation safety related topics.
‘EASA, that means the Agency and its sister national authorities, need to be prepared for the challenges ahead. With these changes, we will be more proportional, flexible and proactive to increase the level of safety in European aviation’ said EASA Executive Director, Patrick Ky, ‘I believe that although our proposals are ambitious they are also reasonable. There is nothing wrong with being ambitious about safety’.
Next step, the Opinion will be sent to the European Commission which will use it as an input for the amendment of the Agency’s current Basic Regulation within 2015.