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Aviation History
1937
1937 - 0816.PDF
312 FLIGHT. MARCH 25, 1937. Commercial Aviation CHAOS IN AUSTRALIA The Change from Commonwealth to State Control : What it Means By EDWARD J. HART (lately Editor of the Australian paper Aircraft) BETWEEN sunrise and sunset of March 6, 1937, the whole aspect of civil aviation in Australia changed from national acceptance of the Air Navigation Act (1921) to what Australia's Prime Minister terms " absolute chaos "—and back has swung the pendulum to the disastrous pre-control era of 1918-20 when a pilot was free to break a neck without breaking an Act. The confusion defies exaggeration. I am writing five days after the States (by a 4-2 majority) had rejected Commonwealth control of civil aviation in favour of control by each State. In London to-day no Anglo-Australian official can shed a ray of light on the situation. No word has been received from Aus tralia by the High Commissioner, the air liaison officer at Australia House, the six Agents-General, or the Civil Aviation officer in charge of Empire air mail services. This applies also to the Air Ministry and managing director of Imperial Air ways. All are still awaiting an official statement. A Qood Customer While the cause of this upheaval is Australia's own affair, its effects may vitally concern our aircraft industry. For Australia has proved a good customer. Mast of her airline contractors have always bought British. The twenty-nine ser vices now operating over 16,776 miles and logging a yearly aggregate of 4,630,080 miles, offer a priceless tribute to British aircraft design and construction. Her flying clubs all use our equipment. All these flying enterprises exist on subsidies granted by the Commonwealth Government, under a liberal policy sponsored by the late Col. Brinsmead, who became Controller of Civil Aviation 011 December 6, 1920. By the recent referendum the federated States of Australia invalidated the Air Navigation Act which for sixteen years Jias governed all civil flying in Australia and New Guinea; simultaneously they declared unconstitutional a department which, till then, was the aviation nerve-centre of a country as large as Europe. The cause of all this was a trivial incident. A private pilot had been prosecuted under the Act. Against the conviction his counsel submitted a novel plea—that the Act should never have been passed. He quoted the Constitution Act (1900) and argued that a prosecution under the 1921 Act must fail unless the six States, by referendum, empowered the Commonwealth Parliament to extend the scope of the 1900 Act by amending Section 51. The High Court upheld the appeal and quashed the conviction. Early Years A referendum was taken. Victoria and Queensland voted for the amendment; New South Wales, Western Australia, South Australia and Tasmania against. Section 51 reads: "The Parliament shall, subject to this Constitution, have power to make laws for the peace, order and good government of the Commonwealth with respect to ... " and goes on to enumerate thirty-nine separate matters. That these do not include aviation is but a natural omission, for the Act was passed on July 9, 1900, and the Wright Brothers first flew on December 17, 1903. Time marched on. In pre-war Australia the men who hopped off the ground for a few minutes could be counted on the fingers of one hand. But as early as April, 1918, I was writing of the need for centralised control; I was, in fact, the first in Australia publicly to advocate it. The Air Navigation Act was needed in Australia a year before it came into force in England. In 1918 two so-called commercial aviation companies were registered; one with nominal capital of ^150,000. Twelve others were born in 1919, and fourteen more in 1920. Also there were several private owners—some wholly untrained. Most of these enterprises were short-lived—literally. For three years there was no sem blance of official control. Since 1920 the Commonwealth Civil Aviation Department has been sole controlling authority-. Centralised in Melbourne, at Victoria Barracks, the organisation has been built up, step by step, with patience, tact, foresight and unremitting toil. Here are kept all records, files, maps, reports, C.A. forms, statistics, and an aviation library unique in Australia. In all- round efficiency the department has but little to learn from Gwydyr House. The functions of the old C.A. Department will, I expect, be taken over and sextuplicated by six State departments, each with its own CCA. More than one political party is in power in the State Parliaments. Will they agree to a uniform aviation policy? I think not. Some of the States pride themselves on being "different." For years there has been talk of secession. Four out of five State-owned railway sys tems break gauge at the contiguous State's border. The transfer of civil aviation to State control will be a slow and tedious affair. I doubt if the necessary legislation can be completed before 1938. First, there must be a Premiers' Conference. It cannot be held until the last Premier returns home from the Coronation festivities. Next, the Premiers will confer at Canberra, this time with the Commonwealth Cabinet. Thirdly, they will report back to their own Cabinets. Finally, there will be twelve separate meetings (of six Legislative Coun cils and six Legislative Assemblies) to debate and pass Bills and Acts to control civil aviation. What of future subsidies ? Who will pay them ? And who will receive them? Will preference be given to native sons? Under Commonwealth administration the first air mail con tract, in Western Australia, went to a Victorian (Norman Brearley); the second, in Queensland, to a Tasmanian (Hudson Fysh). Mosts air lines serve more than one State. Holyman's Airways serves three; Adelaide Airways four. These twenty- nine air line contracts are important. The longest is 4,361 miles; others are of 2,252, 1,453 and 1,164, miles. Eleven services carry mails under subsidy from the P.M.G.'s Depart ment ; fourteen others from the Commonwealth Defence De partment. Will the State Governments renew their subsidies? Or will they raise the old bogy of competition with State- owned railways and subsidised shipping and surface transport? Empire Services Unless Australia's authority to sign the International Air Convention (which she did at Paris on November 27, 1919) also proves unconstitutional, the Empire flying boat service to Brisbane should not be affected; but in New South Wales Mr. Lang's Labour Party may try to block its extension to Sydney by Qantas, which is a Queensland company. It is unlikely that individual States will refuse to continue the Commonwealth subsidy to sections of the Royal Australian Aero Club. These are strictly local organisations, affiliated through the Royal Aero Club to the F.A.I. Air Ministry liaison will probably be attempted between the six State Con trollers of Civil Aviation and their respective Agents-General in London, assuming, of course, that they will not substitute something of their own for the Air Ministry Notices to Airmen and Ground Engineers. Seventeen 3'ears ago the Permanent Head of the Prime Minister's Department, on instructions from the Rt. Hon. W. M. Hughes, wrote to me: " The Commonwealth will in any case itself centralise the control of flying." It did so on February 11, 1921, when the Air Navigation Act was passed— but without a referendum. There lies the root of the new problem. Control was assumed, centralised and exercised. Now there is none. Batavia—Manila I T appears that Mr. Plesman, the managing director of K.L.M., has succeeded in the major object of his recent visit to the United States. Permission has been granted for the operation, by K.N.I.L.M., of a weekly service between the Netherlands East Indies and the Philippines. The con ditions involve the right for P.A.A. to operate a similar service. A, Customer from Lullingstone? T HE possibility that Imperial Airways may eventually move their European flying base from Croydon to the new air port which is being constructed at Lullingstone, six miles south of Dartford, was mentioned at the sitting of a Select Committee in the House of Commons last week. The Committee was considering the Southern Railway Bill, in which powers are sought by the company to alter property in Buckingham Palace Road in connection with the projected headquarters for Imperial Airways. It should be remem bered, however, that the new airport cannot possibly be ready for at least eighteen months, and any excitement caused b%T the suggestion is more than premature.
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