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Aviation History
1949
1949 - 0502.PDF
322 FLIGHT MARCH 17TH, 1949 Civil Aviation Costs Some Sombre Revelations from the Civil Appropriation Accounts I N hit report 011 National Expenditure for the year 1947-48,published last week, the Comptroller and Auditor-Generalcomments upon the Exchequer grants to the Ministry of Civil Aviation. Before the beginning of 1947-48, says the report, the three Airways Corporations submitted programmes of services and certain related financial estimates, those for B.O.A.C. and H.E.A.C. showing deficits which combined were much in excess of the statutory maximum grant of £10,000,000. (.rants to the Corporations did not reflect the full cost to the Exchequer of the air services they operated. Receipts from landing fees represented about one-sixth of the expenditure incurred by the Ministry in providing the airfields and pro- viding the necessary technical services, but excluding any interest on capital. The income fell far short of the cost and it was clear, says the report, that a substantial subvention to air service operators, both British and foreign, was involved. In the year under review expenditure on lauding fields at home and abroad'amounted to 1.56 of 4!ne Corporation's total operating expenditure.^ In January, -1^48, the Treasury agreed that the provision of ground facilities was not the proper responsibility of operators and authorized the Ministry to meet the expense of facilities essential to the reasonable development of the Corporations' programmes when they were not provided by the local governments. This particularly applied to flying- boat routes. For such purposes some £750,000 was paid to the three Airways Corporations and a related company and the Ministry also issued some equipment free of charge. The Auditor has asked the Ministry for information about their arrangements for controlling the expenditure and the basis of contributions from users. In 1943 B.O.A.C. formed a development unit for testing aircraft and equipment under civil operating conditions in collaboration with interested Government departments. Ex- penditure to March 31st, 1946, was allowed under the arrange- ments for deficiency grants, but in March, 1948, the Treasury expressed the view that the Corporation should in future finance the unit and collect contributions from other bodies relating to the benefits obtained from its work. The Treasury agreed, however, to reimburse the Corporation to the extent of 75 per cent for the year under review, estimated at £100,000. Charges for equipment delivered to the Corporations and other operators included £2,117,792 for aircraft adapted from service types and delivered to B.O.A.C. in 1945-46. The credits for these aircraft totalled £513,000. Receipts for sale or hire of other aircraft totalled £3,811,239 in 1947-48. The report refers to aircraft which were sold at prices con- siderably less than the cost to the Ministry and others which were hired at rentals unlikely to repay the cost of the aircraft within their probable life. In 1946 a number of Vikings which cost £1,160,000 were hired to a Corporation and when taken out of service their rental earnings totalled less than £100,000. Some had since been sold for under one-eighth of their cost. Between December, 1946, and March, 1947, JU-52S were re- conditioned at a cost of nearly £ro,ooo each, hired at £20 a month each and taken out of service after a few months' use. In the same year some Lancastrians, priced at £42,000 each, were sold a-t £14,000 each and others were hired at £2,000 a year. Yorks priced at £50,000 each were also delivered and eventually bought outright at the agreed price of £17,500 each. The Auditor has addressed a number of enquiries to the Ministry on these "and similar transactions, including a number of sales and hirings to foreign operators on terms which did not appear likely to cover the costs incurred by the Ministry. On the establishment of the Air Registration Board in 1937 provision was made for meeting deficits for an initial period of five years as to one-fifth by the varous interested concerns (including operators, constructors and insurers) and as to four-fifths by the Air Ministry. This financiaJ self-sufficiency... had, however, never been achieved and in March, 1948, it was 7 agreed that for the four years 1945 to 1949 the outside interests./; would contribute £27,600 and the Ministry the balance, esti-; mated at about £225,000 of the Board's deficit. . ? First B.A.C.A. Conversazione APPLYING the experiences of the early days of Lloyd's andthe Baltic Exchange, the British Air Charter Association has started a regular calling-together of all its members for informal talks. The first quarterly gathering was held on Wednesday, March 9th, at Londonderry House, to which were invited also members of the Aerodrome Owners' Asso- ciation and representatives of aircraft manufacturers. Charter companies which are not members of the association were also encouraged to be represented in order to make the meeting as beneficial as possible to civil aviation. Mr. J. E. Rylands, chairman of the B.A.C.A., hoped that many more charter companies would join the Association, as he had no doubt in his mind that it was of real, practical use to its members and. in fact, had been of value to all indepen- dent air-charter operators. He referred to the number of* occasions on which a B.A.C.A. delegation had been received by the Minister of Civil Aviation and how the Association had ^ made the first move to obtain associate agreements for flying scheduled services. He looked forward to further achievement and considered that only such an Association was in a position to express satisfactorily the views of the independent operators in the international sphere; it was important that their opinions should be heard in I.C.A.O. As to the Civil Aviation^ Act, from the beginning the Association had impressed upon the Minister and the Ministry the unsatisfactory nature of the Act as it stood, and they would not be satisfied until it Left: A group of " independents " at the B.A.C.A. first quarterly "get-together," Mr. T. W. Morton, Capt. G. P. Olley, Mr. J. E. Rylands, Mr. H. R. Gillman and Mr. C. C. Simpson. Above: WjC. N. H. Woodhead and Mr. W. N. Cumming in discussion.
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