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Aviation History
1955
1955 - 1771.PDF
894 FLIGHT, 16 December 1955 M. P. J. M. Nottet (right), leader of the Belgian delegation, takes office as chairman of the Strasbourg conference. With him is M. Henri Bouche, first vice-president of the I.C.A.O. Council. BACKGROUND TO STRASBOURG . . . traffic freedoms, improvement of services and of airline produc-tivity, reduction of operating costs, speedy performance of ground services, establishment of operating or servicing pools."The second recommendation urged that as interchange in- volved legal problems relating to the chartering or hiring of air-craft, the Council of I.C.A.O. should consider the need for an international air law convention on this subject. The conference also pointed out that operation of air-groundcommunications by radio telephony would improve the economics of European transport and urged "better implementation of theI.C.A.O. navigational regional plan." The 1954 Strasbourg meeting also made a number of secondaryrecommendations designed mainly to reduce the time-wasting and costly effects of frontier procedures such as visas, customs exami-nations, manifests and health regulations. European states were asked to ensure that "any treatment accorded to air transport atairports was no less favourable than that given to surface transport at docks, bus or rail frontier posts." The conference also advocateda more liberal approach to the granting of rights to services which did not affect the interests of scheduled air transport: e.g., emer-gency, humanitarian, taxi, charter and freight flights. Boiled down into practical terms, many of these recommenda-tions meant very little, since the existing machinery for inter- national discussion of civil aviation problems was fully capable ofreaching similar conclusions and, probably, of taking equally effective action. The most important outcome of the first Stras-bourg meeting was its decision to set up a European civil aviation conference. It is this conference which, as reported above, held itsfirst session at Strasbourg on November 29th and is still under way at the time of writing. The conference has set itself a less ambitious agenda than itspredecessor and for this reason alone appears more likely to pro- duce some lasting results. States taking part in the conferenceare: Australia, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Nor-way, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey and the United Kingdom. Also present, but without voting rights, are observers of othermember states of I.C.A.O. and of the following international organizations: Council of Europe, United Nations, U.N. Econo-mic Commission for Europe, Organization for European Economic Cooperation, Universal Postal Union, World MeteorologicalOrganization, International Telecommunications Union, Euro- pean Conference of Ministers of Transport, Federation Inter-nationale des Transports Aerien Prives, International Air Trans- port Association, International Chamber of Commerce, Inter-national Federation of Airline Pilots Association, International Institute for Unification of Private Law, International LawAssociation, International Union of Aviation Insurers, Inter- national Aircraft Brokers' Association, Air Research Bureau,Institut Francais du Transport Aerien, International Association of Aircraft Manufacturers. The first action of the conference was to elect a chairman—M. P. J. M. Nottet, leader of the Belgian delegation—and other officials. Next, it was decided to set up two commissions, con-stitutional and economic, dealing with separate items on the agenda. The constitutional commission was appointed to dealwith items 1 and 2, the economic body was divided into sub- commissions, one dealing with commercial rights and the otherwith remaining points, including helicopters and interchange services. The provisional agenda was as follows: (1) Relationship with the International Civil Aviation Organiza- tion and arrangements for future meetings of the European Civil Aviation Conference. (2) Relationship between the Brussels Air Research Bureau andthe European Civil Aviation Conference. (3) Exchange of views on the question of helicopter ferries in Europe. (4) Exchange of views on a multilateral agreement for scheduledservices. (5) Exchange of views on a multilateral agreement for non- scheduled services. (6) Consideration of matters relating to the interchange of aircraft. Soon after the conference opened it appeared probable that onlytwo or three agenda items were likely to yield positive action; once again, perhaps, the conference had too much on its plate.Whatever the theoretical advantages of interchange services, for example, there is little doubt that if European airlines wishedto interchange they could do so through the medium of normal inter-carrier and government negotiations and without the aidof an international conference. Again, it is difficult to appreciate the purpose of an international discussion, at government level,of helicopter services, whose problems are largely technical and financial rather than political. Justifiable Belgian pride in theachievements of Sabena's helicopter network may have led to the inclusion of this subject on the agenda. The constitutional aspect is interesting, because the futurestatus of the conference was uncertain during the opening days at Strasbourg. A move was afoot, one gathered, to establish theEuropean Civil Aviation Conference as a permanent body. The significance of such a step would depend, of course, on the con-ference's powers, and its terms of reference, its relations with I.C.A.O. and its effects on fares and rates policies, which havesince 1946 been determined through the traffic conferences of the International Air Transport Association. Establishment of a separ-ate European air transport organization might generate similar action in other regions. In international aviation circles, thispossibility gives rise to some concern: such conferences might, in undeveloped regions, restrict rather than expedite the growth ofair transport. As we have suggested, it is by no means certain whether the European conference will show a real dividend. The question of the conference's relations with the Air ResearchBureau is also of interest. As its name implies, the Bureau is essentially a research organization, though—depending on the wayin which the conference develops—it might take on a more political character. The A.R.B. (not to be confused with the Air Registra-tion Board) is sponsored by eight of the European national airlines, including B.E.A., and has a small secretariat with headquartersin Brussels. Its main duty is to perform on behalf of the members, market surveys of a scope beyond their individual resources. Inthe past two years it has produced three extremely useful docu- ments in the form of traffic studies, two dealing with the develop-ment of passenger traffic and the third with cargo. Any move to adopt the Bureau as the conference's sole representative of theEuropean air transport industry would not, however, go un- opposed : the International Federation of Independent Air Trans-port (F.I.T.A.P.), for example, represents a powerful body of airline operators, many of whom operate scheduled services butare ineligible for membership of the A.R.B. At the request of the 1954 Strasbourg conference, I.C.A.O.produced a draft agreement for a multilateral convention on scheduled services in the European region, and this has beenpresented for discussion by the present conference. If adopted, this would represent the first victory over a previously insolubleproblem. Opinion at Strasbourg was, however, that the draft would not be adopted except, perhaps, in such qualified form thatit would not mark any significant improvement on the present system of bilateral negotiations. In the limited field of non-scheduled services, the prospects ofagreement were somewhat brighter. In essence, the draft of the multilateral document proposed by I.C.A.O. provides that sig-natory states should give free passage to the following classes of non-scheduled traffic: flights for the purpose of meeting emer-gency or humanitarian needs; taxi-class operations employing aircraft with seating capacity for up to ten passengers; flights onwhich the entire space of an aircraft is used by a single person (individual, firm, corporation or institution) for his own purposeand no part of the space is resold; single flights or flights of not greater frequency than once a month. Even in this restricted sphere of operations, however, theprospects of agreement are reduced by the lack of an internation- ally accepted definition of what constitutes a non-scheduledservice.
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