coljones

The Qeanbeyan meeting was famous. What was infamous was the behaviour of the, then, board, who gamed the system.

Thanks Bruce. I pay my taxes and I am grateful that the poor are getting a bit of it rather than some scumbag politician and his/her scumbag tax dodging mates. Under/in employment stats should be broken out into categories such as under employed of which quite a few are at or below the poverty line and don't end up in the stats, those who have finished one job and on their way to another, those that are shorterm unemployed and looking for work and the long term unemployed a number of who should really be on disability pensions because it is hard to walk from Sydney to Newcastle when you have no legs. Out of all those categories there are few who could be regarded as workshy or bludgers. The people that I despise most are politicians who game unemployment to satisfy their political fantasies and those of their supporters and employers who lean on desperate job seekers by extracting punishing conditions on them aka 7-11 and their ilk. The vast majority of unemployed, workers and employers are good people and deserve our support. I was going to do a thesis on the US Presidential Electoral system - interesting, twisting, confusing and very scary. Maybe I should do it on popular myths on unemployment in Australia instead.

30,000 in an electorate of 100,000????

We are moving (have moved) into an era of extensive underemployment where the workers are getting an amount of hours that makes them employed but not the hours that they want. In some cases they are living below the poverty level and/or working in areas and at times which are unsociable or on zero hour contracts that binds them without offering any money. The workers being let off in the car industry and, perhaps, Camit are going to face issues because of their age, lack of relevant training and lack of jobs where they live.

As long as the loan is for the reengineering of the local operation as opposed to immediate repatriation to the foreign owner - another way to cause a tax leakage offshore. Business should be predicated on a genuine business plan, not a wish list of handouts from the government nor a trick up for offshoring the tax to havens (which add no value, do not work and are just conduits for legal black money)

Teachers have probably worked out that it is better to teach good maths and science than to replicate bad, illogical spelling perverted by dictionary compilers who should have known better. We should have more science and less spelling circuses. Great, they can spell supercalifragilisticexpialidocious but can they fill in a simple tax return???

I am still waiting for the agenda and proxy form to turn up. Telstra sends me these. Isn't RAA playing with the big boys now? I think that RAA has to stop thinking about a flying as an excuse to hold a meeting when in fact they should be thinking that a meeting could be used as an excuse to hold a flying. If they don't want my resolutions moving receipt of the Annual Accounts and the Auditors report thereon and the other one thanking the board then they will have to wait. No, only allowing 48 hours for members to respond to a proposal is not fair as on contentious issues there would be the need to arrange attendance or to instruct proxies and submit them. IMHO the agenda, the accounts (full year or 6 months), all proposals and the proxy forms should be in the hands of the members at least 14 days prior to the meeting, subject to the act. The notice of meeting should be some time in advance to permit the proposals to be in the hands of the secretary, for vetting, collation etc, and in sufficient time to get through Australia Post and into the hands of members as required. Lack of notice and lack of agenda is a fraud on the rank and file.

But the liquidator might accept 1¢ in the $ because that is the best offer. I don't know about Vic but it seems that this is the way private railways and tollways get traded in NSW. I'm sure a few gold mines have been bought by the directors in the same way. As a going concern the creditors, but not the shareholders, might get some scraps to fight over.

Where will I find the proxy paper¿

Jabiru could step in and buy it for a bargain price. The receivers would get more for it as a going concern with local trained and qualified workers than as selling it off for scrap value - there will be lots of scrap now that Ford, GM and ASC were put on the block by the gummint.

Yenn, there is a new board, with one new face, and with an unknown bent. The troika has been augment and is now a board of 7 so there is a possibility that things will change. I think Kasper's proposals were unsupportable. It is now time to sit back a bit and see what this new board delivers for us. If we don't like it we can call a meeting and instruct the board of how it should be. With the change to the Constitution there was, increasingly, a need for speed as progress had become glacial because of vested interests and groups out there castrating mosquitoes. Apart from some procedural issues like elections and notices for meetings all the rest looked moderately OK for a document crafted by lawyers (they can make it much worse and even more undemocratic). My big problem was the size of the board, I always and still feel It should be bigger than 7. Given that the membership was in general support for a board of 7, resistance was futile. If you had a problem with the way RAA in the past blame the old board. If you have the problem with the direction that RAA is heading complain to the new board or just ring Eugene. Let it settle a bit so that all might become clear. You can't become an ELAAA thingy just yet so you might as well hang with the devil you do know for a while longer. If you are impatient, read the Constitution, work out your resolutions, start your petition and call a meeting - if you do call an EGM, please hold it in Sydney, I'm all travelled out this week. Otherwise, enjoy the flying.

RAA IS A MEMBER BASED ORGANISATION!!!! THE MEMBERS CAN VOTE FOR THE BOARD, THE MEMBERS CAN VOTE TO CHANGE THE CONSTITUTION, MEMBERS CAN REQUISITION MEETINGS AND CARRY RESOLUTIONS. The only similarity between RAA and ELAAA is that they are both regulated by ASIC. ELAAA IS A PRIVATE COMPANY OWNED BY THE SHAREHOLDERS.

30+ days is more than 700 hours except that they need stop the engine to do some maintenance and measurements on a periodical basis. Some were surprised that you might stop and do maintenance after only 3 days (in excess of 70 hours). I am sure even a Camit or Rotax would also need that.

3 days is 72 hours.

A bit like the model for ice cream sellers on a beach. The first will set up anywhere on the beach, because they can. The second and All the others Will have a tendency to set up in the middle, and not down the beach, because they want a share of the same, not a reduced, customer base. This will force the 1st to the middle to recapture some of their, now, lost business (why would anyone want to walk past the middle) Because the volume to each seller is reduced so is their profit so each will trim their product lines to only the most profitable lines. (Think ALDI or Bunnings) Which is the least cost, to the registrar, aircraft? Is it 95-10 or is it the factory made plastics? If the non CASA players are facing price competition there may well be an abandonment of those classes of planes and pilot that are less profitable. Yes, the devil will be in the detail!

They might not be able to discriminate between people based on a service they offer but they are not prevented from refusing to be in the business of providing a particular service at all. You can't sue a shop if they refuse to stock Dick Smith Foods. People wouldn't be able to sue if they refuse to manage 95-10, unless CASA insisted as part of some deed.

But the New Company might Play you off. An attempt was made to expel Ian from RAA by refusing his re-admission. There is probably nothing forcing ELAAA to service all comers. The business model for OPTUS was to refuse to cable up blocks of flats and to use Telstra copper in preference to OPTUS cable. There are no guarantees out there in private enterprise land and if you are refused service you can be offended all you like but no-one will really care. There might even be a ELAAA Customers Association formed to represent the customers to ELAAA.

Until we know the scope and authority of the ELAAA administration it is all speculation. It may be that aircraft owners and pilots could be, merely, exchanging one form of slavery for another as the cost of going to a different administration might not be free or easy.

Competition is good unless it is schismatic, where lots of money and energy goes into whether locktite should be red or blue. The fights go on for centuries and invent words like obscuratism and divide families and friends. Is there truly a better mousetrap or just wounded pride¿

perhaps the board might give consideration to the timing of receipt of resolutions by the secretary so that the notice including proposed resolutions can be placed in the hands of the membership with at least 21 days notice. As Kirk has pointed out some members don't/can't receive emails and thusly the use of 2nd class/ordinary mail would require a mailout at least 28 days prior to the meeting. I can't find a formal agenda and the Annual Report and Financials are well hidden. It would appear that if there is no motions to accept the financials or thank the board then there is not an opportunity to censure the board. There does not appear to be any proxy form either. Bugger!!!

Documents get changed all the time - the change gets proposed to the members, the mebers accept it, the secretary registers with ASIC - ASIC will accept it unless it is patently illegal. If it is only slightly illegal it would require a challenge, after registration by a stakeholder. Simple!!!

The old constitution wasn't much chop. No, the process wasn't to my liking. I would have preferred that they discussed the philosophy of RAA with the members first - the only dogma was "We hate the number 13!!!" There is nothing stopping anyone proposing changes to the new one. Don has shown that change is possible. If anyone wants to change the constitution then they could run a campaign here to get a groundswell up. All I have heard is that some people don't like it but I have yet to see statements of philosophy, where the current constitution is sub-optimal and a proposed solution. If people were prepared to do that then even the new board might support it (and make life easy for the proponents) I'm not sure that the election rule is much chop as the national parliament doesn't have multi-member electorates except proportional representation in the senate. I think RAA makes up the rules on the run and corporation law is very flaky in relation to elections.

I understand that RAA Member Guarantee it is $1. Not much when it would cost RAA at least $5 to demand and process those guarantees. This is why it is a limited liability company. Schedule 5 are the daily and periodical inspections - some can be done by pilots - a limited daily list. the 100 hourly inspections are done by AMEs or LAMEs. Schedule 8 covers maintenance by pilots and is a limited list - if it is not on the list it is LAME work.

Those that have competence will self select. There are those that can't pour water out of a bottle - these you wouldn't want to encourage. I thought RAA was enabling L1 awareness and competency through its L1 competency programme.

Back in the old days RAA had my $130 stuck in the bank for no apparent reason. Then CASA came in and showed us why RAA had my money (and increasing) stuck in the bank. It was because RAA wasn't spending any money worth a damn on qualified staff, infrastructure and systems. Basically they were doing nothing!! I didn't like the fee increase by deception (charging for the magazine) but recognised that something had to be done to bring RAA to a condition fit for the future. I don't have a problem with the last board running down the reserves to build a better RAA because that is what they should have done years ago. People maintain and renovate their houses, and families, and so one should with RAA and a short term loss of a reasonable magnitude should allow this to happen. There is no published policy on adequacy of reserves, there should be. I am not quite sure why we need in excess of $1mil in net assert backing but I do expect that the board would know an should publish this to the membership.