Bruce Baird (Cook, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

It is my pleasure to rise to speak on the bill and to follow my colleague the member for Stirling. I thank him for his referral of the matter and for looking at it in fine detail. The Civil Aviation Legislation Amendment (Mutual Recognition with New Zealand) Bill 2005 is a technical bill and relates to the coordination with New Zealand of civil aviation requirements and mutual recognition of safety standards and certificates.

I chair the trade subcommittee of the Joint Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade in this House, and a few weeks ago we visited New Zealand as part of the 20-year anniversary—actually it has passed that; it is now some 23 years since the CER was established with New Zealand. Part of the reason why the CER was established was to ensure that we become a common market. That has happened to quite a large extent, but still there are obstacles which we continually need to overcome.

Part of our review was to look at what issues still remain on the agenda both within Australia and in New Zealand. Of course, we will be producing our report on that shortly. This bill is part of the coordination. In many ways, we operate like one country, but still with our independence. But with air safety, it is appropriate that we should coordinate wherever possible. Only air operator certificates for aircraft with more than 30 seats or 15,000 kilograms maximum take-off weight will be covered by mutual recognition at this stage.

The bill has been developed concurrently with New Zealand legislation, which was passed in the New Zealand parliament in March 2004, whereby their regulation and privileges will be compliant with ours and vice versa. It is a bill that has been designed to take out the duplication and complexity that currently exists for airline operators. It has been designed because current rules and regulations are not consistent with the intention of an open skies air services agreement to promote competition between Australian and New Zealand operators. It certainly will allow for a more flowing system of aircraft operation between the two countries.

The importance of it goes to the very core of the CER and the objectives of the CER to expand free trade by eliminating barriers to trade and promoting free trade competition. The fact is that New Zealand is a very important tourism destination for Australia. It is the No. 1 tourist destination for the Australian market. It is our source of tourists from New Zealand and vice versa—the No. 1 destination of their international visits is Australia, which is not surprising—albeit if you look at the spend of visitors from North America and Germany et cetera, they have a much greater to spend per capita. This is because many New Zealanders will come over to watch a footy match, which is fine, we love to have them. The figures represent them as No. 1 in terms of the number of people who visit this country. New Zealand currently represents 17 per cent of total visitors to Australia.

In 2005 close to 800,000 New Zealanders visited Australia, and it is forecast that by 2012 this figure will be around one million. Around a quarter of the visitors to New Zealand also visit Australia—which is not surprising, as many such visitors would travel through Australia to get to New Zealand—and approximately 10 per cent of visitors to Australia also visit New Zealand. Therefore, it is important, because of the tourism connections between our two countries, that we coordinate. The fact we have got Air New Zealand operating into Australia and flying internationally from Australian airports—

A division having been called in the House of Representatives—

As someone who shows a strong interest in tourism, Mr Deputy Speaker Scott, you would be interested in the way in which the tourism trade between Australia and New Zealand has developed so strongly. We are now in a position where New Zealand is our No. 1 source of tourists in terms of numbers. The same applies for New Zealand: Australians represent their No. 1 market for tourists. It is of note that approximately 10 per cent of those who travel to New Zealand also visit Australia. So there is that flow-on effect between the two countries. Their program ‘100 per cent New Zealand’ has worked very well for them. They attract a lot of international visitors, particularly American visitors, to the country.

As we have many visitors in common and the tourist numbers are similar, we should also be looking at coordinating arrangements in terms of civil aviation. That Air New Zealand flies freely within this country to international routes, particularly to the USA, and Qantas not only flies across to New Zealand to each of their major destinations—Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch—but also operates domestically and we now have Qantas’s subsidiary, Jetstar, operating through to the various ports in Australia, make this a very unique situation. It is a reflection of Australia’s CER agreement with New Zealand in coordinating our economic relations with the country.

There were some in New Zealand who were talking about a common currency and common border. Of course, it is going to take a lot more work before we get to that stage, but I think in the longer term we will see a very much changed environment and the two countries will have economic integration. Some would suggest that a mistake was made in 1901 when we formed the Commonwealth of Australia and that we should have included New Zealand at that time, but it was their decision not to join. We need to work on making sure that the coordination of our two economies is made as strong as possible.

The safety issues are obviously the predominant concern when you are dealing with aviation, and this is what this bill is about—ensuring that the safety standards that apply in one country apply equally in the other. It is obviously an issue which has taken on heightened importance since September 11, 2001. Our friends across the Tasman have very similar safety standards and produce very similar safety outcomes to ours in high-capacity airline operations. Mutual recognition terms are therefore going to allow for eligible aircraft operators to carry out aviation activity in Australia and New Zealand—whether international or domestic, passenger or cargo—based on the air operators certificate issued by their home country. The appropriate quote is:

… that an operator that is the holder of an AOC—

and associated certificates of permission—

issued in one country will not be required to hold an AOC—

or other certificate of permission—

in the second country in order to conduct air transport operations in that country.

This is a program that is going to be phased in. Initially, only eligible operators holding AOCs will be mutually recognised. Then consideration will be given to other certificates not already covered by other recognition arrangements. Currently the bill before us only makes allowances for the recognition of AOCs. However, there are provisions in the act to allow for the mutual recognition of more certificates in the future.

The issue of safety is, by way of an added guarantee, categorically put to rest by the fact that the host regulator has the power to issue a temporary stop notice to an aircraft operator who has permission issued by the other safety regulator if the operator is perceived to present a serious risk to aviation safety. This was brought to the fore with the collapse of Ansett, and there were some questions about the safety standards of Ansett at the time which undoubtedly led to its ultimate demise.

Operators will still have to comply with rules of the air and certain laws of the country in which they are operating. For example, New Zealand operators conducting services in Australia using an AOC supplied by the Civil Aviation Authority of New Zealand will still have to comply with Australian laws with respect to security, the environment, curfew and carrier’s liability, to name but a few. It is widely regarded that both Australia and New Zealand have world’s best practice airline operations with similar standards and consistencies. Of course, as two independent nations there are going to be discrepancies over the harmonisation of safety standards. However, while the overall safety of each system is recognised and achieved, the differences can be accepted.

This bill is going to enhance the cooperation between our two countries. It is going to promote aviation and competition in Australia and New Zealand by reducing the regulatory burden on operators. Instead of them having to meet both Australian and New Zealand requirements, one requirement will be all that is necessary. In fact, it is more than feasible to foresee that the announced changes, with the need to meet only one set of regulatory standards, will result in lower airline costs.

There has also been some fear that jobs are going to be affected. This in fact will not be the case. Australian cabin crew operate in a ratio of one staff member to 36 passengers, compared to one to 50 for New Zealand cabin crews. CASA stated that this Australian level of service is going to be forced to remain. New Zealand staffing ratios have support mechanisms and administration which are geared towards crew and customer staffing levels. On a lowest common denominator basis, Australian and New Zealand standards are comparable.

In conclusion: this bill is about accepting mutual standards for regulation. It is part of the CER, which harmonises our two economies and harmonises regulations between the two countries. It is going to assist in tourism, with the tourism industries on both sides of the Tasman being important. For both countries the other market is a significant source of tourism numbers.

When this was originally negotiated, in November 2000, it was suggested that the single aviation market of Australia and New Zealand was worth $6.8 billion. Mutual recognition will undoubtedly create significant opportunities and will add further to the relationship of our two countries. It is only through the joint understanding and commitment of Australia’s Civil Aviation Safety Authority and the Civil Aviation Authority of New Zealand that mutual recognition is feasible and possible. The force of the law given to CASA and CAANZ under the provisions of the act underpins this mutual recognition. I am happy to support this bill as further evidence that the CER is working and that we are making incremental progress. Following my visit to New Zealand with the trade committee recently, this highlights that we are working towards becoming in the longer term a single economic market. In the meantime, this assists at the level of coordination of the safety standards of the airline industries in both countries.

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