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In last month’s Aviation Intelligence Reporter we spent some time discussing if we are now at peak trade association. Increasingly, we are seeing single issue groupings address particular concerns. Often these staffed by lobbyists and public affairs staff of companies with clients in many sectors. So the question is what can the bricks and mortar, real live membership organisations do for us? IATA is determined to show that they add value by touring the world preaching the value of standards. This week, they were in Doha, and on Monday, at their annual ground handling conference their VP for Airports, Passengers, Cargo and Security, Nick Careen, focused on three things: global standards, increased collaboration and new technology. That is fine, except they are self-contradictory. There is no need for collaboration if everyone is applying standards, and new technologies will call for new standards, so the old ones are otiose. If there wasn’t an IATA, someone would invent one. IATA is the keeper of interlining, one of the greatest pieces of industrial engineering the world has ever seen, but it needs to think through its messaging.
By Tuesday the excitement of the ground handling conference was fading, but ICAO was at the World Travel and Tourism Council summit in Buenos Aires, extolling the virtues of safe and secure travel to the development of aviation. If IATA’s message on Monday was self-contradictory, Dr Fang Lui’s was self-evident. A good test of the robustness of a particular statement is to test it in reverse. Imagine ICAO’s message the other way around. Unsafe and insecure travel is not likely to encourage travel. The unspoken element of the messaging is, of course, about who should pay for safety and security.
That is always a good topic for discussion and on Wednesday the ACI released a new airside security handbook. It promotes the use of common sense – a scarce resource – but also, implicitly accepts that the industry has a role to play. Normally, the industry position is to hold out the begging bowl, whilst wailing like the widows of Cannae. To actually accept responsibility is to take a step towards accepting that the industry is free standing and not dependant on government funding. It is to start to behave like an adult industry not an infant one.
Thursday saw Dr Lui’s world tour continue, with a stop in Berlin to talk with Chancellor Merkel. There she delivered news that will come as a blow to IATA – it turns out that ICAO is the aviation industry’s standard setter. The clash between the role of the State and industry is becoming clearer. Where do we want the line to be drawn? How responsible do we want to be? Completely, when there is good news, not so much in other circumstances. Still Dr Lui did stretch out a hand of friendship to industry – she moved her messaging from the self-evident to the self-contradictory, perhaps as homage. She is looking forward to an expanded growth scenario aviation future that is both greener and more hyper-sonic.
After a week like that you might think a drink is in order, and United would be delighted to help you with their announcement on Friday of new catering on various flights. Remarkably, this apparently includes United becoming ‘the first airline to offer Stella Artois on domestic and international flights this summer’. Really? Has anyone spoken to Brussels Airlines about that? OK, not on their domestic services, granted, but international flights have had Stella available for some years.
