The Civil Aviation Safety Authority has said that it won't establish small regional offices as recommended in the Aviation Safety Regulation Review (ASRR).
Recommendation 22 of the ASRR stated that CASA should consider establishing small offices at specific industry centres to "improve monitoring, service quality, communications and collaborative relationships."
In its response to the ASRR, the Federal Government noted the recommendation, but did not agree with it, referring it to CASA instead.
"CASA has been reviewing the value of small regional offices," a CASA spokesperson told Australian Flying. "We are aware that industry wants CASA to be efficient and consistent in the delivery of our regulatory services and that these services are provided without increased costs.
"We believe we can deliver a better outcome for less cost. This includes adopting a risk based approach rather than increasing our office footprint.
"We are exploring adopting a more agile approach where we will deploy staff short term to work with industry wherever they are required on an operational and safety needs basis."
The government ASRR response linked the recommendation to Recommendation 21, which suggested that CASA needed to change its structure to a "client-oriented output model", something that CASA says it has done through establishing the Stakeholder Engagement Group and the Industry Relations Branch within that group, and the Client Services Centre within the Sustainability Group.
However, the regulator has not at this stage ruled out establishing a general aviation unit under any future re-structure, a concept raised by the government response and not included in the original ASRR recommendation.