Straight and Level

Taking the helm

Eryl Smith Chairman

My long drive south, having attended Alan Kilbride’s funeral in York in early December, found me refl ecting on his passion and enthusiasm for fl ying, his boundless energy and commitment to the LAA, the Vale of York Strut and his beloved Yorkshire! Having recently been appointed Chairman, how might I carry that spirit forward?

I join an illustrious list of former holders of the post of an Association celebrating 75 years rich in history and achievements, which is now weathering the turmoil of Covid. But who are we? What do we want? And where are we going? Challenging questions, I hear you say.

First and foremost we are a members’ Association where every member has a voice, a view and expectations. It may not be possible or realistic to meet them all, but together with fellow directors, we need to hear your voices, and ensure that those collective expectations are refl ected in the agenda we pursue and the service that HQ provides you with. Following the AGM I am delighted that we have a full elected Board of Directors who bring a wealth of experience and a wide geographical representation to the table on your behalf.

Like many member associations we face the challenge of

Balancing the books

Steve Slater CEO

First and foremost, a very happy and, we hope, healthy New Year! From an LAA perspective, we are looking ahead to a year of changes and new initiatives for the LAA, aiming to build on our 75 years of tradition, but offering some new approaches to how we work together and an even more inclusive approach to supporting affordable flying and, above all, flying for fun.

Light Aviation magazine is part of that evolution. This is the first edition with our new editor Ed Hicks in the left-hand seat and I’m sure you’ll agree, having flicked though the January issue, that we are in good hands. The sharper-sighted of you will have noted that last month’s issue, and this magazine, while not lacking in content nor quality, feels a little slimmer, having reverted to a stapled, rather than a hard-spine ‘perfect bound’ format.

We’ve been forced to do this as in the post-Covid environment a number of advertisers have reduced their commitment and at the same time, printers around the UK have increased their charges to cover rising energy costs, in our case by more than 15%. The changes to the format are therefore necessary to help us balance the books.

More widely, in the year ahead we are having to absorb costs in

Updates from the Chairman and CEO

demographics – how to sustain and diversify our membership?

How to stay true to our heritage while meeting the expectations of today’s members and enthusing others to join us? Our members’ profi le continues to evolve with the majority now being owner/ operators rather than builders – is that refl ected in the services and support we offer? Can we do more?

As I look forward there are opportunities to grow and strengthen the Association, but equally challenges and threats to constrain us. Being clear about what we want, having ambition and knowing where we want to go as an Association will enable us to navigate these uncertain times.

In taking the helm I am grateful to Tim Hardy for his stewardship in ensuring that we have weathered the worst effects of the pandemic, and can emerge confi dent to meet the future. As Chairman my commitment to you is to ensure that as an Association we have a clear strategic vision of what we want to achieve and a plan to deliver it, something that as a Board we will begin work on later this month.

As a Board, it is also my intention that we should be more transparent in what we do so that members can see our progress and our performance. I look forward in the coming months to meeting as many members as I can and hearing your views.

At our heart what sustains us, just as it did Alan, is our passion and enthusiasm for the sport and recreational fl ying we all love and enjoy. His celebration and encouragement of all forms of recreational aviation through ‘We All Fly’ is one we should cherish.

May his fl ame burn bright and may you all enjoy a safe, healthy and prosperous New Year. ■ other areas too. We’re making preparations for increased CAA charges and in addition, increasing liability litigation across the whole of the UK, has seen our insurance premiums to defend ourselves against such actions have risen substantially. We’re setting aside £110,000 this year, more than double what it was three years ago.

We made a commitment to operate at a controlled deficit in 2020, 2021 and 2022, to reinvest some of the surpluses of previous years in new staff, resources and activities. However, the impact of Covid has meant that 2021 incomes were reduced, just at the time we need to invest in changes to the staffing and structure of the engineering department, with a view to further improving our services.

We need to cover these added costs and help balance the books, so we have made the decision to increase Permit Renewal fees by an average of £20 per aircraft from 1 January 2022. This is the first such change we have made since 2015 and the fees remain massively less than if you are operating on a CofA. Other membership and engineering fees stay unchanged. This will allow us to invest in the changes necessary to update engineering structures and staffing to make us more effective in the future.

The good news is that the number of members and aircraft in permit have recovered from the early-year slump we noted at the start of 2021 and we’ll end the year with more than 2,700 aircraft with active permits to fly, so despite sounding a bit like Ebenezer Scrooge in the previous few lines, I’m still pretty confident that I can cheerfully wish you a Happy New Year and plenty of fun flying in 2022! ■