Privacy law hinders air industry checks

The air safety watchdog is concerned that the Privacy Act is getting in the way of vetting people wanting to work in the industry.

The Civil Aviation Authority's briefing to new Transport Minister David Parker said it could not, as of right, discover the full history of individuals because of the act's provisions.

This was inhibiting the authority's director from fully meeting obligations under the Civil Aviation Act to approve people - including pilots - to be involved in civil aviation.

"It also has safety implications in terms of the character of individuals exercising key positions of responsibility within the aviation system," the briefing said.

A spokesman for Mr Parker said officials from the Ministry of Justice and Ministry of Transport were looking at ways to improve the authority's access to personal information.

The briefing said the solution would be to change the Privacy Act to include the authority as an enforcement agency with rights of access to certain criminal records.

But the briefing said that was "unlikely to be achievable" in the short term, even if it was accepted that the authority should have access to the information.

In the meantime, the authority was investigating the feasibility of interim solutions to give it limited access to the necessary information.

The Civil Aviation Act requires the director to do "fit and proper person" checks on all those seeking to be involved in the sector, such as aircrew, air traffic control staff, aviation security, airport operators and aircraft maintenance staff.

Assessment includes the person's past record of breaches of transport safety laws, history of physical, mental or serious behavioural problems, and their experience and knowledge of aviation rules.

Authority communications manager Bill Sommer said he could not say how many people the checks applied to, or whether anybody had slipped through the system.

Safe skies


* New Zealand has about 9000 active pilots and 3830 aircraft.

* More than 8.4 million passengers travel on the main airlines' domestic services and 3.7 million arrive on international airlines each year.

* The Civil Aviation Authority is responsible for overseeing air safety.