European Commission adopts a report on the efficiency of the list of banned airlines

The report will be presented to the European Parliament and to the Council. It gathers the experience of twelve updates of the list of airlines banned in the European Union and draws some lessons for the future. These lessons will guide policy decisions in the area of air safety at European and international level in 2010. Three years of application of the rules governing the list of banned airlines have shown the effectiveness of this tool to keep safe Europeans travelling by air.

Over the three years since it came into existence, the list of banned airlines has served as a clear demonstration of the value added by the Community system in the field of air safety. Rather than being employed as a punitive instrument, the list of airlines banned within the EU has proven to be an efficient dissuasive measure, which seeks to identify as early as possible serious air safety deficiencies with potentially disastrous consequences.

Without providing a full guarantee, it has also functioned as a strong incentive to airlines and civil aviation authorities to continuously improve safety. Where a ban was agreed it was always a temporary measure which would last only until the airlines and their regulatory authorities could show that they had addressed the identified shortcomings and were meeting the safety standards.

(c) Centre for Asia Pacific Aviation. Date posted: 12-Jan-10