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CAA price increase !!!


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Oh what a suprise . The CAA has announced a price hike to £10pa  as from 1st of April as announced in the BMFA lataest mail shot.

It should be a an April fools joke as it just beaurocracy for the sake of it .

This come just as the Chancellor announced that he intends to cut wasteful practices in the government . He could start by cutting the job of the  petty minded , probably highly overpaid twonk who thought up the idea of taxing our hobby in the first place . 

Response  from the BMFA "One consolation is that the fee still has some way to go to reach the £16.50 proposed originally by the CAA back in 2019 which was strongly opposed by the BMFA and its members."

Sorry but thats not good enough as we gett absolutely nothing for our annual outlay to the CAA. 

Edited by Engine Doctor
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43 minutes ago, Wookman said:

10% increase for no extra service seems very reasonable by modern standards.

 

Indeed - whilst I agree with @Engine Doctor that modellers have not got much for our money from DMARES, looking at recent inflation and that predicted for 2022...

 

image.png.7d12d34b35dfce71d77d70ae01caed1f.png

 

...it looks like this is pretty much an inflation aligned adjustment.

 

Anyway, railing against registration at this point is pointless - it is now ubiquitous worldwide, and is seen by the authorities (whether we agree it or not) as foundational to integrating SUAS into modern airspace. IMO we now have to accept registration as a least worst but necessary evil, and move on to fighting the advent of much more onerous regulations likely to rear their heads in the medium term such as remote ID.

Edited by MattyB
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Oh boy, another thread to pull out the grumpy old gits !

 

Fact.   Life is going to get more expensive.

Fact.   Complaining won't do anything to reverse the situation.

Fact.   In this country we have it a lot easier than most countries in the world (including America).

Fact.   It could be worse. You could be living in the Ukraine.

 

Let's temper this with a little reality, shall we ?

I doubt very much if anybody on this forum is concerned about where their next meal is going to come from, or even their next bottle of chateaux "whatever".

In fact, most of the members of this forum can probably remember a time when life was indeed a lot worse. I know I can and I wasn't born until the 1950's.

Does that make me one of "those young upstarts" ?   :classic_biggrin:

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44 minutes ago, kevin b said:

Oh boy, another thread to pull out the grumpy old gits !

 

Fact.   Life is going to get more expensive.

Fact.   Complaining won't do anything to reverse the situation.

Fact.   In this country we have it a lot easier than most countries in the world (including America).

Fact.   It could be worse. You could be living in the Ukraine.

 

Let's temper this with a little reality, shall we ?

I doubt very much if anybody on this forum is concerned about where their next meal is going to come from, or even their next bottle of chateaux "whatever".

In fact, most of the members of this forum can probably remember a time when life was indeed a lot worse. I know I can and I wasn't born until the 1950's.

Does that make me one of "those young upstarts" ?   :classic_biggrin:

Please dont  bring or even try to compare  the attrocities happening in Ukraine down to this level of discussion !

If you were born  1950's you should be well aware that its because working men and women fought for their wages and  conditions of service  that things ARE better today.

Being born in the 1950's doesn't make you a " young upstart " any more than it make me or the rest of us "grumpy old gits "  

Like most of us I dont mind paying for a service and the increases that inflation brings  but its an increase for nothing and our BMFA should oppose it however small or next year the increase could be a lot more  .

 

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The reason for my post on this thread is quite simple.

Since the revamp of the site I have noticed that there are fewer and fewer people posting on the forum.

There also seem to be far fewer people creating threads.

I have seen many familiar  names disappear from the forum, who were regular contributors.

Either they are dropping off the perch at an alarming rate, or like me are fed up with others constantly moaning and using the forum just to vent their frustrations.

In this particular case it is about something that we all knew was going to happen anyway. Anybody with half an ounce of common sense knew it was inevitable.

I'm afraid this is not specific to this forum as it appears to be the way of the world these days.

 

Don. A friend of mine once said that people went into politics because they were poor business people (He also thought Maggie Thatcher was a bit left wing !)

Alan. I wouldn't want to denigrate anybody. far from it. If there are people who want to be involved in our hobby who have financial restrictions, maybe we should be discussing how we can help them on the forum instead of topics like this one. I for one would be all in favour, particularly at a local level.

ED. No comparison. Just stating facts and reminding people of them.

I am well aware of the actions of working men and women in the 1950's. Some of them were better than others. 

I take it that you don't believe that the CAA carries out a service that is of benefit to aeromodellers ? They have their overheads increased as well.

 

This is my last post on this thread as I can see it ending up as the usual "slanging match"

However on a positive note I have read a comment that has piqued my interest and I will be starting a new thread on the subject, which I hope will have a more constructive response.

 

Mods. Please feel free to alter or delete this post.

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Yes, I put the reg number on my models. I use a Brother label printing machine (which I already had for years before) to print to the minimum required size. I place the label in the most unobtrusive place I can find. Inside surface of the undercarriage leg is my favourite.

 

Nobody at any of the various clubs where I fly has ever given it a glance!

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From my POV Kev, some didn't move over to the new platform at first but came on later, one or two long time posters have gone for various reasons, threads seem pretty active, maybe not so many builds, but Covid saw plenty so maybe that's caused a lull. Forum (To me) seems pretty easy going, not a great deal of friction of late.

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4 hours ago, Engine Doctor said:

Oh what a suprise . The CAA has announced a price hike to £10pa  as from 1st of April as announced in the BMFA lataest mail shot.

It should be a an April fools joke as it just beaurocracy for the sake of it .

This come just as the Chancellor announced that he intends to cut wasteful practices in the government . He could start by cutting the job of the  petty minded , probably highly overpaid twonk who thought up the idea of taxing our hobby in the first place . 

Response  from the BMFA "One consolation is that the fee still has some way to go to reach the £16.50 proposed originally by the CAA back in 2019 which was strongly opposed by the BMFA and its members."

Sorry but thats not good enough as we gett absolutely nothing for our annual outlay to the CAA. 

On the contrary ED, I cannot but hold my head in my hands in despair at your post.  This is the usual whinge when a purely nominal sum is proposed at a Club meeting to up subs.  In this case, the service we get from the CAA allows us to continue flying pretty much as we were able to before the drone situation arose.

 

If an increase of £1 in your overall costs of building and flying model aircraft in a year is going to make you pack it in then I would say that you would be unique!  The sudden increase in the cost of fuel is going to lead to very much more than £1 in the year so what are you proposing to do about that?  Brexit, Covid and now the tragic invasion of Ukraine have, and will continue to, push up prices a lot more than £1 a year.

 

My goodness, if you think the BMFA should strongly oppose this increase you just are not living in the real world.

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Ah, most of us are a bit stressed, first Covid then cost of living and Ukraine.....

Anyway a positive for the government..... if there is war they have a good list of trained drone pilots......   ?   ?

(only joking, in this life you either laugh or cry ?   ) 

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The increase of £1 is really not the point. The whole registration system, and in particular for BMFA members, is a rediculous and overblown piece of government buraucracy that doesn't do one iota of good to improve safety or whatever else for our members.

I'm surprised that many don't see it that way, but appear to enjoy the extra admin and red tape and don't think to question it.

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8 minutes ago, Cuban8 said:

The increase of £1 is really not the point. The whole registration system, and in particular for BMFA members, is a rediculous and overblown piece of government buraucracy that doesn't do one iota of good to improve safety or whatever else for our members.

I'm surprised that many don't see it that way, but appear to enjoy the extra admin and red tape and don't think to question it.

 

If you look around the rest of the world Cuban 8, you will realise that we have got off fairly lightly and that is down to the efforts of the BMFA and its members in making their views known.  We live in a world where there are multiple forces acting on the use of lower airspace.  The reason I don't see this as "a ridiculous and overblown piece of government bureaucracy" is because of all governments desire to increase the economic activity of their nations while using a technology that has a low barrier of entry unlike traditional aerospace.  So, we have a conflict of interest where some big movers wish to make full use of lower airspace for commercial reasons.  Easiest solution is to stop those without a voice from continuing as before and clogging up chunks of airspace.  However, due to the leadership of the BMFA, and other associations, and support from its membership, we have manage to arrive at a situation that is very much business as usual for 95%+ of members.  With a membership of 30,000 or so, the BMFA dwarfs any other air sports organisation in terms of membership.  Thankfully, we had a S of S for Transport who actually understands the use of lower airspace even though he only uses it to take off and land.  Where would we have been with someone who had no light aviation background?  Things could have been a lot worse.

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34 minutes ago, Cuban8 said:

The increase of £1 is really not the point. The whole registration system, and in particular for BMFA members, is a rediculous and overblown piece of government buraucracy that doesn't do one iota of good to improve safety or whatever else for our members.

I'm surprised that many don't see it that way, but appear to enjoy the extra admin and red tape and don't think to question it.

 

Don't think to question it? That whole discussion was relevant in 2017 (?) when the whole scheme was being proposed and defined. I'm surprised you think the scheme's proposers gave three fifths of a rats hind quarters about us boys with our toys.

 

The BMFA did some great work to ensure we didn't become collateral damage.

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2 hours ago, Cuban8 said:

The increase of £1 is really not the point. The whole registration system, and in particular for BMFA members, is a ridiculous and overblown piece of government buraucracy that doesn't do one iota of good to improve safety or whatever else for our members.

I'm surprised that many don't see it that way, but appear to enjoy the extra admin and red tape and don't think to question it.

 

Sorry, but I have no idea what you believe "questioning it" actually means at this point in terms of practical action. Are you expecting a mass rebellion against a £1 increase to cause the government to do an about turn on registration? This seems unlikely given almost every major developed country is going down the registration route, and some (such as France) have already gone quite a bit further with actions that would severely limit our activities.

 

We as modellers (led by the national associations including the BMFA) questioned the proposals at length via every avenue available from about 2015/16 until mid 2019 when the proposals were finalised. This included completing feedback surveys on government proposals, letter writing campaigns, and the BMFA's representation at the Science and Tech Parliamentary Select Committee and behind closed doors with governement officials and the CAA. Unfortunately the fight against mandatory registration was lost as (whether you agree or not) it is seen as a foundational element of managing the low level airspace as commercial and recreational use increases. However, the fee was at least reduced and so far no additional and more onerous regulations have been forthcoming.

 

The reason I (and I suspect the vast majority of posters here) are not worried about a £1 increase is because a) it's barely an inflationary uptick, b) we all know registration is here to stay whatever happens, and c) we are more worried about the future battles we'll need to fight at some point against more onerous controls that could be far more damaging to our hobby. Railing against a £1 increase would just make us look petty; we are far better keeping our powder dry for when remote ID inevitably rears it's head in coming years.

Edited by MattyB
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14 hours ago, Andrew Calcutt said:

Just wondering if anyone puts the reg no. on models and has anyone ever been asked for it.

When was the last time anyone was asked to produce their driving licence ? 

Edited by PatMc
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On a different but related subject, I was interested to see the doc from the CAA lists out costs associated with an Article 16 Authorisation. This section is a bit confusing though as it's not clear whether it only applies to Article 16 authorisations for models over 25kg, or all Article 16 auths...

 

image.png.9dfaa92dd766cd5e0c8b8c28170170f5.png

 

@Andy Symons - BMFA, is this correct? Do the BMFA and other national associations have to pay for any renewals/changes to their authorisations if and when we request them, or is that only for clubs/private individuals going to the CAA direct for their own authorisation at a specific site? Or does this only apply for Art 16 authorisations for models over 25kg?

 

 

Edited by MattyB
Corrected for error regarding weight bracket
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12 hours ago, kevin b said:

 

 

I take it that you don't believe that the CAA carries out a service that is of benefit to aeromodellers ? They have their overheads increased as well.

 

 

Your correct in your assumption that I dont believe the CAA does anything to benefit our hobby and that's why I object to ANY increase in their fee. If they actively supported up and provided a service like the BMFA  then I would support any increase deemed necessary .

Oh sorry I forgot about the numbers they generate for us to put on our models if that can be counted as a service ?

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