Senator Gerard Craughwell- speech from 21 Oct 2021

Thank you for allowing me time to speak. First I'd like to second Senator Sherlock's amendment, the order of business. The Rescue 116 families have been confronted now with the possibility of having to face massive costs, legal costs. I've spoken about Rescue 116 on a number of occasions here and about the failure to deliver a report. I think it is outrageous that these families are being called upon to pay for their legal costs. I don't believe that they were the people who initiated the review. I believe that that was initiated by the operator who has already, according to the controller and auditor general, benefited from as much as 7 million euros of government money to upgrade their aircraft and bring them in compliance for night vision. That was in 2013 and to this day they have not fully implemented that, which is horrendous when you think about it. So from that point of view, I think that this House should call on the Minister to stand by the families in this case and protect them and protect their assets. On a related issue, Leader, there is a new air regulator appointed and I am deeply disturbed that the regulator has moved from one of the major airlines directly into the regulator's job. There has been no cooling off period that I am aware of. And I think it is just bad business and I would like at some stage to have the Minister for Transport in this House until we debate that. And perhaps at some stage we should have the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform in here because we need to reform the way people in senior positions, like for example, interviewing chairmen of boards, state boards by various committees, committees and Eructis committees after they have been appointed with no real methodology for us to say no we don't want this person or whatever. So I think we need to look at these senior appointments and look at them urgently. Thank you Leska Hearlick for your presentation. Thank you indeed.