A Message From NATCA's Leadership

As the aviation industry continues to struggle through brutally difficult financial times, a troubling development has surfaced: The Administration has decided that the government-run air traffic control system should be subject to the same unpredictable market forces facing all private industry. It wants to sell off the service to the lowest bidder. The National Air Traffic Controllers Association believes this maneuver will jeopardize the safety of air travel.

In an aviation industry in crisis, a silver lining continues to shine: air traffic control. Regardless of the difficulties facing airlines in the United States, air traffic control has continued to operate at peak performance without so much as a hint of raising fees. The same cannot be said of other countries with privatized air traffic control systems, like Great Britain and Canada.

The U.S. system is different. We have not only the safest, largest, busiest and most complex air traffic control system in the world, but we also have remained a government service. Unlike Great Britain and Canada, we have not considered introducing the risk and instability of privatization into maintaining the safety of our skies. This asset belongs to the American people and they deserve the best. The nation's air traffic controllers have always made safety their highest priority. But the Bush Administration wants to change that. It has determined air traffic control is a commercial function. Funny, because we always thought it was a safety function.

We firmly believe the safety of air travel is neither a Republican nor Democrat issue. Sadly, in this case, the administration seems willing to allow political ideology to trump safety.

This policy also creates a puzzling contradiction. The administration has declared that your luggage is important enough to be screened by trained federal workers. But once you're up in the sky, the administration believes your safety should be in the private hands of the lowest bidder.

Other countries' experiments with air traffic control privatization have been, at best, financial messes and, at worst, safety hazards. In Great Britain, near misses have increased by 50 percent. Delays have increased by 20 percent. Debt payments have increased by 80 percent. The private company had to obtain a government bailout to survive. Yet they gave the boss a bonus of 62,100 British pounds. And earlier this year, a 400-mile corridor of airspace was actually closed down for nine hours because of a staffing shortfall.

In Canada, fees to airlines were passed on to passengers and had to be raised by six percent to help cover a projected $145 million revenue shortfall. Staff reductions force air traffic controllers to endure up to 16 hour shifts, mandatory overtime and six-day work weeks. Controllers have worked without a contract for almost two years.

Privatization advocates cite safety and efficiency gains but the proof doesn't exist. In fact, Great Britain's system is responsible for close to half of Europe's flight delays and Canada's error rate far exceeds that of the United States despite handling just nine percent as much traffic as U.S. controllers.

The American public deserves the very best when it flies. The Administration's desire to let market forces decide what's safe instead of trained, experienced safety professionals is unwise and dangerous. Aviation safety is our sacred trust. Your safety is not for sale.

We invite you to browse this portion of our web site to learn more about this very important issue.

John S. Carr
President

Ruth E. Marlin
Executive Vice President