New Zealand News

The Australians are getting CT-4B Airtrainers from ASTA owned PAC; this is the first time the traditional military CT-4B Airtrainer has been sold for civilian purposes. The deal is also significant because it revived production of the Airtrainer – which was originally produced between 1972 and 1978 (refer story elsewhere this issue). Ansett acceptance pilot Darcy O’Connor took the two aircraft for acceptance flights. In a few weeks all 12 Airtrainers should be in NSW, say PAC officials.

Still in NSW, the wives of some Royal New Zealand Air Force personnel now living at Nowra naval base made news with their comments about how much they like life in Australia compared with the “shameful” way the military are treated at home.

Six women were interviewed by journalists after four months at the naval base where they will spend another two years. Mary MacKenzie, American born wife of No 2 Squadron’s Sqdn Ldr Stuart MacKenzie, said Australian defence people were looked after like none in New Zealand. “It makes the New Zealand Government look ashamed,” she said. “People’s attitudes toward the defence system are so much different in Australia. They really look after their people here.

“In New Zealand the military were treated as ‘just nobodies’ but in Australia it was a real perk to be in the forces,” she said. “Maybe in New Zealand it is looked upon as unimportant but if you are defending your country you deserve much more. ” She cited examples of delays on work in New Zealand and how quickly work had been carried out at Nowra.

Just over 50 air force crew and 63 dependents, including 38 children, live in houses they say are better than anything available to New Zealand service people. (Refer P. 32, June 91 A A)

Airport Mak ES$nz90M B Ond Offer

Auckland lnternation Airport is to offer $NZ90m of bonds- the first time a NZ airport company has sought funds from the domestic capital market.

The offering, managed by Westpac Bank, consists of $60m of July 1997 bonds and $30m of March 2000 bonds and is being privately placed. The bonds’ coupon rate is 10%. The airport company is owned by the Crown (51. 6%) and six regional local authorities. The airport’s chief executive, Mr John Goulter, said the airport made a $13. 5m after tax profit in the year to March 31, and expected to clear a profit by next March.

Mr Goulter also says the airport had bought a new $NZ180,000 airboat for search and rescue work on the mudflats near the runway. The American made craft, powered by a large propeller mounted on top, runs either in water or on mudflats. The airboat is 7m long and half as wide

Home Comforts at Airport

Auckland Airport has provided several day rooms in the transit area for passengers to rest and freshen up. The rooms, which contain a bed, writing desk, telephone and television, cost $NZ1O for one hour, $20 for 1-4 hours and $25 for more than four hours. Showers are also available.

Stand Alone Civil Aviation Authority?

A committee set up to look at aviation safety charges has recommended the government establish a stand alone civil aviation authority.

In a report to Transport Minister Rob Storey, the committee said the creation of a civil aviation authority would resolve the divisions between the Ministry of Transport and the aviation industry. It would also eliminate the possibility of Ministry overheads being passed on to the industry.

The Consultative Group on Aviation Safety Charges Cost Recovery was formed by the former Transport Minister, Bill Jeffries, last year. Its report is at odds with Mr Jeffries who rejected a recommendation in the Swedavia-McGregor report on aviation that a stand alone authority should be created. The National Party, now the government, last year promised to establish a stand alone authority headed by an aviation expert. At present the Air Transport Division is part of the Ministry of Transport.

Earlier this year Mr Storey announced a 15% cut in the $NZ11m levied from the industry for aviation safety this financial year. The fees, he said, had been imposed without adequate consultation and failed to assess the likely impact on the industry.

After the recommendations for a stand alone civil aviation authority had been made public, Mr Storey said a small “expert board” would run it. He hopes to have it operating by next July. He told the Air Line Pilots Association conference in Auckland that having taken submissions from the industry, he was going to move directly to legislation. The board running the authority would have representatives from both the industry and the community.

The Transport Minister said the establishment of the authority would not involve or affect the Airways Corporation.

Airport on Bird Alert

Eight Auckland airport staff have been sworn in as honorary fisheries officers to improve safety in the country’s busiest air space.

Their targets are people who poach inside the restricted fishing zone which extends at least half a kilometre into the Manukau harbour from the airport boundaries.

Fishing attracts birds which endanger even the largest of jetliners. Bird scaring duties at the airport involve at least one person daily. A number of devices to scare birds from the airport range from gas bangers to a shotgun which lobs explosive charges.

Airlines Pull In the Dollars

Qantas started it – a $NZ399 return fare to Sydney, Melbourne or Brisbane from Auckland, Wellington or Christchurch. Air New Zealand quickly followed, so did American carriers Continental and United.

Australians got a mid winter surprise too. It cost thousands of travellers only $A299 to visit this country. Flights can be made until early December.

The super low fares to Australia resulted in the Christchurch Internal Affairs office getting about 4,200 passport applications in less than a week – double the number before the Qantas offer. One travel agent boss reckons the country’s 600 agents may have booked up to 300,000 people on the four airlines; that’s just under the population of Christchurch, largest city in the South Island.

Some Americans have also been enjoying the scenic splendour of New Zealand, thanks to marketing moves by a major coach tour operator, the Mount Cook Line, based in Christchurch. The Americans were offered free flights across the Pacific- provided they spent $NZ3,318 on a 14 day coach and air tour. The Mt Cook Group uses HS. 748s and ski equipped smaller aircraft. The sightseers flew Air New Zealand or United to Auckland. The promotion also involved the NZ Tourism Department.

Travel agents battling the $399 trans-Tasman fare were just getting back to normal when another price war broke out: Malay- sian Airlines promoted a $NZ1. 991 Auckland/London return fare -a cut of $1,000 on its published fare, Thai Airways, which earlier this year announced it was ending its Auckland service, matched Malaysian while other London bound carriers assessed the market.

Ansett New Zealand Spreads Its Wings

Ansett New Zealand is expanding its operations here, launching a two pronged attack.

Chief executive Gary Smith says the airline had established a new international markets division, headed by Graeme Camp-bell as general manager. “We are opening regional sales offices in Los Angeles and Tokyo,” said Mr Smith. He said his airline was pledged to support efforts to attract more overseas visitors to this country.

Ansett New Zealand’s new thrust was more evidence of the airline’s commitment to New Zealand and to “helping resolve economic problems through innovation and quality services,” said Mr Smith.

Meanwhile the airline’s first Boeing 737-built in 1968 and used by Ansett New Zealand when it launched its first jet services in 1987, is now in Arizona. The aircraft, the “City of Christchurch”. was the last of the Ansett 737s to leave New Zealand after they were phased out of service in 1989, being replaced by British Aerospace 146s, promoted as the “whisper jets”.

Anz’s Quality of Service Questioned

Quality of service, has interested one of our cabinet ministers, Philip Burdon, following a flight he made from Singapore to Auck- land recently on an Air New Zealand Boeing 767.

The minister bitterly criticised the cabin service before television cameras on touchdown – but less than 30 hours later he was saying “Air New Zealand do a wonderful job”. Speaking ear- lier about the flight, he said: “I doubt if I’ve ever seen such crude boorish and unsophisticated behaviour on any airline. ” The minister’s specific complaints included: being given th usual gift pack reserved for business or first class passengers only to have it taken back when the stewardess said she did no have enough to go round. “It was an astonishing exercise handing out a packet of sweets and then saying, ‘I’m sorry, I wan them back. The chief steward really seemed to have little idea c what he was doing and was utterly indifferent to the embarrassment he was causing to all the business class passengers. ” Saying it needed information from the politician so it coul investigate his comments, Air New Zealand pointed out that fo the last eight years it had been judged “best carrier in the Pacific’ by readers of Executive Travel magazine.

The day after the complaints by Philip Burdon, who represents the electors of Fendalton, Christchurch, the Opposition Leader Mike Moore, offered his colleague a gift pack when they met in Parliament’s debating chamber.

Mr Burdon said Air New Zealand was his favourite airline. “The fact that, like some members of the Opposition, one or two of their staff need to go to charm school is just one of the incidental problems,” he said. “Was the treatment you received because they recognised you?” interjected Mr Moore.

France Wins Big Airways Deal

The Airways Corporation has awarded the main contract in its $NZ26m modernisation of the country’s air navigation system to a French company, instead of Australia’s AWA.

Thomson-CSF got the honour. This company is also doing most of the work on the Corporation’s $91m overhaul of the national air traffic control system. Over the next four years the company will supply equipment to replace 30 year old technology. It was reported that there had been a “substantial price difference between the tenders of Thomson-CSF and AWA”. In fact, according to the Airways Corporation’s Janiene Bayliss, AWA’s price was 12. 5% higher.

Air New Zealand Releases Annual Report

After a $NZ101 million profit last year, Air New Zealand has reported a $NZ19. 4m loss for the 12 months to March. But direc. tors predict a trading profit exceeding $NZ80m in the year to June 1992.

The airline, releasing its annual report, plans to bolster its coffers with a one for two cash issue. The issue price will be $NZ1, which will raise $NZ140m.

Air New Zealand’s chairman, Bob Matthew, saying the 12 month result was not adequate or satisfactory, pointed out that almost all the airline’s competitors “and particularly those who rely much on economics outside the Asia-Pacific region” have reported, or will soon report, dramatic reversals in trading performance.

Money raised from the one for two issue will be used to increase the company’s capital base to take account of a “flight to quality” by international debt markets. Mr Matthew also says the injection will enhance the airline’s ability to buy into Australian Airlines “and/or Qantas”. But the Air New Zealand chairman said the airline had not yet decided definitely how the money would be spent. While it is probable that Air New Zealand will take some part in the Australian airline privatisation process, he says a strategy has not yet crystalised and that is unlikely to happen before next January.

Air New Zealand’s biggest shareholders, Brierley Investments and Qantas, have both committed to take their entitlements. (It is reported that Qantas will have to pay at least $NZ27. 9m to take up its entitlement. ) Air New Zealand produced a $NZ7. 5m trading profit in the March year. Mr Matthews said none of the airline’s 14 Fokker F27s, now out of service, had yet been sold. Some interested people had been “kicking the tyres”.