My Lords, this amendment provides for a new clause which would give the National Audit Office oversight of the Civil Aviation Authority’s accounts. Other regulatory bodies including economic regulators which are also industry funded, such as Ofgem, Ofwat and Ofcom, are subject to National Audit Office oversight. The Office of Rail Regulation is also subject to National Audit Office oversight and is likewise funded from within the industry.
As we know, the Civil Aviation Authority is funded from the aviation industry and also receives a limited amount of money from the taxpayer, but it is not subject to National Audit Office oversight. In its report, the House of Commons Transport Select Committee called on the Government to explain why the Civil Aviation Authority is apparently unique among industry regulators in being outside the remit of the National Audit Office. So, clearly, it did not think that a strong case had been made for that situation to continue.
In Committee, the Minister said:
“I remain unconvinced that there are compelling reasons to believe that NAO scrutiny of the CAA would deliver a different result from the current and new mechanisms by which the CAA's functions are already audited and scrutinised”.—[Official Report, 9/7/12; col. GC 464.]
He accepted that other industry-funded regulators come under the scrutiny of the National Audit Office. In our view, the onus lies on the Minister to show why the arrangements for the Civil Aviation Authority
should be different from those for other regulators, rather than, as he put it in Committee, saying that we have to make the case. It is the Minister who has failed to make the case for not having NAO involvement, and for that reason we have brought this amendment back on Report. We hope that the Minister may have had a change of heart on this point. I beg to move.