Airservices focused on safety and efficiency

Airservices Australia, the national air navigation services provider, continued to make significant investment in delivering a safer and more efficient national airways system in 2014-15, as outlined in its Annual Report published today.

Airservices Acting Chief Executive Officer, Jason Harfield said that since the foundation of Airservices 20 years ago, safety still remained Airservices top priority with over 90 million passengers on every airline flight in Australian airspace watched over by air traffic control, 24 hours a day, 7 days per week.

Service improvements were underpinned by upgrades to infrastructure that keeps our skies operating safely and allows airlines to operate more efficiently through reduced holding and more freedom to choose their own preferred routes.

Delivery of Australia’s future civil-military air traffic control system through the OneSKY Australia program also began during the year with work commencing on the design and build of the new software system in partnership with the Department of Defence.

Safety at regional airports also saw significant improvements including the introduction of new aviation rescue fire fighting services at four additional airports as required by Australia’s safety regulations.

Financial results for the year reflected a downturn in revenue and highlighted the challenges faced by a long-term fixed cost environment with shorter-term tightly regulated service requirements. With air traffic growth remaining flat during 2014-15, revenues were down by almost $16 million against forecast in the pricing agreement that was set back in 2011, with the full year profit of $4.5 million well below the planned target.

“After 20 years of sustained air traffic growth, annual passenger numbers have increased by 50 per cent as more Australians fly than ever before. The current flat environment highlights the need for Airservices to continue to transform and do things differently to the way we have worked in the past.

“While we embarked on a cost-containment program in the past year, we know that we need to pursue significant transformation in order to be to able better adapt to changing industry dynamics, traffic volumes and customer priorities.

“We have renergised our efforts to transform our organisation to be ‘match fit’ and build the infrastructure, culture and cost base that will enable us to continue to be successful,” Mr Harfield said.

The Airservices Annual Report 2014–15 is available online at www.airservicesaustralia.com/publications/corporate-publications/annual-reports/