RAAus board election member voting fail

[tillmanr]

I have just read the results of the 2020 RAAus board election and have no axe to grind with the results.

 

However I am ashamed that nearly half of the votes were declared invalid.

 

How can such a large proportion of the members fail to successfully nominate two candidates yet manage to maintain and fly an aircraft?

 

 

[Jim McDowall]

I think an analysis of the reasons for invalid votes should be presented to members so that this level of invalidity can hopefully be avoided in the future.

[FlyingVizsla]

Where did you find the Invalid vote count?  As far as I can see, 606 valid votes were received (down on last election) and 53 people chose to vote for one person only, making a total of 1159 votes cast (you could vote for up to two).  Normally they would declare the number of invalid votes with the results.

[Jim McDowall]

It seems that the announcement was poorly written. I (as did our friend tillmanr) read it and thought that there were 606 valid  votes out of 1159 cast. Two things arise - if there were two votes per ballot how is it that there were 53 less votes than 606 x 2? And why is there no statement as to the number of ballots received and number of informals? Plus it was not a secret vote - but that's another story.

[tillmanr]

As I indicated to the CEO, when I vote for the senate I am allowed one vote on the day.

Within this one vote I indicate my order of the vote for up to maybe 70 candidates.

[FlyingVizsla]

33 minutes ago, Jim McDowall said:

It seems that the announcement was poorly written. I (as did our friend tillmanr) read it and thought that there were 606 valid  votes out of 1159 cast. Two things arise - if there were two votes per ballot how is it that there were 53 less votes than 606 x 2? And why is there no statement as to the number of ballots received and number of informals? Plus it was not a secret vote - but that's another story.

606 ballot papers, each allowed to vote for up to 2 candidates (2x606 = 1,212 potential votes)  1,159 votes cast; (1212 - 1159) = 53 voters opted to vote for ONE only.  After the first "Meet the Candidates" I was sorely tempted to only vote for one.  However I decided I had to cast a vote for the better of the other three.

[waraton]

From the email sent by RAAus:

 

From the 606 valid ballots a total of 1,159 votes were cast. Remembering that each member could vote for a director in each of the vacant positions, so a total of up to two choices per member was allowed.

Votes were cast as follows:

 

That's less than 6% of members submitting a ballot form if we have over 10,000 members. Why?

Edited October 22, 2020 by waraton

[kgwilson]

1 hour ago, waraton said:

 

That's less than 6% of members submitting a ballot form if we have over 10,000 members. Why?

Apathy. Most pilots only care about their legality to fly. I voted but didn't get the email. I did get the last email on National safety week just 3 days ago so I have no idea what is going on.

[tillmanr]

I seem to be too simplistic in my interpretation of voting. 
 

Seemingly 606 members participated and presented a ballot sheet on which they then voted one or two times for a total of 1159 votes.
 

Is this the correct way to view this?

[kgwilson]

1 hour ago, tillmanr said:

I seem to be too simplistic in my interpretation of voting. 
 

Seemingly 606 members participated and presented a ballot sheet on which they then voted one or two times for a total of 1159 votes.
 

Is this the correct way to view this?

Yes.

[FlyBoy1960]

some of us in Queensland are still waiting for the voting papers to arrive with the first new edition of sport pilot magazine.

 

 contacted the RA-Aus head office several times but nothing ever happened, no voting papers and no magazine !

[SSCBD]

What do we expect to change after this election. As in anything good for the members?

[Thruster88]

Yes only 606 "members" voted. I did not vote because I had no idea what I was voting for. Member since 1990.

[Jim McDowall]

Lets face it RAAus would not exist without the CAO requirement that we have to be members of RAAus to fly. Time to follow the South Africans and bring recreational flying back under CASA's control. As Jonathon Aleck said in the RRAT estimates hearing on Tuesday, CASA can direct RAAus to do things which means that the facade of RAAus is just administration by CASA - RAAus directors cannot act unfettered if CASA can tell them what to do.

[Yenn]

Would you really want CASA to be actively running our flying. They have spent years doing nothing, except growing fatter and taking more taxpayers money.

They are still in the process of changing the rules and what do we have. Just about the same as 50 years ago except it is now impossible to know exactly what we have to comply with.

[Jim McDowall]

Most VH private fliers have very little or no contact with CASA. They pay no annual licence or membership fees and annuals can be modest. Granted the maintenance concessions(?) may have to carried over but EASA now has owner maintenance for private ops aircraft upto 2760kg and the Canadians have had owner maintenance for a couple of decades without any identifiable issues. The drivers licence medical is still an issue but the international evidence is that a Class 2 medical proves nothing - they have room to move - they have to explain to Avmed and their accredited practitioners that they are no longer needed, at least not for Class 2 meds.

It is important to remember that we all fly in the same airspace and that the majority of the aircraft operated under RAAus are as capable as any bottom end VH aircraft (eg C150,172, PA140/160 etc.). RAAus flight training has been recognised as sufficient to enable RAAus pilots to transition to a RPL licence with a flight review and take their endorsements with the transition.

It is also true that CASA approves the operations, technical and other manuals. These manuals are a distillation of the aviation law as it applies to RAAus operators and aircraft. In effect they are CASA's manuals.

The truth is  that CASA uses RAAus as its proxy and imposes an un-necessary cost burden on the members of RAAus.