Transport Minister, SunAir satisfied with investigation into CAA member

Sunair Aviation owners Dan and Bev Power in 2014. File photo

The owner of Sunair Aviation has accepted an independent investigator's findings that a Civil Aviation Authority board member inadvertently shared confidential information about the company with a competitor.

Sunair owner Dan Power called for an investigation in September 2017 after his staff found out Sunair was being grounded from staff of an airline part-owned by the board's former deputy chairman Peter Griffiths, hours before Sunair was officially notified.

Griffiths resigned from the regulator's board shortly after.

Investigator Mary Scholtens' findings - that Griffiths' breach was inadvertent but objectively gave his company a competitive advantage - were released yesterday.

Transport Minister Phil Twyford said he was satisfied it was an isolated event.

"I have full confidence in the way the Civil Aviation Authority operates and its management."

Yesterday Power said he believed the incident had been investigated thoroughly and he accepted the finding that a breach did occur, however inadvertent.

Power said it was clear from the report, which included Scholtens notes on interviews with others in the aviation sector, that there was a lot of "mistrust and suspicion" of the authority in the aviation sector.

He said it was good to see Scholtens found no evidence of a pattern of Griffiths using his influence as a board member to encourage regulatory action against competitors of the two airlines he had a stake in.

He hoped the finding would go some way towards restoring industry confidence in the regulator.

"That in itself is a positive outcome from the report."

Power said his airline's certificate had yet to be restored, six months after the suspension that sparked the investigation, but he hoped SunAir would soon be back in the air.

SunAir had suffered financially and he had been forced to let go five pilots, but all had found other work and the business' other aviation services were keeping it afloat.