ACCESS TO AVIATION SERVICES MARKET MAY BE SIMPLIFIED

On 22 December 2021 draft law No 6405-1 was registered in the Parliament of Ukraine. Thereby, state authorities are planning to facilitate access to the services market in aviation and to adapt aviation law of Ukraine to the legislation of the European Union.

Authors of the draft law suggest to amend the Air Code of Ukraine, inter alia, to abolish:

• certification of the ground handling services. According to the draft, ground handling subjects are going to operate on the declarative principle (with no permit document) on the basis of the declaration of conformity. Meanwhile, control of the ground handling subjects will be performed by airport (airfield) operators;
• obtaining certificates by air transport sales agents and entities that train personnel who organize and/or sale air transportation services;
• the obligation for airlines to operate at least two aircrafts;
• obtaining the right to operate air routes for air transportation within Ukraine and in other countries – for Ukrainian carriers, as well as charter flights within Ukraine for foreign airlines.

At the same time, draft law No 6405-1 contains a number of changes concerning the liability of aviation entities: 

• State Aviation Administration of Ukraine receives the right to file claims in court. Currently, such a right is not provided by legislation of Ukraine;
• state inspectors will be able to prohibit aviation subjects and its personnel from exercising their rights in the event of a threat to aviation safety;
• it is proposed to introduce liability for disrupting the performance of duties by the inspectors, increase the term of the penalty to one year from the date of detection of the offense (instead of the current six months), and to increase the term for payment of the fine imposed by the State Aviation Service to 30 days. It should be noted that according to the current laws entities have only 15 days to pay the fine before its collecting compulsorily.

Furthermore, the adoption of the law will simplify the recognition of certain permits issued in other countries, as well as the issuance of air operator certificates and flight permissions for certain types of imported aircrafts.

We believe that pressure reduction and deregulation are exactly what the aviation industry needs today. The implementation of the changes described above could have a positive impact on the aviation services market. Since the draft law was developed to fulfill Ukraine’s international obligations to the European Union, there is a high probability that the law will be adopted.