European Business Aviation Association (EBAA) members are increasingly frustrated by the uncertainty surrounding the post-Brexit aviation relationship between the UK and the EU. The Brexit challenges for business aviation in Europe are fourfold: traffic rights for commercial flights; ownership and control of operators providing commercial air transport services; VAT and customs; and the UK’s membership in EASA.

Romanian member of the European Parliament (MEP) Claudia Tapardel has advised that the business aviation community should have a “plan B” in place when it comes to Brexit. She cautioned about the seriousness of the lack of a deal between the EU and UK during an April 25 roundtable in Brussels discussing possible implications of the UK’s exit from the EU on business aviation.

“In my opinion, the UK should follow the Norwegian model. This will permit access to all the European markets and EASA [preserve the existing regime],” she said. However, joining the European Economic Area would require the UK to apply the four freedoms of the EU—free movement of goods, people, services, and capital—and recognize the jurisdiction of the European Court of Justice. However, most of these are politically a red line for the UK government. “The reality is uncertainty,” Tapardel concluded.

British conservative MEP Jacqueline Foster took a far more optimistic view. “The UK government and politicians are taking their responsibility seriously to deliver. There will be a deal on Brexit and the UK will remain in EASA,” she said.

Air transport and aerospace are vastly important for both sides and interconnected, so there is a “shared interest” in reaching a good deal. The European Commission, which negotiates the terms of the divorce on behalf of the 27 EU Member States, typically concludes agreements at the 11th hour, she noted, and Brexit will be no different.

Graham Williamson, EBAA board member and TAG Aviation president of aircraft management and charter, does not share her assessment. “It might be all fine, but it might not be. The UK is out [of the EU] at the end of March 2019—that is all we know for sure,” he said.

The implications are huge, since the UK is a major player in the business aviation realm. According to EBAA, 155 of its approximately 750 members are UK companies, the UK-registered business aircraft fleet tops 310, and the based fleet is 498—more than any other country in Europe. The UK also has 146 airports with business aviation traffic, out of a total of 1,391 airfields across Europe, and features six of the top 20 country pairs in Europe in terms of the number of connections, EBAA data for 2017 shows.

For TAG Aviation—which has large operations in the UK, including aircraft management and charter, Farnborough Airport management, MRO and FBO services, and an aircrew training center—Brexit is a “disaster,” Williamson told AIN. “As TAG, I see no opportunity or benefit arising from Brexit. And I don’t think EBAA has identified anything as a plus either.”

Perhaps not all EBAA members are aligned on Brexit, he said, “but we are all aligned on trying to gain clarity on what is the future like on March 30, 2019, or potentially after the transitional period" in December 2020.

“Maintaining the existing relationship as far as possible is key in avoiding detrimental impacts on the business aviation community,” stressed EBAA chairman and head of BMW flight operations Juergen Wiese.

TAG (Booth W33) recognized very early it needed a hedge for Brexit and in March last year set up an air operator certificate (AOC) in Malta to allow it to have an alternative for clients who want their aircraft to be with an EU operator. “We have already eight aircraft registered in Malta, with a forecast rate of at least one a month going forward. The Maltese AOC will be larger than the UK one,” Williamson said. “One of the trends we are already seeing is that we have no clients asking for UK aircraft. We had five existing clients convert from the UK to Malta.”

But TAG has no contingency plan for its other UK activities, which could potentially lose their EASA licenses and certifications. “We thought we had till December 2020, but then we received the European Commission’s stakeholders notice [on April 13] informing us that all these approvals will be revoked on March 30 next year unless the UK remains in EASA and the UK and the EU negotiating teams finalize the withdrawal agreement,” Williamson said.

He accuses the UK CAA of issuing contradictory statements, with the latest declaration in April stating that it still believes that reaching no arrangement to remain in EASA “to be a highly unlikely scenario. However, we continue to make the necessary contingency plans.” What this contingency plan upholds is unclear, according to Williamson. “Give us a plan and a time to execute that plan, and we need it now. The clock is running faster than anticipated,” he urged.

Bernard Van Milders, president of Antwerp-based Flying Group (Booth V107), warned of the possible distortion of competition due to differences in taxes like VAT and fuel tax exemption, the social cost of crew, flight-time limitations, and customs rights. “EU operators shall not be disadvantaged as a consequence of Brexit,” he pointed out.

“If the UK and other third countries receive the same rights as the EU, what advantages will EU operators have to keep their business within the EU?” he questioned, while acknowledging that Flying Group might set up shop in the UK post-Brexit if this offers clear competitive advantages.

The company currently has aircraft bases and AOCs across continental Europe and will be only marginally affected by a reduction in the full access to the UK market, since just 0.6 percent of its flights are UK domestic and less than 7 percent of them depart from the UK. He also called on MEPs to look into the ownership and control rules for EU operators, claiming that “nobody is controlling this.”