Baines Simmons & Frazer-Nash Consultancy awarded four-year STEP contract

The contract is worth between £2 million and £3 million and will span the next four years, with the option of two one-year extensions. The contract will also serve as a framework agreement to support and facilitate safety-related sub-projects across the MoD.

STEP is the successor to the Defence Aviation Error Management System (DAEMS) contracts, which were technical support initiatives designed to assist cultural change and facilitate the establishment of an effective Safety Management System (SMS) across the Defence Aviation Environment (DAE).

Baines Simmons and Frazer-Nash will provide support within the STEP programme to further embed Error Management (EM) and to support the progression towards the next stage of safety maturity, as an effective SMS is developed across the DAE.

With the formation of the Defence Safety Agency (DSA), there is the potential opportunity for STEP to deliver a Training Needs Analysis (TNA) to identify emerging training requirements across the other MoD regulatory domains and develop appropriate training and technical support solutions.

Mark Briffa, CEO at Air Partner, said: 'This is an extremely important initiative for the MoD and I am delighted that we will be supporting them as they take this next step in further strengthening the safety processes they have in place. This contract win is a great start to 2018, following on from a successful 2017 in which we won a number of contracts with tier one national carriers, international civil airlines, the Royal Air Force of Oman and the European Defence Agency, among others.”

Andy Llewellyn, STEP Programme Manager at Baines Simmons, added: “It has been a fantastic team effort to secure the STEP contract, which allows Baines Simmons and Frazer-Nash to build upon the success of the Defence Aviation Error Management System (DAEMS) programmes. Together with the safety professionals within the Military Aviation Authority (MAA) and those across the DAE regulated community (with whom we have worked to establish DAEMS), we have paved the way for the STEP programme. This represents a challenging but exciting opportunity and we will continue to act as trusted advisors to the MoD and assist in any way we can to ensure that an effective SMS prevails, not only within the DAE but across the MoD as a whole”.

Real Admiral Paul Chivers, Director MAA, said: “The Military Aviation Authority (MAA) have been working with Baines Simmons over the last six years to comprehensively deliver Air Safety training.  The awarding of the STEP contract will allow the MAA to continue delivering assured Air Safety training alongside our strategic partner with a common aim of ensuring an increased awareness of Air Safety with the Defence Aviation Environment.”

Tim Andrews, Business Manager at Frazer-Nash Consultancy, said: “Working collaboratively, we look forward to providing change management, training analysis and specialist technical support to the programme, which will help the MoD to prevent accidents, reduce risk to life, enhance its operational capability and drive down unnecessary resource expenditure.”

It has been a successful period for Baines Simmons, in which it was also announced that it has secured two separate contracts with two NATO operating units, the Heavy Airlift Wing at Papa, Hungary, and the AWACS unit (Airborne Warning and Control System) in Geilenkirchen, Germany. Baines Simmons will help the units to understand the benefits and the challenges associated with EMAR (European Military Airworthiness Requirements) 21, 145 and M implementation.