Any company’s most important asset is its people, and NATS is no exception. People are our lynchpin in the safe and efficient management of our increasingly busy skies and advances in technological developments across the air traffic management (ATM) industry.

Flying is one of the safest forms of transport; emergencies are rare. But if and when situations do occur, pilots and air traffic controllers have the skills and training to handle them.

I am pleased to announce that my colleague Philip Binks and I will be presenting and hosting a stand at the UK Drone Show, using this opportunity to improve awareness about the safe use of drones in our airspace.

Remotely Piloted Aircraft System (RPAS) or “drones” are now well established in the public consciousness. Safety agency EASA has launched a public consultation on their new regulatory framework, which will enable drone operators greater access to the airspace used by manned aviation.

An ‘invisible infrastructure’, with ‘huge motorways in the sky’. When NATS released its UK 24 video, it showed just how many flights are up in that invisible infrastructure on a daily basis.

Automation has a major role to play in the future of air traffic management. People are key to the success of any automation; how they design, monitor and maintain the systems and tools available to controllers, and how those tools are used. It’s something we’re dedicating a lot of attention to and I was pleased to be invited to discuss this at a recent Flight Safety Foundation Forum in Brussels.

As Air Traffic Management (ATM) becomes ever-busier, more complex and more inter-connected across different Air Navigation Service Providers (ANSPs), it is timely to consider how human performance is best optimised for smooth, efficient and safe handling of air traffic.

Human performance is especially important in ATM as it is a 24/7 industry which strongly depends on people. Aviation needs its frontline staff to be on top performance in order to maintain the safety and efficiency of the air transport system.

Every year the International Air Transport Association (IATA) brings its members together for an Operations Conference. This year the conference was in Los Angeles and focused on the challenge and opportunity from introducing new technology to enhance safety, efficiency and capacity.

On the 2nd April 2015, Glasgow Airport will be allocated a listening squawk of 2620. A listening squawk is a code that can be entered into a GA aircraft’s transponder when flying near controlled airspace around an airfield. This makes the aircraft show up on the Glasgow air traffic control team’s radar.

Safety is our first priority and our commitment to a culture of safety has resulted in significant improvement in recent years to our safety record. In the past ten years we have halved the number of reportable safety incidents and reduced the number of airprox by 75%. It is a record of which we are justifiably proud but by no means complacent, and we continue to place our Just Culture at the heart of all we are doing to improve our record further.