(1)An application for the revocation, suspension or variation of an air transport licence may be made to the CAA at any time by a person of a prescribed description.
(2)The CAA may at any time revoke, suspend or vary an air transport licence if it considers it appropriate to do so, whether or not an application with respect to the licence has been made in pursuance of subsection (1) above.
(3)It shall be the duty of the CAA to revoke or suspend or vary an air transport licence (whichever it thinks appropriate in the circumstances) if it is not or is no longer satisfied—
(a)that the holder of the licence is, having regard to—
(i)his and his employees’ experience in the field of aviation and his and their past activities generally, and
(ii)where the holder of the licence is a body corporate, the experience in the field of aviation and the past activities generally of the persons appearing to the CAA to control that body,
a fit person to operate aircraft under the authority of the licence; or
(b)that the resources of the holder of the licence and the financial arrangements made by him are adequate for discharging his actual and potential obligations in respect of the business activities in which he is engaged;
and if the CAA has reason to believe that the holder of a licence is neither a United Kingdom national nor such a body as is mentioned in paragraph (b) of subsection (3) of section 65 above it shall be the duty of the CAA to inform the Secretary of State accordingly and, if he so directs, to revoke the licence.
(4)The provisions of subsections (2) and (3) above conferring on the CAA power to suspend an air transport licence shall be construed as conferring on the CAA power to provide, by a notice in writing served in the prescribed manner on the holder of the licence, that subject to subsection (5) below the licence shall not be effective during a period specified in the notice; and while a licence is ineffective by virtue of such a notice the CAA may, by a further notice in writing served in the prescribed manner on the holder of the licence, provide that the licence shall be effective on and after a date specified in the further notice, but the further notice shall not prejudice the CAA’s powers to suspend the licence again or to revoke or vary it.
(5)Subject to subsection (6) below, if a licence is revoked, suspended or varied by the CAA otherwise than on the application of the holder of the licence and otherwise than in consequence of a direction given in pursuance of subsection (3) above, the revocation, suspension or variation shall not take effect before the expiration of the period prescribed in pursuance of subsection (5) of section 67 below for the bringing of an appeal against the CAA’s decision nor, if such an appeal is brought during that period, before the determination or abandonment of the appeal.
(6)Notwithstanding anything in subsection (5) above, the CAA may—
(a)direct that so much of the variation of a licence as relates to any tariff provision of the licence,
(b)with the consent of the holder of the licence, direct that so much of the variation of a licence as relates to any other matter,
shall to a specified extent take effect on a specified day earlier than is permitted by that subsection.
In this subsection “tariff provision” means, in relation to any licence, any term of that licence being a term such as is mentioned in section 65(5)(b) above.