Section 8(2)(h) of the Civil Aviation Act 1949 gives power to make provision in the Air Navigation Order ‘generally for securing the safety, efficiency and regularity of air navigation and the safety of aircraft and of persons or property carried therein’. When it was decided to institute a Mandatory Occurrence Reporting system, there was therefore no problem about including a requirement for reporting in the Air Navigation Order, since the whole purpose of the system is to secure the safety of air navigation.

Provision for Mandatory Occurrence Reporting was first made in the summer of 1974 by the Air Navigation (Amendment) Order 1974 which added to the Order a new article, Article 80(A), which specified classes of persons required to report to the Civil Aviation Authority ‘any reportable occurrence … which is of such a description as may be prescribed’. ‘Prescribed’ in the Air Navigation Order means prescribed in regulations (in this context the Air Navigation (General) Regulations) and Article 80(A) did not in fact bite until regulations had been made.