| Previous Section | Index | Home Page |
17 Jun 2009 : Column 86WH—continued
The hon. Member for Sedgefield has a correct beef to pursue in BAA’s and British Airways’ attitude. Perhaps BA should be called “London Airways” because of its policy of marginalising regional airports. I know that colleagues in Manchester feel strongly about the reduction in the number of direct flights from Manchester to New York because they must now go via Heathrow with consequent extra carbon emissions. We can agree on such points.
I am conscious that there has been a big drop in the number of people using Durham Tees Valley airport. CAA figures show that 19,601 passengers used it in February 2009, which is a 52 per cent. fall from the previous year, and such falls must be examined. There is no indication that a third runway at Heathrow would solve the problem. The approach of the hon. Member for Sedgefield should be regulatory, because with a third runway BAA and BA will simply provide more flights to New York, Bangalore and Singapore.
Phil Wilson: My point was that ring-fencing some of the slots at Heathrow would help to mitigate the problem of regional airports that do not have access to Heathrow.
Norman Baker: I understand that.
I want to return to the problem of carbon emissions and the point that the hon. Member for Edinburgh, North and Leith (Mark Lazarowicz) made. If projected carbon emissions from aviation, even according to Government figures, stabilised where they are now and remained the same in 2050, a cut not of 80 per cent. but of 89 per cent. would be required from this country to compensate for what would effectively be a free ride for aviation. The current projection is that aviation emissions will increase by 38 per cent. by 2040.
The problem is largely out of control, so it is reasonable to consider the alternatives, including high-speed rail. I do not agree with the reference made by the hon. Member for Sedgefield to the north-east being peripheral, nor do I believe that Exeter is peripheral.
Alison Seabeck: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
Norman Baker: I will not, because I have done so twice.
For me, Scottish islands such as Shetland are peripheral. Exeter is not. I challenge the hon. Member for Plymouth, Devonport (Alison Seabeck) to travel door to door from this place to the middle of Exeter by rail or air—
Alison Seabeck: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
Norman Baker: In a moment. If the hon. Lady travelled door to door by rail or air, allowing for transport to Heathrow and the queues there, would she get to Exeter quickest by train or plane? I challenge her to make that journey.
Alison Seabeck: Perhaps the hon. Gentleman would like to do the journey to Plymouth. As I have explained, it takes five hours by rail or car from my base in London to my home in Plymouth. If I use the airline, which uses City airport, it takes two and a half hours.
Norman Baker: I referred to Exeter, not Plymouth, but the hon. Lady was welcome to intervene.
Studies have been done and for destinations such as Paris, Brussels, Manchester and elsewhere it is quicker to travel from door to door by rail.
Phil Wilson: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
Norman Baker: I will not, because I have only four minutes left.
It takes two hours 40 minutes to travel to Darlington—even now, with an unimproved rail line from King’s Cross. That compares favourably with the overall journey time by air, taking account of delays at the airport.
In response to the point about high-speed rail, I understand that, thanks to Lord Adonis and the Government, High Speed 2 is being considered not only for London to the west midlands, but for scoping corridors way beyond that, including to the north-east. I look forward to the report on High Speed 2. My vision for high-speed rail is that it should benefit the north-east, Scotland and Wales. It should not be one line. That is achievable and has been done elsewhere in Europe, so there is no reason why it should not be done in this country.
It is worth making the point that regional airports have sought to expand in recent years, and many of the connections have been for holiday purposes. There is nothing wrong with that, but we must not assume that extra slots will necessarily be taken up by journeys to London for business purposes. They will also be taken up for holiday purposes to holiday destinations.
On the alternatives to short-haul flights to Heathrow and comparing them with the alternative of high-speed rail, when businesses were polled in 2008, almost 10 times as many UK businesses supported the suggestion of a high-speed rail link from London to the north as supported the expansion of Heathrow with extra slots to the north-east.
Phil Wilson: The Airport Operators Association has said:
“Using CAA statistics, even if all of Heathrow’s domestic passengers switched to rail, Heathrow would operate at around 90 per cent. of capacity and still be full before 2020 when a third runway could be operational. Rail is not an alternative to airport expansion, but it is part of a coherent intermodal transport policy.”
Norman Baker: I do not accept that. There is an alternative to a large range of domestic destinations and new European destinations. There should be direct train journeys to Amsterdam and Berlin, for example. There is no reason why we should not be able to make such journeys by rail. Yesterday, I met Deutsche Bahn to talk about that. Plans are progressing well, and when EU open access occurs in 2010, we will see more of those journeys.
David Taylor:
Twenty-four hours ago, Mr. Streeter, I sat in your Chair and heard a fine speech by the hon. Member have for Canterbury (Mr. Brazier) in which he comprehensively demolished the research underpinning what Oxford Economic Forecasting has said, which shaped the predicted usage of aviation, both freight and passenger. Is it not about time that we had a
thoroughly independent and effective analysis that is more balanced than the Oxford document, which is substantially discredited?
Norman Baker: Yes, it is. The aviation industry has made a practice in the past 10 years of skewing figures to try to influence Government policy in an improper direction. We need an independent look at the issue, and I hope that with a new Minister in charge and Lord Adonis as Secretary of State, we will get it.
I have not been able to make all the points that I wanted to—I have been keen to give way to hon. Members—but let me say to the hon. Member for Sedgefield that I very much sympathise with his wish to support his regional economy. That is right. I also sympathise over the lack of direct flights, the pulling of flights and the loss of slots to London. However, the prescription that he produced for more flying, while dismissing the environmental case and ignoring high-speed rail, is not the right solution.
10.40 am
Mr. Julian Brazier (Canterbury) (Con): It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr. Streeter. I congratulate the hon. Member for Sedgefield (Phil Wilson) on securing this debate on regional aviation policy. He is a strong supporter of his local airport, Durham Tees Valley, which is also my sister’s local airport; she lives near it. Like many regional airports, Durham Tees is struggling in the current economic conditions. Figures obtained by the Airport Operators Association suggest that airport employment will fall by one quarter this year and the average profits at UK airports by one fifth. My party profoundly believes in the importance of our regional airports and the contribution that they make to regional economies.
Hilary Armstrong: Will the hon. Gentleman therefore rebut the statement that his leader made that the north-east requires only one airport?
Mr. Brazier: I have not seen the detail of that statement, but the position at the moment is that we have a number of busy airports in northern England. Having used Newcastle and Leeds myself and my sister being a regular user of Durham Tees Valley, I am conscious of the role that they all play.
Regional airports have grown in popularity in the past few years. The hon. Member for Sedgefield cited various figures. The most striking one is that the percentage of passenger traffic going to regional airports grew from 39 to 48 per cent. between 2001 and just before the recession. We support the expansion of regional airports where community support exists. We can see a case for proportionate and sensible expansion of regional airports, with decisions made on a case-by-case basis, taking account of local and national environmental factors as usual. Regional airports have the potential to reduce transit flights by increasing point-to-point movements—as the hon. Member for Montgomeryshire (Lembit Öpik) pointed out—as well as reducing road congestion in the south-east, where there is still an unhealthy concentration of flying.
The hon. Member for Sedgefield stressed the importance of links to Heathrow and I will return to that point, but I think that he was wrong to underplay the importance
of direct flights as more and more regional airports get longer runways. My party believes that regional airport policy should allow maximum utilisation of existing infrastructure and thus take some of the pressure off the south-east. Some spare capacity already exists, but in other areas, including the south-east, there are problems. A number of airports are stuck in very long planning processes and there may be good reasons why some of those projects should not go ahead.
Turning to specific issues, I would be interested if the Minister commented on the need for temporary surge capacity in the south-east to deal with the Olympic games. Over a couple of weeks, there will be 900 extra movements. Clearly, smaller airports should pick that up. What thought has he given to that?
My local regional airport, of which I am extremely proud, is Kent International at Manston. Its current infrastructure includes one of the longest runways in the country. It is suitable for code E aircraft such as Boeing 747-400s and is also capable of hosting code F aircraft such as the A380. Sadly, it is massively underused. However, the forthcoming enhancement of the rail service between London and Ramsgate means that travel times will drop from two hours to barely 80 minutes, with the trains passing the bottom of the runway. The medium-term aim is to cater for 500,000 tonnes of freight and 6 million passengers a year, which will potentially provide 7,500 jobs. Even partial success would make the airport a substantial driver of economic growth in east Kent, which is one of the poorer areas of the country.
Southend is another example of a regional airport that can expand. Its runway is operating at a tiny percentage of capacity, but the planned extension and new railway line will take pressure off other south-eastern airports.
I listened with interest to the comments by the hon. Member for Plymouth, Devonport (Alison Seabeck) on Plymouth. My parents live in the west country, so I am rather sensitive to those points, but I put it to her that the Conservative plans for a rail hub at Heathrow that links Heathrow directly into the rail system would transform the ability of constituents such as hers to travel.
Alison Seabeck: I understand the point that the hon. Gentleman is making and it is an interesting proposal. None the less, the time taken on the rail link to go all the way down to Plymouth and Cornwall is still much longer than if we had the air link into Heathrow. Tourism is important. It is important that we get Americans coming to Heathrow who then come to Plymouth to visit it and the far south-west. Playing down tourism is a mistake.
Mr. Brazier: The point is that people would be able to get off an aeroplane and go directly to a rail terminal, which would avoid the huge transfer times.
Today, regional airports are struggling, as a number of hon. Members have said. Air passenger duty is growing substantially, and regional airports have been hit by the economic downturn. A point that the hon. Member for Sedgefield made strongly is that a serious distortion in APD is hitting our regional airports. It is hitting the viability of their routes to Heathrow, which is a key reason why we have lost some of those routes, and it bears down particularly heavily on point-to-point flights, as opposed to people getting a short connection
to a continental airport and then doing an APD-free flight from there. There are other anomalies, but one is that charges are based on the distance from London to the capital city of the destination country, not the destination itself. Therefore, frequent flyers to the western United States or eastern Russia pay much less; they get a relatively free ride compared with other people flying comparable distances.
The structure for APD is in a mess. We propose moving to a flights tax to end the absurdity whereby full carbon-efficient aircraft subsidise empty carbon-inefficient aircraft. I do not have time to go into more detail, but my shadow Treasury colleagues are examining the issue closely.
The administered incentive pricing proposal is causing regional airports huge worry. Ofcom proposes to introduce such pricing for the use of aeronautical spectrum, which is a good idea, in principle as it would encourage people to use less. The problem, as the Cave review pointed out, is that some people, including airports, have no choice. The Government themselves have said:
“In many cases, international agreements limit the scope to improve spectrum efficiency”.
Ofcom is ignoring the Cave review. Will the Minister give guidance to Ofcom and tell it to look at what the Cave review and the Government said about the issue? Ofcom’s original consultation document was only placed on its website, not sent to stakeholders. Will the Minister tell us who responded and who provided evidence to Helios and Plum in their work on the impact assessment for Ofcom’s AIP proposals? He may need to write to me on that. Ofcom proposes a two-stage approach to spectrum pricing. When is the second consultation, on pricing of radar and aeronautical radio navigation aids, expected? Have the Government done any detailed research on the cost implications for regional airports? To give one example, the losses at Inverness would be increased by one sixth—that would be picked up directly by the Scottish taxpayer.
Norman Baker: Can the hon. Gentleman guarantee, given the indication from the shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer, the hon. Member for Tatton (Mr. Osborne), that there will be a 10 per cent. cut in funding for public sector projects after the next election, that the Conservative proposals for high-speed rail will go ahead?
Mr. Brazier: The Conservative proposals for high-speed rail have been personally endorsed by the leader. They are a long-term project, although the first stage, which connects into the link to the channel tunnel, is the one that will deliver most of the alternatives to flying by bringing journeys by rail to Brussels, Paris, Amsterdam and many other destinations within three hours. The Conservative party is closely committed to that project. The hon. Gentleman and I have the same view on Heathrow and similar views on high-speed rail, but I do not share his downbeat view of the savings that can be generated by some of the exciting developments in aeronautical technology or the carbon savings that will come from biofuels.
To conclude, the Conservative party believes that regional airports are a huge asset. We must find ways to make life easier for them.
10.50 am
The Minister of State, Department for Transport (Mr. Sadiq Khan): It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair, Mr. Streeter. I know that you have a genuine interest in this area of policy.
One’s nervousness is compounded by the fact that the Prime Minister’s Parliamentary Private Secretary has walked into the Chamber. I hope that she is here for the next debate, rather than to take notes on this one.
I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Sedgefield (Phil Wilson) on his excellent and thought-provoking speech. He is a champion of the north-east, not just because he led a delegation with my right hon. Friend the Member for North-West Durham (Hilary Armstrong) and others to meet the previous Aviation Minister, or because of the issues he has raised at Prime Minister’s questions, but because of the way he has challenged and cajoled previous and current Ministers and officials regarding some of the challenges that his region faces. That will benefit not just his region and his constituents, but the wider community.
We have had interventions and speeches from across the UK. We have heard from North-West Durham; Montgomeryshire; Paisley and Renfrewshire, North; Edinburgh, North and Leith; North-West Leicestershire; Castle Point—I always enjoy it when the hon. Member for Castle Point (Bob Spink) has a dig at the Mayor of London—Orkney and Shetland; Lewes; Canterbury; Copeland; and Stockton, North. I will try to deal with the points that have been raised, but if I do not, I will, of course, write to my right hon. and hon. Friends, as well as to the hon. Member for Canterbury (Mr. Brazier), who speaks for Her Majesty’s official Opposition.
The hon. Gentleman was understandably nervous when asked to confirm his leader’s view that there should be only one airport in north-east England, and he was nervous when asked another important question. I know that this is a hard assumption for my hon. Friends to make, but let us assume for a second that the Leader of the Opposition is being truthful when he says that, should the Conservative party form a Government—God forbid—the only ring-fenced areas of expenditure would be the NHS, development and schools. That raises the question of where the cuts will be made, so when I am being sanctimoniously lectured about high-speed rail, I know that the words I am hearing are not worth the breath taken to say them.
Alison Seabeck: Will my right hon. Friend acknowledge that having a super-hub at Heathrow does not help Plymouth, because we do not have a slot there?
Mr. Khan: My hon. Friend made an interesting speech. I have great respect for the hon. Member for Lewes (Norman Baker), but I do not envy my hon. Friend her five-hour journey with him to Plymouth. However, she raises a serious point, because this is not an either/or. We need to recognise that only one party—well, there is probably another one—is committed to investment in infrastructure, which is what we are talking about.
| Next Section | Index | Home Page |