Airports: Heathrow
Debate between Baroness Valentine and Earl Attlee(11 years, 9 months ago)
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Earl Attlee
My Lords, I know that the noble Lord has strong feelings on this matter, but I am afraid that he should take no encouragement from what I have just said at all. We will have to wait until the Airports Commission reports. However, Heathrow is well connected at the moment, and compares very well with our European partners.
Baroness Valentine
As chief executive of London First, I hear daily of businesses’ frustration that capacity constraints are not being tackled more urgently. In the mean time, recent trials at Heathrow using both runways to land and take off appear to have reduced the number of stacking planes and to have improved punctuality. If the Government are satisfied with these trials, when do they intend to make the practice permanent?
Earl Attlee
My Lords, the noble Baroness raises an important point about the operational freedoms trials which arose from the south-east airports taskforce, chaired by my right honourable friend Theresa Villiers. We are in the second phase of the trials. They are not yet complete, so we do not yet have the complete answer. We will just have to see the results, but we are making good progress on the trials.
On stacking, the Civil Aviation Authority is undertaking a study on the future airspace strategy. One of the objectives is to reduce stacking of aircraft, because of the noise, emission and cost.
Railways: Crossrail
Debate between Baroness Valentine and Earl Attlee
Baroness Valentine
Does the Minister therefore accept that all parties have done a very good job in supporting Crossrail thus far?
Earl Attlee
My Lords, I entirely agree with the noble Baroness. I thought that she would come in with a slightly different question which I would latch on to, but her support is much appreciated.