Civil Aviation (Consumer Protection and Regulatory Reform) Bill [HL]

Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb Excerpts

2nd reading
Tuesday 2nd June 2026 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

My Lords, surprisingly perhaps, I welcome the Government’s attempt to strengthen airline passengers’ rights, especially with the worries about aviation fuel due to Israel and Trump launching a disastrous and illegal war on Iran. I am happy to support the Civil Aviation Authority being given additional enforcement powers to ensure that airlines comply with consumer laws. However, I am not so keen on legislation that makes it easier to expand airports, especially if that increases noise and pollution for people living in the immediate area or along the flight path. It is extremely bad for human health and well-being.

As a Green, I am well aware that a lot of what I say in your Lordships’ House is not supported by anyone around me and that my views on the environment, climate change and the disastrous path we are taking as humans are at best contentious and, at worst, regarded as plain wrong. I am just staggered by the lack of ecological awareness among Members of your Lordships’ House. It defeats me that noble Lords cannot understand the science, cannot see what is in front of them, and still support things such as airport expansion when we know it is bad for the planet—I exclude the noble Earl, Lord Russell, from this, obviously, and some of his colleagues. Luckily, there are people outside—many scientists and people who know what they are talking about better than I do—who can say that we are headed for disastrous circumstances if we do not take climate change seriously.

This whole Bill is just ludicrous in terms of the future of people and planet. I have mostly lost hope that this Government care about people and planet. They have lost all claim to be a green Government, with their attacks on nature in Britain and their decisions to expand aviation. The go-ahead for the expansion of London City Airport, Luton, Gatwick and Stansted means an extra 51 million passengers per annum. If the Government add Heathrow to that total, it is an extra 65 million. The Minister in his opening remarks said that aviation is a “cornerstone” of our economy, or some such. I would say it is a cornerstone of climate collapse. If we cannot see that, I would be happy to have one-to-one sessions with any Peer who would like to discuss this further, because, quite honestly, I am in despair at the lack of awareness about what our future could be.

As I said, luckily there are people outside. For example, Professor Bill Rutherford of Imperial College London said:

“The only way you can make aviation any more sustainable is to do less of it”.


All those extra flights result in either extra emissions or extra farmland taken up growing jet fuel, and that means rising food prices and more public subsidy.

The Sustainable Aviation Fuel Bill was appallingly named: there is no such thing as sustainable aviation fuel. That was infuriating as well. It is just greenwash that will leave future Governments needing to do the hard work of behaviour change to achieve net-zero targets. Actually, I am not a supporter of net zero. It is a ridiculous aim; we should be going for less than zero and cutting back completely. Net zero is unrealistic. It is real zero that we need, and less. The climate crisis is accelerating and this Bill would have been a chance to do something about that. Rather than promoting aviation, we need to cut back.

The first step towards stopping more flights leading to accelerating climate change is to deal with private jets. The rich are paying a lot of money for the privilege of wrecking our planet and the Government need to tell them that it is no longer acceptable. Being rich does not excuse you from your responsibilities as global citizens. Flying off for the weekend, perhaps every weekend, has consequences. The ice is melting, the seas are rising, flash floods and storms are becoming more powerful, and heatwaves and droughts are going to hit farming very hard. Our food supplies will be under threat. Change is happening now, not decades in the future. That means we have to act now as well, so private jets should be the first thing that the Government target to cut back on, and this Bill is the obvious opportunity to do that.

Next to the frequent flyers, the Government should be raising the aviation tax on people who take two or more flights a year. Frequent flying is something that well-off people do; we can discourage them by reflecting the true environmental cost in the amount that frequent flyers pay. Business flights have already changed since Covid made us shift towards online working and that trend must be given another shove.

Finally, we are experiencing another record-breaking year for temperatures in this country and across the globe. The next decade will see yet more record-breaking years, as will the decade after that. The decisions being made by this Government on aviation will add to the disaster that the younger generation will have to live and struggle with. I ask noble Lords to stop and rethink. I do not mean just the Government; I mean every single Member of this House who has supported the whole idea of aviation. Stop and think about what you are doing for the future—for your children and grandchildren. You are destroying their future.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Grender (LD)]

I thank the noble Lord, Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill, for introducing the Bill. In this debate many Peers have been clear about the strength of our aviation sector. Indeed, it has been great to have insight from a flight operations officer, no less, in the noble Baroness, Lady Antrobus, and from pilots in the noble Lords, Lord Tunnicliffe and Lord Kirkhope. This Bill and in particular the air passenger rights are much needed and welcome, along with the modernisation of our airspace.

In many clauses this is, as the Minister described, paving legislation, a framework designed to be filled in later through secondary powers, CAA rules and ministerial directions whose details we are yet to see. Paving legislation, as we have heard from many other Peers, by its nature raises more questions than it answers. But I personally remain hopeful that we will get all those answers either in a few minutes or certainly in Committee, especially with the work of noble Peers such as the noble Lord, Lord Tunnicliffe.

Particularly welcome was the Minister’s engagement with some of us beforehand, including my noble friend Lord Russell and the noble Lord, Lord Barber, last week. It gave me an opportunity to raise with the Minister the concerns of my noble friend Lady Brinton and others, which they will pursue in Committee, because of the lived experiences of disabled passengers. That remains a serious and unacceptable part of modern air travel. Our advance conversations went some way to providing reassurance, in particular that the Bill is not intended as a vehicle for airport expansion. We take that in good faith, but good faith is rarely the same as an absolute guarantee, so we welcome the reassurances already given from the Dispatch Box. It will come as no surprise to the Minister that we will be seeking more, and he will understand why. As a long-standing resident of Richmond, he will be only too well aware of the demands and needs, as set out by the noble Baroness, Lady Bray, of local communities who are under flight paths.

The Minister mentioned the airports national policy statement and said it would be the opportunity for MPs and Peers to scrutinise any changes, but he will also understand that we will seek to embed that within some kind of statutory status. He will be aware that scrutiny of a statement does not sound like a strong opportunity for scrutiny.

I ask the Minister directly whether he can confirm on the record, when he sums up, that the powers in the Bill, including those relating to slot allocation and airspace direction, will not be used in any way to facilitate expansion at Heathrow or Gatwick. If airport expansion is on the agenda, this House deserves, frankly, a very different piece of legislation—one with substantive provisions on the face of the Bill, full environmental impact requirements written into statutes and meaningful parliamentary scrutiny at every stage.

That points to a broader concern about the Bill’s reliance on secondary legislation. The Government are asking this House to endorse a framework before we have sight of the regulations that will give it substance. It is a bit like being asked to buy a house without seeing any of the rooms in it. It is a regular practice that the Conservative and Labour parties in this House do not vote down statutory instruments or support fatal Motions. But without the heft and suggestion of that, we will not achieve what we want to achieve, which is having the potential for detailed scrutiny within the Bill.

Sometimes I miss the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, on these occasions, because he will say, “Just vote for the fatal Motion, and then the civil servants will have to work the detail out”. It is a bit of a brutal instrument, but it is sometimes the only place we are left—and, of course, it is entirely academic because the Conservatives will never, or rarely, support a fatal Motion. That is the only way, if secondary legislation is the only direction.

On the face of the Bill, the consumer protection provisions, the new CAA rule-making powers, the reforms to slot allocation and the Secretary of State’s direction over airspace change all carry significant implications. Yet again, we will need more clarity on those.

On what I consider to be one of the most consequential provisions—that relating to slot allocation and airspace change—the Bill will allow the Secretary of State to make directions about the implementation of airspace changes. Slot and airspace decisions are not merely technical: they are levers over airport capacity. A reallocation of slots at a level 3 co-ordinated airport, combined with changes to airspace design and air traffic redistribution, can have the practical effect of facilitating expansion, even when the expansion has not been presented to Parliament or to communities as a discrete, clear policy choice. Communities living under flight paths, enduring the noise and breathing the emissions, deserve better than to find that outcome enabled quietly through delegated legislation. Any exercise of these powers that has the practical effect of facilitating increased capacity must be preceded by meaningful community consultation and a proper environmental impact assessment. My second question to the Minister is this: what environmental and noise tests will apply before the Secretary of State exercises directions under this Bill?

Like the noble Lord, Lord Harper, I am intrigued to learn what happened to the consultation, which was in 2023, I believe. I noticed that, in the notes we had when we met with the Minister, there was an assurance that no decisions on specific changes to the airport slots regime have been made yet. It says that industry views will be sought, including through formal consultation. It does not reference the consultation of communities on that. I wonder whether the Minister can elaborate on that, along with the very useful consultation of pilots as set out by the noble Lord, Lord Barber.

I turn to the part of the Bill that we hope is at its heart: consumer and passenger protection. The Bill will grant powers to the UK to diverge from retained EU law as it relates to the aviation industry. It is critical that, where this is done, it does not come at the expense of passengers. UK 261 gives passengers rights to compensation for delays and cancellations, but, as we have heard from noble Lords, it has been patchy. Last year, the CAA had to pursue enforcement action to recover over £1 million in refunds owed to passengers for just one budget airline. It should not require a regulator to chase each airline individually for compliance with basic rights.

The EU is currently reforming EU 261, as we know, including maintaining the right to compensation after a three-hour delay and banning fees for basic check-in and child seating. I would be intrigued to know whether the Government intend to keep pace with that. I do not want us to follow that if it is a low common denominator; let us pursue the highest common denominator, whether it is EU 261 or UK 261. We also believe that there is a compelling case for a passenger charter embedded in this legislation: a clear, accessible statement of a passenger-first approach, with statutory weight, not buried guidance. No one could have made a more eloquent case for something along those lines than the noble Baroness, Lady Gill, so I hope she will support it, but I suspect not, given the Bench she sits on. She gave a very eloquent argument about what I think should be a passenger charter.

On accessibility, the new regulatory framework must ensure the CAA has robust enforcement powers over accessibility rights, not just in guidance. My noble friend Lady Brinton shares similar experiences to those outlined by the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson; the mum of the noble Baroness, Lady Ramsey; the noble Lord, Lord Holmes; and the noble Baroness, Lady Griffin. The noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson, has shared in the past with this House her appalling experience at the hands of WhizzGo, which insisted on the impossible task of her removing from her wheelchair and carrying two large batteries, bigger than bus batteries. She was evicted from a flight, stuck in Bucharest for seven hours, and then had to pay an additional £900 to get home. We will work with others to ensure that measures such as a wheelchair passport, which the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, is suggesting, are included in the Bill.

On Clause 8 and the new powers relating to CAA rules, we will want to understand the scope of those powers, when they can be exercised and what parliamentary procedures apply. We look forward to guidance from the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee’s report—we have not seen that as yet. The accumulation of wide delegated powers in the Bill deserves this House’s sustained and skilled scrutiny. It is no surprise that so many noble Peers raise this and rightly reference it as an issue, among those the noble Baronesses, Lady Dacres, Lady Foster and Lady Bray, and the noble Lords, Lord Kirkhope and Lord Tunnicliffe.

Finally, where high-quality rail alternatives exist or can be developed, they should be promoted, as described by my noble friend Lord Russell. Eurostar’s potential to connect more of Britain to more of Europe is one such opportunity, not as a substitute for all aviation but as part of an intelligent and integrated transport framework that the Bill should sit within. The climate emergency means we cannot ignore this issue, as the noble Lord, Lord Empey, made clear. I very gently refer the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, to recent research by Climate Outreach which suggested that her own party dramatically reduced its own references to the climate emergency in the local May elections. I am very happy to send the research on. The Liberal Democrats were much more explicit on that issue.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

What a pointless jibe.

[Baroness Grender (LD)]

We will engage with the Bill at every stage, welcome its stated consumer protection goals, test its environmental safeguards, scrutinise its delegated powers and ensure that communities and passengers sit at the centre of whatever framework emerges. I look forward to the Minister’s response and a thorough Committee stage.