Airport Expansion

Baroness Kramer Excerpts

Tuesday 25th February 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

As soon as the noble Lord got up, I was reminded that he was one of the principal promoters of the Thames estuary airport. That was a good, innovative and brave proposal, but would have cost the country far more than the figures he is quoting for the expansion of Heathrow. We have to wait for the proposals from Heathrow, or any other promoter, for the third runway and see what they look like. We can then see what the application for a DCO actually consists of, how much it is said to cost and what else needs to be done in order to achieve it. That will clearly be work in progress, considering that a proposal is expected only early in the summer.

[Baroness Kramer (LD)]

My Lords, the Government—the Minister referred to this a moment ago—based their pronouncements on Heathrow on a report by Frontier Economics, but I recognise the key graph. It looks like a forecast for high demand for air travel, which is then met by Heathrow runway 3, but it is actually a graph of how much more air travel could be induced by runway 3 if a company applied an aggressive marketing strategy. How does a strategy based on inducing more air travel fit with the Government’s statements on climate change?

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

The next process is that the Government are committed to reviewing the Airports National Policy Statement, which is a government action. Then, as I say, this summer we will receive proposals from Heathrow, or from any other promoter, about a third runway, followed by an application for a development consent order. The matters that the noble Baroness refers to will no doubt be set out in Heathrow’s proposals and those of any other promoter, and then set out in detail in the DCO. We have to wait until then to see what they say about the demand, how it should be paid for—which was the subject of the previous question—and the Government’s view about what it will do for the economy.