Airport Capacity

Drew Hendry Excerpts

Tuesday 25th October 2016 Commons Chamber

[Chris Grayling]

My right hon. Friend has been a passionate advocate for the communities around Stansted for a very long time; I remember visiting the airport with him when I shadowed this brief a decade ago. This is something we must be immensely sensitive to, and I give him a commitment that we will be. We are now looking very carefully at the proposals he was involved in shaping and the set of recommendations that he published recently. I want everything done as soon as is practical to make sure that the links to Stansted are as good as those to London’s other airports.

[Drew Hendry (Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey) (SNP)]

I welcome the Secretary of State to his place and thank him for early sight of his statement. After what has been world-leading prevarication from his Government, we welcome this decision, which finally almost ends what the Scottish Chambers of Commerce has called the “economic illiteracy” of failing to make a decision. True to form, however, the Government’s indecisiveness could not resist one last piece of bad taste fudge to stick in people’s throats. The lack of a vote in this House for more than a year will not allow people and companies a true end, and the soap opera will therefore continue.

That said, we welcome the announcement of Heathrow as a preference. Although airport expansion of this type disproportionately benefits the south-east of England, it has strategic consequences for Scottish air routes. In preparation for this announcement, and after more than 18 months of meetings with, among others, airports, campaign groups, business bodies and the UK Government, the Scottish National party Scottish Government have agreed a memorandum of understanding with Heathrow that will bring, among many other things, jobs, an engineering hub and route support to Scotland.

It is now time for the UK Government to ensure a full and fair deal for Scotland. We must see a commitment to addressing those needs. A lot is required. Will the Secretary of State commit to meeting the following wider challenges? First, as he has intimated, will he work with me and the Scottish Government to develop genuine route support and public service obligations, and address Scotland’s needs in relation to this development? Secondly, will he make a proper commitment to supporting aircraft biofuels and giving genuine encouragement to carbon-reducing technology in aircraft? Thirdly, will he go further than he did in his statement and commit to starting immediate work to replace the airspace strategy for the UK, which is more than 50 years old?

[Chris Grayling]

I am grateful to the SNP for its support for today’s announcement. The hon. Gentleman talked about the lack of a vote. I remind him that this is the law. We are following a process that is set out in statute—he is surely not suggesting that we should not follow that process. We will do so in as timely a way as possible, but we have a duty to follow primary legislation.

The hon. Gentleman talked about the benefits the expansion can bring to Scotland. I absolutely agree and will be delighted to work with his party and my counterparts in other parties in Scotland to ensure that Scotland gets a good deal out of all of this. It is not just about Scotland, however, but about the whole United Kingdom. It is about Northern Ireland. It is about making sure that skills development happens in Wales. It is about ensuring better links to the south-west of England, and good links to the north-east—I am going to Newcastle tomorrow, and the north-east is one region that I hope will benefit from today’s announcement. This is about the whole United Kingdom and so I have every intention of ensuring that our work is about the whole UK.

The hon. Gentleman raised the airspace modernisation programme. The CAA has already started preparatory work on that, and we need to press ahead with it, not simply because of today’s announcement but because we need to change many of the things that unnecessarily use up fuel and cause additional carbon emissions, such as the stacking structures. That work is beginning. We will consult on it extensively over the next two years. That modernisation has to happen alongside the development of the runway plan.