Flying Schools

Henry Smith Excerpts

Tuesday 12th September 2023 Westminster Hall

[Henry Smith (Crawley) (Con)]

One of my constituents is affected by this issue. He paid significant fees up front for flight training, and that money has seemingly been lost. It is an issue that the Department for Transport needs to address. More broadly, as my hon. Friend rightly points out, the aviation industry, which is central to this country’s trade and connectivity, will start to suffer if the problem is not properly fixed.

[Tim Loughton]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend and near neighbour from Crawley who represents Gatwick airport. I know he can with us today only briefly due to a sitting of the Foreign Affairs Committee. One of his constituents contacted me, along with many other people from other constituencies who had relatives or were themselves being trained at Shoreham airport, then found themselves out of pocket with very serious financial implications. I will come on to what we need to do about that. It certainly has implications for capacity in the airline industry in the UK. If anybody knows about that issue, it is my hon. Friend, who represents one of the largest airports in the country. There is an angle whereby some of the commercial airlines may be able to help.

I am going to read out correspondence from some of those affected by Shoreham who contacted me. I invited a number of them to come and meet me in my constituency; we had a roundtable to hear some of their experiences and plan a way forward. It is my fault if Members have been contacted, because I encouraged people to contact their MPs to tell them about their experiences. That way we could get as many hon. Members as possible to put pressure on the transport authorities and others to look at the immediate problem, as well as address the longer-term implications and the weaknesses in the system.

I have also been working with the British Airline Pilots’ Association, which has been lobbying the Government for changes in the regulation of flight training schools, particularly to protect students who have made a big financial commitment and are, for all intents and purposes, completely unprotected. That is unlike the situation if they were at a university paying fees, or had other financial investments or obligations, which would be covered under Financial Conduct Authority provisions. The point I am making is that if someone is on a pilot training course, it is little different from any other form of tertiary education, yet it is treated completely differently from training on other expensive courses, such training courses for medics and lawyers. Pilot training is one of the most expensive training courses.

One potential protection that has been suggested, not least by the Minister and the Civil Aviation Authority, is that someone paying their fee could do so by credit card. The trouble is, many of the flying schools do not take credit cards. If someone has to pay £90,000 up front, not many people have got a limit on their credit cards that would allow them to pay it in one sum. That is not a facility that is open or practical for many potential students.

I wrote to the noble Baroness Vere in the Lords, who is the Minister responsible for aviation. I am grateful to the Minister of State, Department for Transport, my right hon. Friend the Member for Hereford and South Herefordshire (Jesse Norman), for covering her position today. I am afraid that it took some months and a bit of chasing to secure a meeting, but I am glad to say we have now secured one for a few weeks’ time, and I will be taking a delegation along with representatives from BALPA to see Baroness Vere.

A statement from the BALPA interim general secretary, Miranda Rackley, rightly noted that there is no public funding for pilot training:

“Flight schools going bust is financially devastating to hard-working students who deserve to have their money better protected from flight school failures. Pilot training is amongst the most expensive training of all professions, and unlike other careers such as law and medicine, there is no student funding available…Many trainees resort to family support to fund their training, such as remortgaging family houses. Government needs to step up and protect students that are so vital to the future of the UK aviation industry.”

BALPA has given a number of examples, and I have some direct examples too. A couple from Worthing, in my constituency, had to raise £90,000 for their daughter to train as an airline pilot. The 19-year-old signed up with FTA at Shoreham, and had to make a downpayment of £10,000 and pay a further £4,500 each month. In late May the school went out of business, which left her parents with losses of £45,000. That is a lot of money.

I can give other examples. Somebody wrote to me to say that their son

“was extremely keen on training to work for an airline. Because of that I remortgaged my house to fund him and almost paid for entire lessons in advance. Now I have no money left to support him financially for his dream job, and I am stuck in a predicament in how to move forward with my son’s education”.

Somebody from East Sussex said:

“My son was a student pilot at FTA in Shoreham, which has gone into liquidation. We have lost over £80,000.”

Somebody from London said:

“I paid a deposit to start training with them”

—Flying Time Limited—

“due to Covid and the changing of the schools schedule they were not able to provide lessons. When I asked for a refund they said they will get back to me and a week later they sent an email informing me the school is closing. It’s extremely sad and I’m not sure what to do or where to start as I want to continue with lessons.”

A constituent said:

“I have now been offered a place at one of the big ATO’s to continue my flight training as the FTA Global syllabus has been approved by the CAA and my training records have been reviewed by the training team at the ATO. So I am now in a situation that I am out of pocket”

—but could be transferred elsewhere—

“and the only way to get back into training without significant time off (due to being recent on training) is by gaining some sort of financial assistance. There is also a time frame I would need to start the training hence why us students would really need assistance from the government.”

There is a particularly poignant one from a Newcastle resident, who said that

“we have lost £50,313 that we had paid into my son’s training. Since a very young age all my son wanted to do was to be a pilot. He is unable to go into the RAF as he has corrected vision…and so we focused on the commercial training route. I have worked for the NHS for the last 27 years and you can imagine we are not rich people. We are hardworking and will give anything we can to enable my son to become a pilot. My husband…used some of his pension money to help…pay the school fees…It is astounding to realise that someone can pay in so much money for their education only to lose it all and that there is no route for any recompense.”

Their son

“will no longer be able to become a pilot as we cannot financially afford to fund a full course again. The failure of FTA has devastated my son and he no longer knows how to move forward in any career path.”

Here is another one from Uxbridge:

“I am a pilot student who was learning an integrated course at Flying Time Aviation limited in Shoreham-by-Sea. The course cost around £78,140, excluding the accommodation and cost of living”

On top of the fees, students have to fund living away from home and their general living expenses as well, which are not taken into consideration. The letter continued:

“The payment was made in 12 monthly instalments after paying an initial deposit of £14,190. On May 22nd, I received an email from the director of FTA informing us about the closure of FTA. I had assumed that the company would have the decency to give back what they owed to the students... However, it was made clear that no refunds would be made at all at the meeting held the next day. This has not only left me but more than 170 students in debt…I received an email last week from the liquidation company, which shows that the company owes me £65,500…however, with the company being extremely in debt, the chances of me and the rest of the fellow students receiving their money back are slim to none…we were only informed about the severity of this situation on the day they ceased trading.”

Finally, somebody from Kent said:

“I am one of the many who have been affected by this closure and have lost considerable amount of money and time—roughly £16,000 and only up until June to finish my flight training”.

There is a time consideration as well. People have 18 months under CAA regulations from the start of their course to the end and the examinations to complete that course. If people have started the course and cannot find or fund an alternative, they are right back where they started and that money has gone completely to waste.

I have taken up the case with Baroness Vere and the CAA, and they have both written back to me. The problem is that the CAA has oversight only of safety considerations and the quality of pilot training for flying schools, and has nothing to do with the finances or their sustainability, but surely the two are linked. There is growing evidence that the cash-flow problems that flying schools have had were leading to corners being cut, which could lead to compromised levels of safety, so financial sustainability is an important consideration in ensuring that flying training schools offer the full, safe and regulated pilots course that those students pay for.

Why do flying schools find themselves in this parlous situation? There are a number of reasons. First, they were hit hard by the pandemic. There was some support for them from the Government, but clearly flying training was not a priority at that time; indeed, much of it stopped for quite a long period. Secondly, flying schools are very dependent on fuel prices, which have rocketed because of events in Ukraine. The third consideration is that, perhaps uniquely in Europe, flying training courses in this country are subject to VAT, which is a large premium on top of already large fees. That does not happen in most if not all other European countries, where flying training is quite rightly treated as being educational, so is not subject to VAT.

I would like the Minister to comment on that last point. Does he think that flying training is a form of education and training, which the Government quite rightly encourage? If so, can he say why it is being treated as just any other sort of consumer item on which people are liable to pay VAT? That does not seem right.

There is also a Brexit element, which I am sure will greatly encourage the hon. Member for Dundee West. That is because previously flying training schools would only pay regulation fees to the CAA, but now, in some cases, if students have European pilots’ licences they will also pay fees to the European Union Aviation Safety Agency, or EASA. However, there is a Brexit bonus for pilots, which you, Sir Robert, will be glad to hear. Now that the UK has left the European aviation system, pilots are able to hold both a UK licence and a European licence, which was not possible previously under European regulations.

As a result of all these factors, many flying schools have had cash-flow problems, leading to claims that they have been demanding money up-front from students in order to keep themselves afloat. In the case of the FTA at Shoreham, it is claimed that it now has debts in excess of £5.5 million, including a £1-million debt to His Majesty’s Revenue and Customs, much of which will be accounted for by VAT liability. However, the FTA’s planes are all mortgaged and it has precious few assets, so it is highly unlikely that there will be anything left for the students who paid up-front or who are partway through their course; they will have to find a new flying school to transfer to, if they can afford to raise the necessary funds to do so.

As I have said, there is the added complication that this issue is time-limited, which is where I think the CAA has a far greater role to play. There are concerns that the CAA has not been as proactive as it might have been in trying to find solutions for some of the students at FTA, including reconsidering the way that exams are held and considering whether there can be any flexibility in that regard, particularly for those people whose course was delayed because of the pandemic; earlier, I cited the case of one such student.

There are also serious questions to be asked of the owners of FTA, who apparently were in touch with the potential receivers back in January, and there was also a reorganisation of debt liabilities to a new company, even though FTA was still taking up-front fees from students virtually up to the day on which it went under. As I have said, those students are not covered by basic Financial Conduct Authority protections, and the advice from the CAA and Ministers has been that they should pay with a credit card which, as I have also said, is not very practical. Consequently, those students are not covered by the protections in section 75 of the Consumer Credit Act 1974 that other credit card purchases would attract. The FTA flying school in Shoreham was a key academy, offering a European flying licence, and it looked like one of the safer and more sustainable flying schools. Consequently, its closure has shocked the industry and clearly other flying schools remain vulnerable.

When I wrote to the Minister, Baroness Vere, her response, as I have said, was that

“the extent of the CAA’s regulatory oversight of flight training organisations is limited to ensuring each organisation complies with specified safety requirements, including suitable training to an agreed safety standard.

The CAA has no direct regulatory oversight of the financial health of a flight training organisation or of the individuals operating within that business, and any proposals to grant these powers to the CAA would first require the Department to consider amending existing legislation, through its rule-making programme, to introduce such powers. In this regard, any changes to the scope of the CAA’s role and functions would likely require a process of developing and consulting on new draft regulations, new regulatory guidance, training for CAA inspectors and the establishment of a framework for regulatory oversight and insurance of the initial and ongoing financial resilience of flight training organisations.”

Right—let’s do it, because, as I have said, all of that will be needed before long if we are still to have a flying school business left in this country in the future.

BALPA contends that the CAA has a statutory responsibility, under retained EU law, to operate an ongoing oversight programme for UK-approved flight schools, which includes requiring “evidence of sufficient funding”. BALPA does not believe that, to date, the CAA has discharged that responsibility diligently or at all, and I agree. There is a financial oversight aspect of the CAA’s regulatory role. Clearly, demanding fees up front to keep operations afloat does not smack of flying schools having sufficient funding. The CAA needs to step up and step in.

BALPA has been working with students to introduce protections to avoid some of the disastrous financial consequences that have befallen students at Bournemouth, Shoreham and Dundee. Specifically, it has brought in its finance fairness charter, under which it asks that, as dedicated approved training organisations, flight schools

“commit to a fundamental principle of not accepting advance payments or deposits from cadets that exceed”

a certain amount

“for training services. This financial limit aims to assure cadets while promoting fiscal responsibility.”

Additionally, it asks that ATOs

“pledge to furnish cadets with comprehensive information regarding payment alternatives if available, further underscoring transparency in line with these commitments”

and

“pledge to extend the convenience of payment by credit card without imposing any undue surcharge providing the cadet with additional consumer protection.”

The BALPA charter adds:

“Transparency is paramount. ATOs undertake the commitment to furnish cadets with accessible information pertaining to their training programs, associated costs, payment protocols, refund mechanisms, and all pertinent terms and conditions.”

That seems perfectly sensible to me, and I hope the Minister will consider taking it up with the CAA. One person who has been caught up in all this wrote to me, referring to the

“seemingly disinterested attitude the CAA has taken towards investigation of misuse of Student monies”,

with the CAA just rolling out the excuse that that does not come its remit, when many of us think that it does.

“For many pilot hopefuls,” BALPA says,

“the costs involved in attaining the necessary qualifications have meant going to extreme measures to secure the funding required, including re-mortgaging family homes”—

I have given examples of that—

“taking out multiple un-secured loans, maximising limits on credit cards and/or borrowing sums of money from family, far exceeding any normal student borrowing.”

It adds:

“In the UK, a trainee professional pilot is not viewed in the same way as a student in any other field or profession. In 99% of cases in the UK, a trainee professional pilot does not even qualify for student status.

For too long, trainee pilots have been viewed and treated as customers. They are students in education, investing in their futures and they are the future of the UK’s aviation industry.”

I wholly agree.

There is another issue, which I referred to briefly: VAT. Interestingly, this point was raised by the now Defence Secretary in a question to the Chancellor of the Exchequer in June 2018, when he was on the Back Benches. He asked the Chancellor,

“with reference to Strategic Review of General Aviation, published by the Civil Aviation Authority in July 2006, whether his Department has conducted a review of whether the current VAT treatment applied to flight training places UK flying schools at a competitive disadvantage to those based in other countries; and if he will make a statement.”

The Treasury replied:

“The government does not hold information on tax revenues that can be broken down to assess the impact of tax on flight training.”

This is not a new issue and many senior colleagues have raised it in the past. I cannot stress enough the financial impact that these closures have had on students who have saved or begged families hard to train as pilots to fulfil their dreams. Why do we not treat flying schools like any other places teaching students in tertiary education, rather than treating students as consumers of a product that happens to be a training course? Why is flight training subject to VAT in this country, unlike anywhere else in Europe?

Having said that, the consequences of the recent closures go far beyond the implications for individual students who find themselves severely out of pocket and need protections. BALPA says that we also need new protections to help secure the training pipeline of commercial pilots to aid forward planning for airlines. We need those new protections to prevent the loss of foreign investment from airlines investing in the UK’s highly experienced flight training industry. We used to be the pride of the world and many foreign pilots would come here for their training. We need new protections to support smaller airfields across the country that support thousands of skilled jobs, including flight instructors, engineers and air traffic controllers.

Today, I received a note from Airlines UK, which makes some interesting observations. Of the 15,295 holders of CAA-issued commercial pilot licences aged between 18 and 64, only 2,954 are under 30, while 3,500 are between 51 and 64. We have an ageing population of pilots who are already trained and working. In the last decade, the total number of UK commercial pilot licence holders fell by 10% and the number under the age of 30 fell by 4%. Airlines UK therefore supports many of the proposals made by BALPA, including that we should remove

“VAT from pilot and air traffic control officer training”;

that we should

“enable student and/or other self-funded options to be used for courses to qualify as a pilot”;

and that there should be an update of the apprenticeship levy

“to enable employers to overcome existing barriers to use apprenticeship funding for pilot and ATCO training.”

We should bring together people from the Department for Education, the Department for Transport and the Treasury, BALPA, and the rest of the airline industry, which plays a role because it is the beneficiary of pilot training—the bigger airlines do not tend to pay for some of this training, but I think they have a role too—to find an immediate solution for those prospective pilots left severely out of pocket, and to introduce financial protections to ensure that that is highly unlikely to happen again, and to ensure that there is oversight of financial sustainability and that the CAA, or an alternative body, can regulate the future of flight training schools.

Without that, we will have an awful lot of students who find themselves at a loose end, unable to fulfil their dreams of becoming the pilots that this country desperately needs. There will also a big confidence issue for pilot training in the United Kingdom. Other countries send their students to this country to train, but people from our own country who want to train as pilots will not be able to do so in the United Kingdom, either because of a lack of capacity or because it is too risky, so they will go abroad and decide to stay and work there, and we will lose them.

There is a severe risk to the UK airline industry unless this situation is sorted out urgently, and that is my ask of the Minister and his colleagues. This issue has big implications for the flying industry in the United Kingdom and a big implication for a lot of the students represented by hon. Members here today. It cannot be ignored any more. I hope that in our forthcoming meeting with the Minister she will be able to progress some urgently needed solutions to the problem.

International Travel

Henry Smith Excerpts

Tuesday 15th March 2022 Commons Chamber

[Grant Shapps]

I should point out to the hon. Gentleman and the House that the UK Health Security Agency is a four-nations body made up of the chief medical officers from all parts of the United Kingdom, including Scotland. Therefore, when we came to yesterday’s discussion at Covid-O, which included Scottish Ministers, we could take into account the advice provided. I do not want to accuse him of being happy to see the forms and bureaucracy scrapped while still somehow opposing it, but it seems to me that if one is really serious about cutting bureaucracy, one should welcome this step.

The hon. Gentleman refers to support that he claims the Scottish Government have given to aviation, but it is worth reminding the House that that is not what Edinburgh and Glasgow airports have said. They were upset that Ministers in Scotland refused to meet them, which they said was “galling” and in “stark contrast” to the UK Government’s approach. Indeed, the Scottish Passenger Agents’ Association said that its industry had been “sacrificed” by the SNP—its word rather than mine. It is important to say that we are supporting the sector, not least by removing these restrictions.

The hon. Gentleman asked about the strategic aviation review. I hope he will accept that there is no point in carrying out a review during omicron and covid—we want to do it as the industry comes out—so that will be forthcoming. He asked a sensible question about continued monitoring, which will happen in two ways. First, he will be familiar with me having said many times at the Dispatch Box when we were in the midst of the pandemic that the UK was carrying out up to 50% of the genomic sequencing in the entire world. That figure is now different, because we have helped and other countries have caught up, so, although we are carrying on our programme, much of that genomic sequencing is happening around the world rather than needing to be done specifically here. Secondly, we have the programme led by the Office for National Statistics that carries on finding out where coronavirus is in the country and the extent to which different variants might be starting to take hold. We can therefore continue to monitor things comprehensively through both genomic sequencing and the covid-19 infection survey of the population.

[Henry Smith (Crawley) (Con)]

May I express my gratitude to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for removing all covid-19 international travel restrictions for those coming into the United Kingdom? Will he join me in welcoming the reopening of the south terminal at Gatwick airport on 27 March and the thousands of job vacancies now available and needing to be filled as we recover our industry and our economy?

[Grant Shapps]

I do not think it is too much of an exaggeration to say that virtually nobody in the House has done more than my hon. Friend to promote the case of the hard-pressed aviation sector during the last two years of the crisis. It is great news that Gatwick’s south terminal will reopen on 27 March; I very much hope to be there for that. I know that he shares my enthusiasm for all the work that carried on during the crisis to aim for jet zero, to help clean up the aviation sector and ensure that, by 2050, we have not only a booming British aviation sector but a cleaner one.

Covid-19: International Travel

Henry Smith Excerpts

Monday 24th January 2022 Commons Chamber

[Grant Shapps]

I appreciate the right hon. Gentleman’s comments. I also heard him making approving noises while I made my statement. He will want to speak to his Front-Bench colleagues, who, unlike Government Members, have consistently wanted us to go further and faster on closing the borders. We have tried to balance it against the critical nature of our island status as a nation.

The right hon. Gentleman asks a very good question about the passenger locator form and why we are keeping it. Members may not be aware that it is our only way of distinguishing between those who are vaccinated and those who are unvaccinated when they use e-gates to come into this country. A lot of work has been done to automate the e-gate so that it reads the passport number, refers back to the passenger locator form and knows whether that individual has had to take a pre-departure test—which people who have not been vaccinated have to take—and, indeed, whether they have to take a day 2 test. It is there for a critical reason. I entirely agree with the right hon. Gentleman about the complexity of the passenger locator form, and I committed in my statement to going back through it and simplifying it, which is much easier to do now that we have the status of fully vaccinated people not requiring any tests at all.

[Henry Smith (Crawley) (Con)]

My sincere thanks to the Government for these measures to reduce significantly the testing requirements for international travel during covid-19. As the Secretary of State has correctly mentioned, other jurisdictions around the world will require British travellers entering those countries and territories to do testing. Will he continue to monitor those testing companies in this country that, frankly, have been ripping off many customers and providing appalling service? One example affecting a number of my constituents is Chronomics. People have paid a lot of money to it and have waited in many cases more than a week to get test results back.

[Grant Shapps]

I absolutely commit to doing that. The system of testing is run by our colleagues at the Department of Health and Social Care, and I share the frustration that the public have, as I know do colleagues at the Department of Health and Social Care, that on occasions these companies have in some cases not behaved appropriately. The vast majority of the time, it should be said, they have provided excellent private sector provision, without which we would not have had capacity within the NHS, but I share my hon. Friend’s concern, and I know that colleagues at the Department of Health and Social Care are on the case.

Airport and Ground Operations Support Scheme

Henry Smith Excerpts

Monday 29th November 2021 General Committees

[Henry Smith (Crawley) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship again, Ms Nokes, and always a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Wythenshawe and Sale East. He is always welcome at Gatwick, as long as he does not travel a little further south and knock on doors in Crawley to try to win voters down there.

I rise briefly to warmly welcome this extended support for airports and ground operators. It will be a significant help for airports such as the one I represent, Gatwick, and across the country. At that point, normally, I would have sat down, but my hon. Friend the Minister mentioned the omicron variant of covid-19 and its effect on international travel, and I cannot let that pass. I think the Government have reacted swiftly and proportionately to that threat, until we know the full extent of it, but the imposition of PCR tests for those returning to the UK from international destinations, at least for the next three weeks, will be a huge disincentive to travel, with people perhaps reassessing plans for the Christmas holiday period.

I know the Department for Transport and the aviation Minister get that point, and that it is a broader Government issue, but I put in a plea for a cap on the cost of those tests, and hopefully an ability to review in three weeks’ time—

[The Chair]

Order. I make the same comment to the hon. Member for Crawley.

International Travel

Henry Smith Excerpts

Monday 20th September 2021 Commons Chamber

[Grant Shapps]

I thank the right hon. Lady, who approaches this from a very wise perspective. The first thing I would say is that of course everybody will appreciate that we now have over nine out of 10 adults with at least one jab and over eight out of 10—83%, I think—of adults fully vaccinated. Of course, as that picture has been replicated around the world, that makes it easier to allow and open up international travel, and it is part of the balance.

The second thing to say is that using lateral flow tests, which provide virtually instant results, means that people may not be out and about for an extra day or perhaps more before they get their results. That of course has to be factored against the fact that a lateral flow test is known to be less observant—with different specificity and sensitivity rates—than a PCR test. The scientists have taken all of that into account in providing ideas for this regime. Of course, it is critically important that a lateral flow test is then backed up by a PCR. It will be, and we will also be talking more about requirements for ensuring that the lateral flow test has been properly taken.

[Henry Smith (Crawley) (Con)]

I very much welcome this statement, with a pragmatic approach to covid-19 testing for international travel and recognition of vaccines, and also, on the day that the Prime Minister is in New York, the news that the US Administration—this has taken a lot of work from the US-UK taskforce to achieve—are opening up to fully vaccinated passengers. Can my right hon. Friend say when slot allocations will be reviewed, particularly with a view to the spring and summer season next year?

[Grant Shapps]

I pay tribute to my hon. Friend for his work on the future of aviation all-party parliamentary group, which has not gone unnoticed by Ministers throughout the difficult 18 months. He is right about the sensitivities of things such as slot allocations. It is quite a technical issue to do both with the way that allocations at busy airports are granted and—I suspect he is getting at this—with something called the 80:20 and 50:50 rules, which are about the amount of usage on allocations. He will know, because he has a major airport in his constituency, that there is a difference of opinion, quite rightly, between the airport operators and the aviation companies—the airlines themselves—about where the correct balance should lie. The aviation Minister, the Under-Secretary of State for Transport, my hon. Friend the Member for Witney (Robert Courts), who is sitting right next to me, is keeping these matters under constant review and is doing an excellent job with it, and I invite the two of them to have a meet-up.

HGV Driver Shortages

Henry Smith Excerpts

Monday 13th September 2021 Commons Chamber

[Grant Shapps]

It is a long-held reserved power. As the United Kingdom, the United Kingdom Government decide who can come into the country and under what circumstances. There are 6 million EU citizens with pre-settled status. They are not necessarily all here, but many could come and drive here. As I said to the Opposition Front Bencher, rather than trying to undercut people’s salaries, why do we not work on attracting more people into the sector by paying them a little bit more?

[Henry Smith (Crawley) (Con)]

I was recently in the US, where a shortage of 60,000 truck drivers was across the media. Does my right hon. Friend agree that the answer is improving standards and conditions for British workers, not undercutting them?

[Grant Shapps]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. I think I saw the figure that the US will need another 1.5 million drivers over the next few years. It is experiencing very, very similar problems to those here within its own market, as are—this has been discussed many times now—many countries in the EU and beyond. It is a global supply issue. The British Government are doing everything within their power to ensure that we can help to ameliorate it as much as possible through the measures that I wish the Opposition would support.

International Travel

Henry Smith Excerpts

Thursday 8th July 2021 Commons Chamber

[Grant Shapps]

First, I do not accept the premise of the hon. Gentleman’s point. We have had one of the most rigorous border check systems in place. When I was in the House only last week, I think that every single speaker in all parts of the House urged an opening up, so I am interested to hear his views. Secondly, the steps in place still require a pre-departure test and a PCR test on or before day two in order that it can be sequenced, and there is all the other guidance that exists as well.

[Henry Smith (Crawley) (Con) [V]]

I warmly welcome the Secretary of State’s announcement. These are absolutely the right measures to be taking. However, can I encourage him as soon as possible to go further and look to expand the number of green list countries to which international travel is possible, particularly working in the US-UK travel taskforce? It is estimated that every day we do not have meaningful transatlantic flights is costing the UK economy some £23 million?

[Grant Shapps]

I pay tribute to my hon. Friend for all his work and campaigning on this subject; his constituency is greatly impacted by the success or otherwise of aviation. Yes, we will certainly look at which countries fall into the red, amber and green categories. For the purpose of clarity for the House it is probably helpful to say that the next review will take place on 15 July—so there is not long to wait—and there are then two checkpoints, one on 31 July to look at the system and its operation in total and then on 1 October, which are already in the programme going forward.

International Travel

Henry Smith Excerpts

Tuesday 29th June 2021 Commons Chamber

[Grant Shapps]

I pay tribute to the hon. Gentleman, who often speaks up for aviation, given the airport-constituency connection that he has. I point out again that we have provided billions of pounds of support for the aviation sector, including to the Scottish aviation sector, through money that has gone from the furlough programme, for example.

The hon. Gentleman asked a series of questions, and I fear I may have to redirect him in some cases to his own Scottish Government, because I have the Scottish airports constantly on the line to me complaining about the actions of the Scottish Government, who seem to do everything they possibly can to make it harder for airlines and airports to see a route to a recovery. That said, there was a strong degree of work together to bring in the latest changes to the traffic light system.

[Henry Smith (Crawley) (Con) [V]]

If we do not have a meaningful summer of transatlantic operations, it will cost the UK economy an estimated £2.5 billion and mean up to 52,000 jobs are lost, so may I encourage my right hon. Friend to make sure that we press for that UK-US taskforce on opening up international travel to conclude as soon as possible?

[Grant Shapps]

My hon. Friend, who has done a great deal to support the aviation sector, is absolutely right. The Prime Minister and the President announced the working group. As I mentioned before, it has already met, and it is working on the details of trying to reopen international travel. We are faced with a section 212(f) executive order that was brought in by the previous American Administration and has not been rescinded by the current one. We need to see that removed, in addition to sorting some of the complexities of accepting vaccine status both ways around. Our officials are working on that at pace, and I look forward to further developments.

Covid-19: Support for Aviation, Tourism and Travel Industries

Henry Smith Excerpts

Thursday 24th June 2021 Westminster Hall

[Henry Smith (Crawley) (Con)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered support for the aviation, tourism and travel industries in response to the covid-19 pandemic.

It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair for this important debate, Dr Huq, as we seek to recover from the covid-19 pandemic, and I am delighted to see my hon. Friend the Minister in his place. I will be interested to hear his comments.

Aviation, travel and tourism were among the first sectors to face the negative effects of the covid-19 pandemic, which were almost immediate, and unfortunately, owing to the nature of those industries and the restrictions still in place, they will be among the slowest to recover fully. In normal times before the pandemic, more than 1.5 million people were employed in those sectors. Sadly, many of them have lost their job over the past 15 months or so. About 50% of people in the sector are still on furlough, which finishes at the end of September, and I fear that if travel, aviation and tourism cannot pick up meaningfully over the summer months, many of them will also unfortunately lose their job.

This is devastating for aviation communities such as mine in the Gatwick area. An assessment of unemployment from February 2020 to February 2021 showed an increase of 115% across the nation, but for the top 20 aviation communities the increase was 147%. I do not think we have yet seen the worst of the situation.

Do not mistake this for some parochial plea for support for these sectors because aviation and international connectivity are essential for the UK economy. In normal times, outbound travel accounts for a contribution of about £37 billion to our economy, and inbound travel accounts for £28 billion. That travel has not been able to operate meaningfully for a year and a half, and the impact has been significant. If we were able to operate in a more meaningful way this summer, it would make a contribution to the UK economy of an estimated £19 billion—quite significant.

The title of the debate refers to support for the travel and aviation sectors. The best way to support them is to allow them to meaningfully and safely operate. If that cannot happen, I am afraid the bill for unemployment benefits this coming autumn and winter will be a significant burden to the taxpayer. Many companies and employers in the sector will be coming to the Government asking for bailouts. Far better that we let the industry recover and make money for the UK Exchequer, whose bills are already significant, than cost it some more.

I pay tribute to the Government for the world-leading vaccination programme over the past six months. We were told just before Christmas that if we had a successful vaccination programme, that would allow us our liberty and enable us to get back to much more normal life. Yesterday, we hit the target of 60%-plus of people across the country who have been doubly jabbed with covid-19 vaccines. I fear that we are squandering the vaccine dividend that we were told would allow us far greater freedoms once again.

We are, quite simply, at a competitive disadvantage. Many countries in the EU and the world are allowing a far greater number of countries to be travelled to, particularly for those who have received full covid-19 vaccinations. This is not just about two weeks on the beach in a sunny environment, nice though that is. It is about global Britain and us being a trading nation. For every day that there is not meaning transatlantic travel between the UK and the US, an estimated £32 billion is lost to the British economy.

I welcome and support the Government’s traffic light system for international travel. It is absolutely right that for parts of the world where cases of covid-19 are still unfortunately far too high, we must protect ourselves against that and new variants. I support those quarantine arrangements, but for countries that have had a similar vaccination roll-out success and similar or lower infection rates than the UK, we need to have a much more pragmatic regime for amber and green list countries.

I welcome the fact that the Government are reportedly looking at requiring those who are fully vaccinated and travelling from amber countries only to test, rather than to quarantine at home. That would be very positive, but I think we need to go further. We need to expand the green list of countries—I welcome reports that it will be announced later today that Malta and the Balearic Islands will be added to that list—but the list needs to be far wider than that.

The cost and complexity of covid-19 testing for international passengers is a major disincentive for people to travel. For a family of four, it really becomes prohibitive. It is ridiculous that many tests are more expensive than the flight itself. Perhaps more rapid antigen testing for lower risk countries would be appropriate, particularly if we are also dealing with people who are fully vaccinated. If there is a positive test, they can have a PCR test to back that up. It is interesting that, of those who have been tested who have been able to travel, less than 1% have proved positive in that test.

This is about people’s jobs and livelihoods. It is not just about going on holiday. Airports are likely to lose a further £2.6 billion if we do not see meaningful opening up. We are losing about £60 million in exports throughout this period because we do not have people able to visit this country and spend their money here.

Finally—I want to make sure that as many colleagues as possible can take part today and I am grateful to hon. and right hon. Members from all parts of the country and across the House for contributing to this important debate today— I want to comment on where respect for the restrictions is beginning to seriously break down. We hear that Wembley will be three quarters full for the Euros final, because an exception will be made for VIP guests from UEFA to come to London. I do not mind Wembley being near capacity. I welcome that easing of restrictions, but what is not right is to have one rule for VIPs and another for everybody else. When parents cannot go to school sports days, VIPs should not be able to come to Wembley.

The answer is to open up in a realistic and pragmatic way, to save jobs and recover our economy from the devastating effects of covid-19. The best way to support the travel, aviation and tourism sectors is to allow them to operate, save those jobs and make money for our economy, rather than them being yet another burden on every taxpayer for years to come.

[Dr Rupa Huq (in the Chair)]

Given the popularity of the debate, the three Front-Bench spokespeople and the new finish time of 5.25 pm, I reckon that if everyone sticks to within four minutes, everyone gets in and Henry Smith has time for concluding remarks. I call Ben Bradshaw.

--- Later in debate ---

[Henry Smith]

I thank the right hon. Members for Exeter (Mr Bradshaw) and for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell), my hon. Friends the Members for Bexhill and Battle (Huw Merriman), for Southend West (Sir David Amess) and for Warrington South (Andy Carter), and the hon. Members for Upper Bann (Carla Lockhart), for Newport East (Jessica Morden), for Slough (Mr Dhesi), for Cynon Valley (Beth Winter), for Jarrow (Kate Osborne), for North Ayrshire and Arran (Patricia Gibson), for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath (Neale Hanvey), for Wythenshawe and Sale East (Mike Kane) and for Renfrewshire North (Gavin Newlands)—he has had to fly back to Scotland and cannot be present.

I also thank my hon. Friend the aviation Minister. I know he understands the importance of getting the sector back up and running. Even though he cannot say so, I know he shares many of our frustrations. The message I want to leave is that we cannot operate as an economy, be it international travel or anything else, on a zero-covid strategy. The coronavirus will probably be with us for the rest of our lives. We will probably have to have a rolling vaccination programme for the foreseeable future. We will have to learn to live with it. We cannot afford for it to dominate our lives for much longer. Otherwise, the impact that it will have on employment and general prosperity—mental health has been mentioned as well—will be severe. There is a special case for the sector to have furlough extended beyond September, because of the fact that, unlike most other parts of the economy, it seems, sadly, that it will not be able to open in a meaningful way.

I thank all right hon. and hon. Members for their eloquence and erudite comments, many of which, if not all of them, I very much agree with.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House has considered support for the aviation, tourism and travel industries in response to the covid-19 pandemic.

Aviation, Travel and Tourism Industries

Henry Smith Excerpts

Thursday 10th June 2021 Commons Chamber

[Henry Smith (Crawley) (Con)]

The aviation industry was one of the first to face the negative impact of the covid-19 pandemic 15 months ago. Sadly, because of the overly cautious restrictions and the confusion coming from the Government, it will be one of the slowest to recover.

I see this daily as the representative of an aviation community. It is timely for us to remember that we are not just talking about two weeks on the beach in the sun; this is about people’s livelihoods, their wellbeing and their jobs. It is also important for our UK economy. Outbound international travel accounts, in normal times, for a contribution of approximately £37 billion to the UK economy, and inbound international travel accounts for about £28 billion, at 2019 levels.

More than 1.5 million people were employed in the aviation and travel sectors. Sadly, many of those have lost their jobs and about half are on furlough. The furlough is coming to an end in September and will need to be extended if the aviation and travel sectors are not able to regenerate themselves by being able to operate at least to some meaningful degree in the coming summer months. This lost summer, which I fear it will be, will cost the UK economy some £19 billion. I am encouraged to hear news from Cornwall today that there will be a UK-US travel taskforce. The fact that we do not have transatlantic travel at the moment is costing our UK economy about £32 million a day, and that puts us at a competitive disadvantage compared with many other countries.

I pay tribute to the Government for the world successful vaccination programme. More than 70 million doses have been delivered, but we are squandering that advantage by being overly cautious and not being able to open up. This is about global Britain. This is about international trade. This is about people’s jobs. I urge the Government to allow aviation to safely reopen, which it can do with vaccination and testing. I also urge them to reduce the cost of testing and to remove the VAT on testing to allow greater freedom of movement. If they do not do that, the industry, rather than making money for the UK economy, will be asking for further bail-outs, which will cost every taxpayer much more.