Civil Aviation Bill

Jim Fitzpatrick Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd May 2012 Commons Chamber

[Jim Fitzpatrick (Poplar and Limehouse) (Lab)]

I begin by thanking all my colleagues who sat on the Bill Committee for their support, assistance and advice, as well as those who helped on Report, outside stakeholders who sent submissions and/or gave evidence and the Transport Committee for its scrutiny of the Bill.

We welcome and support the Bill. On Second Reading, my hon. Friend the Member for Garston and Halewood (Maria Eagle) said that we would support the Bill. That was no surprise. Much of it was drafted when we were in government, so there was a legacy. However, the timing of its arrival was a bit of a surprise, so the Transport Committee scrutiny was a little dislocated. Indeed, the Government’s response to the Select Committee was published only last Friday. It is good that it is out, but it demonstrates that there were surprises in the timing.

Not only was the arrival and timing a surprise but the inclusion of the security clauses, which were not in the original Bill, was not expected. Also, importantly from our point of view, the environmental protection measures, which were in the original draft Bill and mentioned in the Department for Transport press releases announcing the publication of the Bill, surprisingly did not appear in the Bill. That was a disappointment to the Opposition, and I shall return to it.

I do not want to appear too critical, however, although it might come across that way in due course, because, as I said, we support the Bill. In Committee, the Minister was as courteous as usual, although she and the Government did not accept a single amendment—she did so quite politely—even when she was injured and might have been a bit more vulnerable. The fact that Ministers did not accept any amendments was a matter of considerable disappointment to us, particularly given that we had the support of many stakeholders and recommendations from the Transport Committee.

The Minister has well covered two of the obviously key elements of the Bill—putting the passenger at the core of the CAA and updating the industry’s economic regulation. However, a number of other issues were raised in Committee, highlighting the strengths and weaknesses of the Bill, and I wish briefly to refer to some of them. We had a good discussion on security and the outcomes-focused, risk-based system. We support those arrangements, but, as my hon. Friend the Member for Bolton West (Julie Hilling) said, we were concerned about the arrangements for staff transfers and the certainty of their entitlements on wages, conditions, pensions and redundancy agreements. The staff side raised concerns that members of staff might be worried and often not accept or apply for transfers. The potential haemorrhaging of staff in such a sensitive area was of concern to the whole Committee, so it was good to hear the Minister provide additional reassurances before and after my hon. Friend’s intervention.

The Minister mentioned the ATOL reforms, which we all support, despite the delays. We will do what we can to help the Secretary of State and the Minister of State introduce and enact the reforms, because that is what we all want. Recent pronouncements have perhaps pointed towards more complications arising, which is obviously frustrating not only to the Department and the Government, but to all concerned.

Let me turn to the opportunities that were missed. On the environment, we proposed a duty, as the Minister mentioned. We also suggested including environmental aspects in the licensing conditions for Heathrow, which we think would be reflected right across the industry. On the passenger experience, we proposed that the responsibility for producing welfare plans should be a matter for the licensing arrangements for Heathrow, given the experiences in recent years of passengers being stranded, with all the difficulties that we have seen, heard about and, in some instances, experienced. It is interesting that the indicative licence produced for the Civil Aviation Authority suggested that the licence that it will produce for Heathrow ought to contain passenger welfare elements. We think that the Government could have given a firmer steer by referring to that in the Bill, which would have helped. We also made various suggestions about the efficiency and scrutiny of the Civil Aviation Authority, although I will return to those presently.

There are two additional areas that the other place will want to take account of: one was mentioned in Committee, whereas the other was not. The first is the honesty and accuracy of ticket prices, particularly from the bucket airlines, and the hidden surcharges. The CAA could clearly play a role in addressing that, and I am sure that the issue will be raised in the other place. The other issue, raised most recently, is the suggestion that certain passengers should be able to fast-track themselves through security and immigration for a price, which has caused quite a bit of consternation among passengers generally. Given that the suggestion has been made since Report, I suspect that the other place will want to see how things could be obviated to ensure fairness for everybody going through our airports.

Let me look briefly at the three areas I have mentioned. On the environment, we had a bit of banter with the Government about their mantra, which we hear all too frequently, of wanting to be the greenest Government ever. We obviously had quite a bit of disagreement about whether the Bill reinforces that claim. Indeed, the Minister for shipping, who is in his place, and I had a discussion this afternoon about this being the greenest Government ever in terms of environmental protection. However, I do not think that Mr Deputy Speaker—[Interruption]—if he was paying attention—will let me go there. [Hon. Members: “Ooh!”] My apologies, Mr Deputy Speaker: I wanted to ensure that you did not allow me to stray, because, seeing the hon. Gentleman in his place, I could easily have gone down that cul-de-sac.

On reporting and giving information to passengers, clauses 83 and 84, which we covered extensively, are welcome. However, we thought that there ought to be a duty on the Civil Aviation Authority, as there is on every other economic regulator, to take account of the environment. Reading between the lines, I am not sure whether the Minister’s comment that she expects the matter to be raised in the other place was perhaps an indication of more openness from the Government or that they might be prepared to look at this again.

One element of licensing to do with the environment that was raised by a number of my hon. Friends concerns protection for neighbourhoods, planning permissions and the rest of it. We think that including that in the licence would give communities greater strength and the certainty that airports and the aviation industry would take account of the sensitivities mentioned by the Minister of State.

The last thing we suggested—which the Government did not think it was appropriate to pick up—was the requirement for ticketing to show the environmental impacts of different modes of travel, thereby helping passengers to make decisions based in part, perhaps, on the difference between the environmental impact of going by air and the impact of travelling by rail or coach. I will be surprised if that suggestion is not examined further in the other place.

On the passenger experience, the reporting, information gathering and publishing will, again, be welcomed. However, as I have said, we think that the welfare plans should have been included in the licence, and that represents a missed opportunity by the Government.

[Mrs Villiers]

I feel that I ought to reiterate the reassurance I gave in Committee and on Report. We, too, are very supportive of a focus on passenger welfare plans. We just do not believe that the content of the licence should be hard-coded in legislation. We believe that the best approach is to give the independent, expert regulator the responsibility to decide what licence conditions are appropriate.

[Jim Fitzpatrick]

I fully accept that; we have a disagreement over whether this ought to be in the licence. We think that putting this in the Bill would strengthen the requirement and give a much clearer indication to the regulator that the Government expected it to look at this as a key area, particularly given the experience in recent years. We are talking about a difference in emphasis, rather than a difference in principle, because we all want passengers to be better protected against the vagaries of the weather or other factors detrimentally affecting them.

Labour Members raised the whole question of the information on queuing times, and not just in baggage-handling areas. The key area where we disagreed was on whether immigration queues could or should be counted and measured, with information given to the public. Obviously, the Government’s position is that immigration and the immigration service, the UK Border Agency and the UK Border Force are the responsibility of the Home Office, and therefore it is not appropriate to deal with them in this Bill. However, given the further recent confusion over what the queuing time actually is, particularly at Heathrow, and given the disagreements on measuring between the airports and the immigration service, we think that the CAA could have played a very constructive role in that area, authoritatively collating the evidence and publishing it. As with a number of the other amendments that we failed with, I am sure that the Lords will wish to return to that.

On CAA efficiency and National Audit Office scrutiny, we again agree to differ, but at least the Minister did come up with a proposal to strengthen the scrutiny, which, in some way, addressed the concerns we were raising. Obviously, we will monitor how the proposal works in effect. We hope that it will give greater reassurance to the airlines and other customers that the CAA will operate as we would all wish.

In conclusion, this was a good Bill in draft and, in essence, it remains a good Bill, but there is still much room for it to be even better. We hope that the other place will be able to make the improvements that we were, sadly, unable to make.

--- Later in debate ---

[Dr Julian Huppert (Cambridge) (LD)]

I welcome the Bill. For too long, regulation across Government has been too centralised in Whitehall and has not focused on its core consideration, which is the needs of the public. The general duty to passengers in the Bill is an excellent step forward.

For far too many decades, we have seen top-down central control of transport policy. Even if all we had was a general duty for passengers the Bill would be good, but it has more to it, as has been outlined by the Minister, such as the ATOL reforms. Under clauses 83 and 84, extra information must be provided for passengers so that they know what is going on, whether it is about transport options for getting to the airport or the environmental impact. It lets passengers know and lets them decide what they want. I particularly welcome the environmental information required under clause 84.

It is clear that we must tackle the growing environmental impact of aviation. Even if we simply stick with the framework set by the Committee on Climate Change back in 2009, by 2050 aviation is due to make up at least 25% of our allowed carbon emissions. Its relevance to the future of our planet is hard to quantify but also hard to overestimate. Aviation already has a huge impact on people’s daily lives. Hundreds of thousands of people live under the Heathrow flight path—indeed, a quarter of all people in Europe who are affected by aircraft noise pollution are under the Heathrow flight path.

I have made it clear throughout the progress of the Bill that I want an enhanced environmental duty and a strengthening of the Bill in that regard. I have been talking to the Minister about that point, as we have not yet reached a solution that works. I am optimistic that the Minister will be able to work out the exact wording before the Bill reaches the other place, but we are not there yet.

[Jim Fitzpatrick]

rose—

[Dr Huppert]

I was about to be nice about the shadow Minister, but I shall let him speak first.

[Jim Fitzpatrick]

In that case, my timing is appalling. It might have been the first time that the hon. Gentleman had been nice to me—[Hon. Members: “Aah!”] I am not getting this right at all tonight, Mr Speaker. I apologise for that.

In Committee, the hon. Gentleman and I had a very difficult exchange. He rightly said that our first amendment on the environment did not have the quite the right focus or the right wording, was not strong enough and did not mention the Climate Change Committee. We took his advice, changed all those points and tabled an amendment on Report that covered all those elements, but he still could not vote for it. Will he give us some indication whether he will be more successful with the Minister this time than we were last time?

[Dr Huppert]

I thank the shadow Minister for his praise and I am glad that he listened to my comments about the first version of the amendment. I was about to say that I welcomed its intentions and was very pleased that it was improved. I think that it is almost at a stage where it could be accepted. Unfortunately, it was not quite there.

I was wondering whether to use some of the criticisms that I had stored up, and I shall use one. One thing that concerns me about the shadow Minister’s position is his party’s overall position on the environment. The new shadow Environment Minister whose post was announced in the recent reshuffle—the hon. Member for Glasgow South (Mr Harris)—said on Second Reading that he hoped his party would support the third runway at Heathrow and argued that concern for the environment was really a form of class warfare, saying that we were coming up with environmental concerns because people with less money were able to fly. I am sure that that is not what the shadow Transport Minister, the hon. Member for Poplar and Limehouse (Jim Fitzpatrick), means and I hope that he will be successful in persuading his colleagues to take a more sensible approach.