Airports National Policy Statement

John Grogan Excerpts

Thursday 7th June 2018 Westminster Hall

[John Grogan (Keighley) (Lab)]

It is a great pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Hammersmith (Andy Slaughter), who gave a typically thoughtful and forensic speech. I will try to cheer him up even more if I can. On a day when no fewer than seven England squad players born in Yorkshire are to play at Elland Road, in their last match before the World cup, I intend to try to give the perspective from God’s own county; but I will not be able to do it nearly as well as the right hon. Member for Putney (Justine Greening) did. She may have left Rotherham a while ago, but she retains a love of the north of England and Yorkshire, and a real passion. If I may say so, the hon. Member for Windsor (Adam Afriyie) spoke with such knowledge of the north of England—he spoke, indeed, for the nation—that, by the powers invested in me, I make him an honorary Yorkshireman for the day.

Like many hon. Members present for the debate, I want to praise the Select Committee report for its thoroughness. However, just as the Committee Chair, my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham South (Lilian Greenwood), inserted a few caveats and “buts” in her remarks, I want to express a “but” in my praise. Reading the report was, to me, like watching a 12-round boxing match. Each round came and went, and I thought there was only one boxer in it, as I read all the criticisms of the Heathrow case in the 150 pages, including appendices. I was rather surprised. It was like watching all 12 rounds when there was only one possible verdict, and then finding that the bout went to the other boxer. I felt all the evidence in the report led to one conclusion—to say, on the precautionary principle at the very least, no to Heathrow.

I want particularly to direct some remarks to someone who will be giving the third speech that we can look forward to today from a Yorkshire-born Member: I mean my hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull East (Karl Turner), who will speak from the Opposition Front Bench. I want to talk about the impact of the Heathrow announcement on Humberside airport. I hope that we shall soon hear from the Labour Transport Front-Bench team that they will follow the lead given over many years by the shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer, my right hon. Friend the Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell), who has been in strong opposition to the expansion of Heathrow. At one stage such voices were lonely ones. There is a gentleman called, I think, Len McCluskey, who is putting a little pressure on our leaders, which I hope will be resisted. Particularly given all the criticisms we have heard from the Conservative Benches of crony capitalism, I hope that the shadow Transport team will before long put a three-line Whip on the Labour party to go through the Lobby to oppose the proposal. I will be proud to be in the Opposition Lobby on that occasion.

I want to concentrate my remarks on regional connectivity and the economies of the north of England, which is what I am best able to do. We have heard a lot about that already, and I shall not repeat what has been said, but I will express some doubts about the promises that have been heard and examined about connectivity. As I understand it, there is a promise of up to 15%. I am not sure whether there is a floor: could it be 7%, 2% or 11%? If the Minister knows of a floor, I would be glad to hear about it. I would also be interested in publication of the Government’s legal advice that it would be legal to subsidise airport-to-airport connections. It is not clear, as various hon. Members have mentioned, that that would be legal. I listened to Baroness Sugg, the Under-Secretary, in the other place yesterday, and at column 1331 she made it clear, as other Ministers have, that most of the flights in relation to regional connectivity are expected to happen on a commercial basis.

My local airport is Leeds Bradford—an engine of the northern powerhouse. If flights to Heathrow cannot be made commercial from Leeds Bradford, where can they? Yet in the past 20 to 25 years there has been a continual story of someone getting a route to Heathrow for a few months or years, which is then cut. “Bmi cuts routes between Heathrow and the North” was the headline about 10 years ago. Just a few months ago it was “Leeds Bradford airport ‘disappointed’ as British Airways announces flight cuts to and from Heathrow”—halving the number of flights. It would be good to hear which airports Ministers consider to have a commercial case for running more slots into Heathrow.

For the north of England and for us in Yorkshire, Amsterdam is the main business connection if people want to go to a hub—although we prefer to go point to point. I think that is true for Scotland as well. I try to follow Scottish politics, and there is an awful lot of talk about connections with the Baltic states, the low countries and so on. As I look towards my hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull East, I think that it is true for Humberside as well. Flights from there are frequent, whereas from Leeds Bradford they will be down to one a day. The northern powerhouse really wants point-to-point travel. We do not want to be reliant on changing at other airports if we do not need to.

The Select Committee Chair drew attention to an extremely important sentence on page 26 of the report:

“While direct international connectivity from the regions will continue to grow in any eventuality”—

I acknowledge that—

“the DfT’s forecasts show that direct international connectivity from the regions would be lower with a NWR than without expansion.”

It is lower with the north-west runway by a big factor. There would be 74,000 fewer direct international flights per year to and from airports in the non-London regions in 2030, which I think is about 10% of the total. That increases to 161,000 fewer flights from areas outside London in 2050. That is remarkable, and how any northern MP can vote for it I am not sure.

I commend the information in the Select Committee report to my hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull East. It is all based on Government figures, by the way; it is not the Select Committee’s imaginings, but the churning of Government figures. They have been broken down now, and perhaps—I do not know—the Committee Chair could do the House a favour and have them put in the Library of the House, as they say. I do not know how that is done, but I am sure that, like Ministers, she has the power to do it. The Committee report has the figures broken down for individual airports. I will not read them all, but will give a couple of examples. Without Heathrow expansion, Birmingham would have roughly 124,000 international flights in 2030. That number goes down to 107,000 in 2030 if Heathrow expands. For Leeds Bradford, the figure is 39,000 without expansion and roughly 35,000 with expansion, over the same period. For Manchester, the figure is 179,000 if Heathrow does not expand and 159,000—20,000 fewer international flights—by 2030 if it does. Projecting through to 2060 for Glasgow, there would still be fewer flights: there would be 64,970 without Heathrow expansion and 62,874 with it.

The impact—the chilling factor—will be felt throughout the United Kingdom. As the hon. Member for Windsor said, there will be a lot of legal uncertainty, and the effect will be to put the mockers on the growth plans of all those airports around the country. I call on the airports of Birmingham and Manchester, and all the great airports, to stand up and be counted. After talking privately to their representatives, I think that the Department for Transport has had a word with some of them and pointed out that they are hoping for extra rail links and a period of silence would be appreciated. I think that is the message that is received when they are asked about it privately. Paul Kehoe, who was the chief executive of Birmingham airport, but has now gone, was vocal about the case for Birmingham. If it gets high-speed rail, Birmingham will be closer to London than Stansted. Equally, Manchester has gone suspiciously quiet in recent times. I think this is a matter on which the political representatives of those great cities should be called on. I hope that the Mayors of Manchester and Birmingham will lead the clamour against the expansion of Heathrow, in the interest of their regional economies.

I have high hopes of the Scottish National party. I do not think that the issue is yet fixed. I think the SNP is thoughtfully thinking about whether it truly sees itself going into the Lobby with some Conservatives, rather than joining what I hope will be the Labour party and the Green party—otherwise what will it say about anyone’s green credentials? I know that the environment in question is that of London, but it is important to us all in the United Kingdom. I hope that the SNP will reflect on that.

[Justine Greening]

I know the SNP are all for Scottish independence, but I am worried that they will get it by losing every single flight out of the country. I am not sure that is the kind of independence Scotland really wants. I would have thought that the SNP would be better off seizing the opportunity to develop a genuine Scottish airports strategy. One of the other airport CEOs who is concerned about Heathrow expansion is the CEO of Edinburgh airport.

[John Grogan]

It is almost like the right hon. Lady, who is a fellow Yorkshire-born Member, and I co-operated, because I have a quote from said gentleman—Gordon Dewar. Admittedly, Edinburgh has associations with Gatwick, which has gone suspiciously quiet in recent months. I do not know how it has been silenced, but Gordon Dewar has not been—he has been speaking for Scotland and the United Kingdom. He said:

“Heathrow expansion risks a monopolised market which is bad for passengers.”

He argues that Scottish airports are less dependent on London than ever before, and that

“our passengers tell us that they want to fly directly.”

I have high hopes that, despite Mr Len McCluskey, my hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull East will lead us into the Lobby against the Government. I have equal hopes that our Scottish nationalist comrades will reflect on this issue and that they, too, will be in the Opposition Lobby when the vote comes.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jesse Norman]

The answer to that question is, of course, that the package will be developed in consultation with local communities and, wherever possible, with an attempt to respond to the concerns that people have had.

The hon. Member for Slough (Mr Dhesi), who is not in his place, asked whether compensation would be targeted to those most affected. The answer is that we are talking about what appears at the moment to be £2.6 billion in commitments, which is ten times bigger than the previous compensation offer made, including £700 million for noise insulation for homes and £40 million to insulate schools and community buildings. Those will be developed in a way that recognises the impacts, and the greatest impacts will be those most affected.

With regard to surface access, we know that Heathrow is already Britain’s best-connected airport by road and rail—a position that will be strengthened by future planned improvements to the public transport systems that serve the area. In responding to the Committee’s call for a written commitment to southern and western rail access, the Government have amended the NPS—a further change of direction in response to the Committee’s work—to set out our clear support for the western rail link and to explain the continuing development of a southern rail access scheme. We are pressing ahead with both, but these are subject, in the usual way, to appropriate planning processes and approvals. Network Rail already has underway a statutory consultation on the development consent order for western rail. The Transport Secretary recently held an event to engage the market more closely on the appetite for a privately funded and financed southern rail scheme. We are not delaying on this.

We also welcome the Committee’s focus on managing traffic associated with the airport. The airports national policy statement requires the applicant to set out clearly how it will mitigate any impact on the transport network and support additional demands that may be created by expansion. We have proposed specific mode share targets for passengers and employees at the airport, which we expect to be requirements of any development consent order. We also support the aspiration of Heathrow Airport Ltd to expand the airport without increasing airport-related traffic. Of course, it should be for the airport operator to demonstrate, as part of any development consent application, how it intends to deliver that goal and how it will, in so doing, mitigate any impact on the public transport network.

The Chair of the Committee said, absolutely rightly, that expansion cannot come at any cost, and we concur. It is important to take a calibrated approach to this, as the Committee has done. We have been clear that we expect expansion to be financed by the private sector without Government support. We also expect the industry to work together to deliver the ambition, set by the Secretary of State in 2016, that airport charges should remain close to current levels in real terms. We will continue to test the “financeability” and affordability of the Heathrow third runway scheme, as will the regulator, the CAA, and we have revised the national policy statement to clarify how the regulatory and planning processes work in this regard, with a considerable amount of further information provided in the final proposed national policy statement. Again, we are grateful to the Committee for its input.

I am also aware of the various representations that have been made in the Chamber that the Government would somehow be liable for Heathrow’s costs, should they decide to withdraw support for the scheme. That point was raised by my right hon. Friend the Member for Putney this morning and in this debate. To be clear to her, I did not say that those policy statements were the same for all three bidders. I said that they were substantially similar. I made that point because I wanted to show that there was no predilection, as it were, towards one bid over another; they were being treated in an equal way. The language in question creates no obligation on the Government, contingent or otherwise.

Let me be clear that the Government have not entered into any agreement that gives Heathrow the right to recover its losses in the light of any scheme not proceeding, and nor do we recognise any liability for any of the costs that Heathrow Airports Ltd has incurred or will incur in future. Separately, the Government laid before Parliament yesterday a written ministerial statement and a departmental minute that set out—this makes the point the other way—a contingent liability where one does in fact exist for statutory blight, which would commence if the proposed airports national policy statement is designated. That liability is contingent, because the Government have rightly protected the taxpayer by entering into a binding agreement with Heathrow Airport Ltd, whereby the airport will assume the financial liability for successful blight claims if, and only if, the scheme proceeds, thus protecting the taxpayer.

Many hon. Members have rightly raised the question of connectivity and regional impact. We agree with the Committee that the benefits of Heathrow expansion must be felt nationally. We welcome the Committee’s endorsement of our plans for an expanded Heathrow airport to retain existing domestic routes and add new routes. We have made it clear in our response that we will further consider domestic connectivity as part of the aviation strategy, which is in the process of being developed. Colleagues will be aware that consultation on that has recently closed. It will include the Secretary of State’s ambition for up to 15% of slots released under expansion to be used for domestic flights. The proposed airports national policy statement makes it clear that the Government require Heathrow Airport Ltd to work with the airlines to protect existing routes and deliver new connections. This will be examined as part of any DCO application. The Government will also hold Heathrow Airport Ltd to account on its public pledges, including the introduction of its £10 million route connectivity fund.

[John Grogan]

The Minister mentioned “up to 15%”. Is there a floor or could it be anything between 0% and 15%?

[Jesse Norman]

Our expectation is that it will be up to 15%, but we wait to see how far that 15% can be fully utilised. We have made it perfectly clear that, although this is not a matter for Government as such, we expect to see many regional airports come forward with plans, as many have already said they would. The hon. Member for Kilmarnock and Loudoun (Alan Brown) has already given evidence of the support of Scottish airports.