Air Passenger Duty: Regional Airports
Debate between Jonathan Edwards and Julian Knight(9 years ago)
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Julian Knight
The right hon. Gentleman highlights an issue to do not only with his own airport but the wider UK aviation industry. Both Derry airport—also in Northern Ireland—and Cambridge airport in England claim that they are being prevented from expanding their services by APD. My argument is that the hub status of the major London airports, in particular Heathrow, allows them more easily to absorb the shock of air passenger duty, but that is not the case for some of the regional airports.
There have of course been successes in attracting new long-haul routes to Birmingham, for example. We have Air India now flying its routes to Delhi and Amritsar daily; American Airlines has begun daily flights to JFK, alongside the daily flight to Newark—that is not Nottinghamshire; Emirates has launched a third daily flight to Dubai; and this summer Hainan Airlines operated 34 twice-weekly flights between Birmingham and Beijing.
As was made clear to me in my recent meetings with the Ontario Teachers Pension Plan, which owns Birmingham airport and is a responsible trustee, my local airport would love to have a regular direct flight between the UK and China week in, week out, rather than only for the summer, and it is a real failing that in the week in which the Chinese President is visiting we do not have a regular scheduled flight between the UK’s second city and Beijing. We cannot separate the issue of APD and devolution, which is a central plank of the Government’s approach to reforming and reinvigorating the UK economy.
It is hugely important that the fruits of growth that come from devolution extend to our connectivity as well. That must include greater use of our regional airports for short and long-haul flights.
Jonathan Edwards (Carmarthen East and Dinefwr) (PC)
I, too, congratulate the hon. Gentleman on securing this important debate. We have a strange situation in Wales. The Welsh Government own our own national airport, but the UK Government will not devolve APD to them so that they may utilise their asset. Does he agree that that is a slightly strange situation?
Julian Knight
I thank the hon. Gentleman for his contribution. I am about to turn to those particular points.