Air Passenger Duty and Developing Economies

Lord Bradshaw Excerpts

Wednesday 18th May 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bradshaw]

My Lords, I, too, congratulate my noble friend Lady Benjamin on securing the debate. As something of a newcomer to air passenger duty, it seems to me not only unfair but particularly unfair on the Caribbean. We have seen the industries on which they used to depend—the sugar and bananas, to which my noble friend referred, and other agricultural businesses —undermined by the agreements with the United States and Europe to allow free competition in those markets. Having done that, we have dealt a double blow to them in the form of the air passenger duty.

I say that advisedly, because I believe that we have a particular duty to the people of the Caribbean. I well remember, in the early part of my career, how dependent the public services here—transport and hospitals—were on labour from the Caribbean, the people who came here to work. It is a pretty poor way to pay those people back as they get older to impose this unfair tax on them. When my noble friend Lord De Mauley sums up, he ought to find some way to show some concern for those territories, which have for so long been associated with the British Crown. That is essential.