Airports Slot Allocation (Alleviation of Usage Requirements) (No. 2) Regulations 2023

Lord Tunnicliffe Excerpts

Tuesday 19th September 2023 Grand Committee

[Lord Tunnicliffe (Lab)]

My Lords, I would like to make a declaration of interest, although it is not required within the rules. I am a British Airways pensioner, which is a significant part of my lifestyle after 20 years in the industry.

I thank the Minister for introducing this SI. I do not know whether it is something to do with my dying brain, but I found the Explanatory Memorandum somewhat difficult to follow, and I thank my associate, the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, for giving the EM a good beating on my behalf. I had some difficulty understanding it, but I thank the Minister for ensuring that this time there was a telephone number in the document.

The concept divides into two parts. One is the tools available and the other is the need. As far as I could tell, the tools available are roughly the same tools as we had for this winter. If that is not true, I would be grateful if the Minister could put me right, but if they are not the same, I think they are substantially the same. Are the problems facing airlines sufficiently serious to resurrect this set of tools? Clearly, the department thinks the answer is yes. I am content with the reasoning for winter 2023-24 that this SI should succeed and the tools become available.

However, I think that creates some questions. The principal question is: is the exceptional becoming the norm? If it is, and if the Government concur with me that it is looking dangerously close to that, we need to move to a more permanent arrangement because the notice that operators will get under these systems continues to be very short. It would be much more satisfactory if the industry were able to plan further ahead against a more stable environment or regime. If there is an agreement that it should move ahead, there is a need for a more numerically supported case. For instance, an issue that is brought out is the availability of spares. I am sure that is a problem, but we need to know just what impact it is having.

The reason given for these rules is that the consumer needs stability, volume, frequency and all that. I am sure that is true, but it is important that we do not lose sight of the fact that the application of these rules and the extent to which they allow operators not to operate have an impact on the balance between established operators and potential new entrants. That has to enter the balance between the solution and the extent to which these tools are enhanced or diminished. The question then becomes: how do you determine the right balance? I argue that the right balance is the general good. Having faced the problem in transport of how you define the general good, it is an important question that deserves debate—well ahead of the introduction of the next set of rules. I hope that the Minister will agree that a more in-depth look at this problem, with the possibility of producing a more permanent set of rules, can be considered.

[Baroness Vere of Norbiton (Con)]

My Lords, I am grateful to both noble Lords for their contributions to this short debate and for welcoming the regulations in general. I will take a few minutes to go through some of the points raised.

The noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, started by noting the Explanatory Memorandum. I am now in a situation where I am not sure I will ever get an Explanatory Memorandum right, but we do try, and I hope she will appreciate that. We have them read by a senior civil servant not connected with the policy. The criticism of this one was that it was too light in certain elements, so we added more in. Sometimes they then become too hefty, particularly as noble Lords will have seen these regulations many times previously in different forms. We will continue to do our very best when it comes to the SLSC and keeping everybody happy and, more importantly, informed, both in your Lordships’ House and beyond, about what the Government are trying to do and explaining that position. That is incredibly important. It remains top of mind, and I will continue to try to do my best.

On the point the noble Baroness raised about the aviation industry in general, I do not think it is under- performing as much as she thinks it is. It had a very successful summer. Apart from the issue at the end of the summer, I was not made aware of any issues to make me feel that the industry was underperforming. The major airports were amazing, particularly when I travelled through. I found that there were no queues. Bar the NATS outage, which, as noble Lords know, the CAA is investigating, and the wildfires, which of course are a factor beyond the airlines’ control, the industry performed really well.

The noble Baroness mentioned recruitment. There is no recruitment problem. The aviation sector over- recruited on purpose to ensure that we did not see a repeat of what happened in summer 2022. I will hold the next Aviation Council in a couple of weeks and obviously I will reflect with it on how it felt the summer went, but in broad terms, bar one or two issues—there will always be one or two—it stood up pretty well.

[Lord Tunnicliffe (Lab)]

Does the Minister anticipate producing a report as a result of that meeting? If so, can we have it?

[Baroness Vere of Norbiton (Con)]

I do not believe that we will produce a report as a result of that meeting because, if we discuss performance, those meetings are very much ad hoc check-ins. We cover more substantive issues, such as airspace modernisation; I believe that the next one might be on slot reform, which might be interesting. The minutes of the meetings are published on GOV.UK, so the noble Lord might wish to look at that.

The noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, will know that slot oversight and enforcement are done by a third party, ACL, which is entirely separate from government. We do not have any involvement at all—rightly so—in the way in which it oversees and enforces slots. If the noble Baroness is aware of anomalies, I would be grateful if she could let me know; I will raise them with ACL, because that is how it is supposed to do its job. It does a very good job in many circumstances; indeed, it does slot oversight not only in the UK but in many other countries because it is that good.