Aviation Sector

Debate between Neale Hanvey and Gavin Newlands

Thursday 10th September 2020 Commons Chamber

[Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP)]

Let me, too, start by welcoming the new Under-Secretary of State for Transport, the hon. Member for Witney (Robert Courts), to his place—if he is listening. He has a fantastic job, albeit an extremely difficult one, because the challenges facing our aviation industry are manifold and unprecedented. Our Committee managed to examine them in depth and detail, even though Members were scattered in spare rooms and at dinner tables around the country. That is a tribute to the Clerks, the staff of the Committee and its Chair, the hon. Member for Bexhill and Battle (Huw Merriman), who opened the debate so powerfully. I thank them for their generosity and hard work in ensuring that the Committee’s report was as thorough as it was. Those challenges facing the industry are not going away, and as the decision to scrap the furlough kicks in over the coming weeks they are just going to get worse. Aviation faces a crisis the likes of which has not been seen since world war two.

As others have, I wish particularly to highlight the fact that regional airports across the UK are facing existential challenges. Too often, aviation policy and debate seem to be driven by the big London airports, particularly Heathrow. The local airports around these isles, such as Glasgow airport, in my constituency, provide not only domestic links, but connectivity to Europe and a world without a stopover in the south-east of England. That connectivity is now under serious threat. Many airports are teetering on the brink, hit by a double whammy of coronavirus and the collapse of Flybe earlier this year. Others still face short-term and long-term challenges that not only threaten their businesses, but risk having a severe impact on other sectors of the economy as well.

There is a real urgency to this issue, and recommendation 9 of the Committee’s report urged the Government to commit to complete and publish their much-heralded regional connectivity review by the end of the year. To say that the Government response is underwhelming is an understatement. It said:

“Workstreams focusing on regional connectivity will continue beyond the publication of the Autumn recovery plan”—

one that is already coming too late for many. The only action in response to the connectivity points was the support for some Northern Irish routes: nothing about support anywhere else in the UK; nothing about increasing use of public service obligations; and, on the review, nothing about a definite timetable, let alone the required acceleration to it. This simply is not good enough. I ask the new Minister to look at this issue and to do all he can to bring this forward.

[Neale Hanvey (Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath) (SNP)]

On regional connectivity, the first airline to fall foul of covid was Flybe. Does my hon. Friend agree that in supporting the Flybe workforce as a result of the pandemic, EY and the Government have been completely neglectful? The workforce have been cast aside and completely ignored throughout this whole experience. They should have had full entitlement to the job retention scheme and should have been protected, because they are essential to the recovery post covid.

[Gavin Newlands]

I could not agree more. The Transport Secretary came to the Dispatch Box and said that he had saved Flybe. Furthermore, the Chancellor promised back in March that there would be sector-specific support for the aviation industry. The Secretary of State stood in the same room as me, looked the industry in the eye, and said, “I understand the enormity of what you are facing and this Government will stand by your side.” But where is he? Where are the Government? The loyal workers of British Airways, EasyJet, Menzies Aviation, Swissport and so many others look at their P45s or their shamefully slashed contracts and do not think that the Government have been by their side. What is left of the sector is waiting. As of now we have seen nothing, and, as we have seen, it is the employees who are taking the brunt.

The Committee also recommended that business rates relief should be extended in England and Wales to aviation businesses. The only sector-specific support for the aviation industry has come from the Scottish Government and Northern Ireland Executive in giving airports and ancillary firms a rates holiday for a year. The Treasury must step up and do the same.