Aviation Sector

Debate between Sarah Olney and Gavin Newlands

Thursday 10th September 2020 Commons Chamber

[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.

[Sarah Olney (Richmond Park) (LD)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Gavin Newlands]

I will make some progress.

We also looked at problems faced by thousands of customers in their attempts to secure refunds from airlines after cancellations caused by the pandemic. It is unacceptable that airline after airline has decided that the law does not apply to them—although given the example set this week by the Government it is perhaps unsurprising—and tried to evade their legal responsibilities by fobbing customers off with vouchers. While welcoming the recent, belated announcement extending the protections under the ATOL—air travel organisers’ licence—scheme, the reprehensible behaviour by some airlines has shown that we need to look at how the system operates and whether we should be keeping passenger fares in trust.

This PR disaster has been confounded by the actions of airlines such as British Airways/IAG. While making full use of Government finance, BA/IAG and its hatchet man-in-chief, Willie Walsh, who has just skipped off into the sunset with an £800,000 bonus pay-off, have sacked 12,000 staff and fired and rehired 30,000 more, with staff forced to take wage cuts of up to 60% and drastically reduced conditions, under threat of being thrown on the dole in the middle of the biggest economic crisis since the war.

We have also seen ground handler Menzies Aviation follow a similar path—this despite, during a phone call with me, assuring me that it absolutely would not be taking this kind of approach: an approach that we said would swiftly be followed by others if the Government refused to act. So it has proven, with blue chip company Centrica/British Gas making the same threats, along with many other companies across the UK. This sort of disreputable and despicable management tactic should be against the law, but is not. I again repeat my call for the Government to get behind my Bill or introduce their own measure to make these bully-boy tactics illegal. But despite the difficulties they cause for advocates like me, an industry should not and cannot be judged on the behaviour of its worst members.

At the start of this period, aviation supported nearly 1 million direct and indirect jobs. For those of us who represent airport constituencies, there is real danger that the flood of redundancies becomes a tsunami, with a catastrophic impact on our local and regional economies. The effects on the supply chain are even more devastating when it comes to aerospace companies such as Rolls-Royce. At Inchinnan in my constituency, 700 jobs—over 50% of the workforce—are gone. These were high-skilled, high-value jobs, now lost from our economy, perhaps never to return. I fear for the long-term future of high-level manufacturing like Rolls-Royce if the Government continue to lift not a finger to save jobs and save local communities.