Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask Her Majesty's Government whether they intend to reclassify existing areas of unnecessarily controlled airspace to improve safety, efficiency and access to airspace for general aviation traffic.

The Government is working with the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) and other key stakeholders to modernise our airspace. The specific needs of general aviation, including whether existing areas of controlled airspace should be reclassified, will be considered by the independent airspace regulator, the CAA, which is responsible for the classification of UK airspace.

Last year, the Secretary of State for Transport commissioned NATS to produce a feasibility assessment of the potential future demands for airspace of airports in the South of the UK. This work was the first step in the co-ordination of airspace modernisation, examining its feasibility and potential implementation. It was a design requirement of the NATS modelling that the total volume of controlled airspace does not increase and that where possible, controlled airspace would be released to other airspace users, including general aviation. The Government expects to publish the high level findings of this later in 2018.