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Civil Aviation Bill

We are broadly in favour of bringing all airports on to the same footing, but we appear to have a funny situation in which the Secretary of State is giving himself incredibly detailed powers in relation to one category of airport, while another is unaffected. I should like to turn finally to the dog that does not bark at all in the Bill but has filled a significant amount of the deliberations today: the proposals for airport expansion. We have set out our three cardinal principles: we must have robust emissions trading before we have airport expansion; there should be no cross-subsidy; and we need greater, genuine help for those who suffer blight. There is, indeed, a difficult decision to take on whether we need a new runway—it involves balancing the real requirement of the airlines for more capacity in the south-east at current growth rates against the environmental concerns that that growth rate may be more than the conditions for CO2 and NOx emissions can stand—but, surely, the conclusion that we can firmly reach is the exact reverse of the one that the Government have reached. There is no case for building a new runway at an airport that has failed to attract any long-haul passenger business at all, that is operating below capacity and that has by far the longest of the three train services from London—a service that is deteriorating. Overall, the Bill, if not a mouse, is at least a lot less than the House was hoping for. Little is firmly decided in it, and what has been decided is dubious and unbalanced. This week, we are celebrating at sea the 200th anniversary of the battle of Trafalgar: England expects something better for aviation.