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Heathrow

To revert to an earlier theme, I am not embarrassed to represent my constituents on the matter that we are discussing. Indeed, I would be embarrassed not to do so. More than 1,000 of my constituents in W4 attended a meeting in Chiswick earlier this year to protest as part of the consultation, and more than 800 of my current and prospective constituents in W12 and W6 attended a meeting at Hammersmith town hall, at which I spoke. I have received literally thousands of e-mails and letters on the subject and I cannot recall one of them being in favour of the expansion of Heathrow—and, with the exception of correspondence from the Mayor of London, I cannot recall one of them calling for the closure of Heathrow. Although those people are angry, their requests are reasonable and I hope that the Government will listen to them. They essentially ask the Government to think again about the proposal to expand Heathrow and, before making a decision, to reconsider the out-of-date and unreliable information on which they currently propose to act. As for the Government, little appears to have changed since the 2003 White Paper on the subject, yet, on the ground, almost everything has changed. Environmental concerns and policy, and planning policy have changed, the ownership of the London airports is in the process of changing and, thanks to the Competition Commission report, the BAA monopoly will be broken. Not only the economic climate, but the challenges to the economic case for Heathrow expansion have changed. Politics have also changed. By that, I do not simply mean the Conservative party’s volte face, which, although welcome as far as it goes, is expressed in shallow and rather questionable terms. Like my hon. Friend the Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell), I mean the absolute groundswell across not only west London but a much wider area, and a coalition of interest that has not been seen previously, which challenges Government policy on the matter. Given the time available, I hope that I shall not repeat points that have already been made, but I will make a couple of points about the harm that the proposal would cause my constituents and others in west London. A good article in The Economist last week states that,"““Heathrow makes more people miserable than just about any other big developed-country airport.””" That is true not just because of air quality and noise, which have been covered at length. Thousands of people in Chiswick, Hammersmith and Shepherd’s Bush have not experienced those problems to a great extent, but will suffer from them significantly and continually if the third runway is built. The Piccadilly line has been mentioned. I recently had a meeting with London Underground, after it wrote to me about reconfiguring its services on the Piccadilly line. We all know what that means. As it explained to me, it means longer gaps between trains to fulfil timetable commitments. On interrogation, it became clear that that is partly due to the current expansion of Heathrow—too many people already use the Piccadilly line. Yet we read in one of the briefings that was sent to us today that, although capacity on the Piccadilly line will increase by 20 per cent. by 2015, the consultation document on Heathrow claims that expansion requires a 39 per cent. increase on the London underground, making the current position untenable. My hon. Friend the Member for Reading, West (Martin Salter) spoke about the problems of surface access. That is true of not only the M4 but local road networks across west London. Anybody who tries to drive around Shepherd’s Bush since the opening of the Westfield shopping centre will find that there is no room for major infrastructure developments on the current road network in west London. Contrary to what my local councillors seem to think, with their grandiose schemes for commercial development, the capacity simply does not exist in that area. Alternatives to Heathrow have not been properly examined. We have heard that growth in aircraft size will effectively expand the capacity within existing planning constraints by 30 per cent. by 2030, yet that does not appear to be enough for BAA, BA and other large airlines. A broad coalition includes people from extreme unrepentant environmentalists to those who would be perfectly prepared to countenance airport expansion, but believe that, if airports in the south-east are to be expanded, Heathrow is the last airport one would consider for such expansion. Again, I quote the article in The Economist:"““Expanding Gatwick is not without difficulties, but these are trivial compared with those at Heathrow.””" Why on earth would we look to Heathrow for the major expansion of airport provision in the south-east, given its position and the misery that it causes in a predominantly built-up area? There is some capacity in high-speed rail, but the Conservatives do themselves a disservice by saying that their plan to build a high-speed link to Leeds-Bradford would solve the problems of Heathrow expansion, when it would in fact take no more than 3 per cent. of current capacity out of the equation. Let us try to be realistic. We should work in a cross-party fashion, as my hon. Friend the Member for Hayes and Harlington suggested, but that is simply not happening. London is a five-airport city that, on current planning constraints, has the potential to go from 137 million passengers to 210 million by 2030 without the planned additional runway. The comparisons that the Government have made with hub airports on the continent do not stack up. There is no airport in a similar location to Heathrow or with the same number of charter and low-cost flights, which could be more appropriately directed elsewhere. I do not believe that the argument about transfer passengers stands up to scrutiny in the long term either, when so many people prefer to take direct flights from regional or other London airports. This has been a good debate, with the exception, I am afraid to say, of the contributions from those on the Government and official Opposition Front Benches. The Conservatives have performed an extraordinary volte-face over the past couple of months, standing the policy that they have supported for so long on its head. [Interruption.] I see Opposition Members shaking their heads, but exactly a year ago the hon. Member for Chipping Barnet (Mrs. Villiers) said:"““We recognise that the economic arguments for expanding Heathrow are much stronger than any other airport in the south-east””." Talking to a west London audience on ““Any Questions?”” earlier this year, the hon. Member for Havant (Mr. Willetts) said:"““there is an economic need for more airport capacity…somewhere in the South East””." When asked whether that meant Heathrow, he said:"““although I recognise this will not be welcome by this audience we have to accept that…things sometimes have to happen that people don’t wish.””" If the Conservative party has sincerely converted, we need more than the rather trivial examples that we have seen so far or the Mayor of London’s bizarre proposal, which his party leader has rejected. I make similar criticisms of those on my own Front Bench. I did not feel from what the Secretary of State said in opening the debate that he had been listening to MPs from west London or elsewhere. In the light of the wholly changed circumstances over the past five years, I hope that in responding to the debate, the aviation Minister will indicate that the door is open at least to looking again at both the risks and the prospects if Heathrow expansion does not go ahead. What is to be lost by reviewing this mad proposal for expansion at Heathrow—particularly in the light of the Government’s now excellent environmental credentials—which would cause misery and extraordinary inconvenience to thousands of people in west London, particularly my constituents?