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Airports (Amendment) Bill [HL]

My Lords, I can see the noble Lord, Lord Howell, in his place, hoping that I am going to go through a very detailed response to every speaker who has contributed this morning. I thank all who have contributed, because the debate has raised the fact that aviation issues in general are of great concern to many Members of the House. I hope that Members will forgive me for not dealing specifically with every contribution, but I want to raise a few points. The noble Earl, Lord Caithness, as a former Aviation Minister, made a number of points about the commercial issues. Of course regional policy, which all Governments have followed since the 1950s, is by definition to some extent interfering with the market. If we did not interfere with the market to some extent, areas of this country would be laid waste. That is the practical reality. Why do we have the European regional development fund? Why do we have regional growth funds? All these things deliberately address a market failure. Aviation is no different. Although it would be nice to say, ““Let us leave things and the market will fix it””, I assure noble Lords that the market will not fix it. At present, if you look at Heathrow, you see small regional aircraft parked that have a capacity of, may be, 34 passengers. They occupy one slot, whereas you have an A380 that may take 500 or 600 passengers for the same slot. Common sense dictates that it will not be long before someone in an airline somewhere works out that it is cheaper per head to land 600 people than 34 people. The big issue economically, for me, is not specifically a Northern Ireland issue. I have tried to go out of my way not to make it a Northern Ireland issue. The issue is that at present, our Government, as they have conceded, have no power to intervene should the market decide to push the slots somewhere else; I got a very strong clue when the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie of Luton, got to his feet. Of course we welcome and enjoy the links with Luton, Stansted and so on, but we are talking about the narrower issue; my colleague, my noble friend Lord Rogan, made it very clear as a businessman himself that, if you do not have the international connections, businesspeople are not going to travel for hours between airports at great inconvenience to themselves to get to a region. It is a disincentive which goes against the grain of all the millions of pounds we pour into regional policy in this country year after year. Given the time, I will perhaps not address the wider issues that the noble Lord, Lord Soley, and a number of other noble Lords addressed, although I have to say that we must have an answer to those questions. I come to the point about the European dimension to this. We have a unique opportunity because, by sheer coincidence, the European Union is addressing these matters in parallel with us. I fully understand what the Minister said. I have been out there. I believe we have the opportunity to make a strong case to the European Union. I believe we will have support out there—I know we have, certainly in the Parliament of the European Union. Although the Parliament is not the final decider in this case, I assure noble Lords that the growing influence of the Parliament over the Commission and in codecision-making in a number of areas will give us an opportunity in the coming months, as the year progresses, to negotiate with the European Union so that, ultimately, something like the Bill will be compatible with our European obligations. I understand the Minister’s position at present, and I do not seek to put us in conflict with our European partners. To coin a phrase that is a bit colloquial, I do not intend to go away on this issue, you know. The fact is that we have local interests to protect at home, but this is a UK issue. I have to tell your Lordships about the destinations that are available. You can fly from Amsterdam to Belfast and, as the noble Lord, Lord Soley, made clear, to far more cities than you can from Heathrow. The commercial value of those slots is, I think, between £20 million and £30 million each. Common sense dictates that, unless Heathrow has extra capacity, ultimately the only way to protect access to it from the regions will be through some form of intervention. We do not have the power to do that at the moment and we would be in conflict with Europe if we did, but I think that there may be an opportunity to do so, particularly this year, as reports are being drafted in Brussels right now. I believe that we have the ear of the Parliament and many of the people associated with it, because they are working through the same process themselves. I strongly believe that we are doing the right thing at the right time. It may not be perfect—I fully understand that it needs a lot more work—but, if we pull together and work with our European partners, I believe very strongly that we will be able to bring forward a series of proposals that will provide a guarantee for the future. Let us not get too hung up about the commercial deals before us today. It is the long term that we are trying to protect, and this will give us an opportunity to protect regional connectivity for the long term. All regional policy will fail if we do not have adequate connections. Bill read a second time and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.