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Civil Aviation (Consumer Protection and Regulatory Reform) Bill [HL]

My Lords, I have some comments and observations. This is a wide-ranging group, and very varied regulations are part of it. We must be careful not to mix them all together. The former EU regulation 261/2004 was about delays and compensation and regulation 1107/2006 was about passengers with reduced mobility. We appear to be having conversations here where it is all mixed into one, and that is obviously not how we can legislate.

These regulations are already in place, and I was very involved with them as a Member of the European Parliament. We put in place robust regulations over the last 20 years, and they have fared well. In my view, we have been let down not by the regulations themselves but by certain bodies in certain airports that are not being compliant in ensuring that they are fulfilling their obligations. We have heard examples of passengers with reduced mobility in wheelchairs being separated from carers or relatives. That is not allowed—it should not be happening.

I gently remind colleagues who were in Committee the other week that it was not, ironically, the airlines themselves that wanted to put in place the responsibility for passengers with reduced mobility. The European Commission took away the responsibility for passengers with reduced mobility to be looked after by the airlines. That was part of what you got in your ticket. That changed about 20 years ago, when it was put into the hands of the airports. As I said at the time, this will not be reversed now. It is a massive operation.

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We see some very good practices where people are looked after very well—they are not left on aircraft; their wheelchairs are not being damaged—but we have seen far too many examples over the last years of people being treated very badly. It is not acceptable. I do not believe that this is beyond the wit of man. I do not think we need a consultation about it or to go into too much further regulation; it is about those authorities complying with the regulations that are currently laid down. It does not affect just us in the UK; the regulations are reciprocated when passengers travel to third countries—into Europe, into the States and around the world. There are also regulations that come under ICAO, where the airlines and the airports need to be compliant.

Another point is about the compensation, or the damage that could be paid for a damaged wheelchair, for example. My noble friend Lord Moylan is correct: it is the Montreal convention that oversees the whole airline industry and determines what should be given

for damage to baggage, et cetera. It is quite correct that we in the United Kingdom would have to find a way so that we could look at that. It would technically be only for domestic flights, but it is something that we could aim for in the long term.

One final point is about children and adults being separated. We know that we can pay extra for extra legroom on a number of airlines these days, but I do not see any reason why a family should book a holiday or book a flight and then be separated. That is not good enough. By the same token, there are different situations. We have what are called unaccompanied minors—children who will be flying without an adult. The rule generally, speaking as someone who worked in the airline industry, was that we placed a young person next to a female. People may say, “My goodness me, is this discriminatory?” No, it was not. It was just that, at that time and for many years, it felt most appropriate, and children perhaps felt a bit more comfortable, but it was the crew who were really looking after these young people while they were on an aircraft without their parents or guardians.

There are very simple solutions. The legislation and the rules are already in place and civil aviation can come down like a ton of bricks. It behoves the Government, and I would support them absolutely, to ensure that the airlines and the airports—it is the airports in a lot of these cases—actually comply with the regulations that are laid down.