Orders of the Day — Airways Corporations Bill

Part of the debate – in the House of Commons at 12:00 am on 29 June 1949.

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Photo of Wing Commander Geoffrey Cooper Wing Commander Geoffrey Cooper , Middlesbrough West 12:00, 29 June 1949

As I said earlier, I believe the decisions whether or not to amalgamate should be taken on technical grounds. If that is so, we should realise that the world is a certain shape, that centres of population are where they are, that the Colonial Empire must be served and communications built up. If we analyse the situation from that standpoint we come inevitably to the conclusion, I think, that it would be of the greatest help to the development of our civil airlines if we were to increase, rather than to decrease, the number of Corporations. If we were to increase the number of autonomous divisions or units which will operate in the five essential areas, each of which has distinct and separate technical aspects which must be taken into account, we should have one Corporation to operate the internal areas of England, a second to operate the European, Middle East and Mediterranean airlines, and a third to operate on the Empire air routes——