Orders of the Day — Air Corporations Bill

Part of the debate – in the House of Commons at 12:00 am on 4 April 1968.

Alert me about debates like this

Photo of Mr Jon Rankin Mr Jon Rankin , Glasgow Govan 12:00, 4 April 1968

I agreed with a good deal of what the hon. Member for Orpington (Mr. Lubbock) said towards the end of his speech. I regret that I was not able to be in my place during the earlier part of his remarks.

Yesterday evening, on a visit to Southend Airport, we were told about the bus-stop services which fly between Southend and Aberdeen, stopping at Edinburgh and various other places en route. The airport manager assured us that these services were well patronised and extremely successful. Projects like this should be explored, not merely between Britain and the Continent—although we must always bear that type of market in mind—but also from the point of view of Scotland. There is now a great travelling market for the intermediate type of service; that is, a flight which takes a passenger to stops between Glasgow and London, and for this reason we should not all the time think in terms of the Glasgow-London demand. The same can be said of freight services.

My hon. Friend the Member for Bolton, East (Mr. Robert Howarth) will agree—because he was one of the hon. Members on that visit to Southend Airport—that every half hour an aeroplane arrived at Southend Airport and that, at a similar interval, one took off. I was assured that these services were profitable. There is, therefore, still a wonderful avenue for aircraft operators to explore in the United Kingdom—always bearing in mind the larger avenue of the Continent and the world in general.

It is important for us to begin to think about the future of London Airport. I use this airport twice a week. Already the number of passengers being handled there is presenting a problem. When one thinks of the situation that will arise when the new 400-seater turbo-jets come into service, the problem will be even worse. The airport is in a state of perpetual change, with work going on in almost every part of it. If, in addition, we have supersonic aircraft landings there, the problem will be virtually insuperable. Not only is there a lack of manoeuvring space but an insufficiency of runways. If that is the case now, what will it be like in the future? Last Monday the aircraft in which I was travelling was held up and had to circle for half an hour before being able to land.

I agree with the hon. Member about increasing flights to and from Scotland. That has been a long felt want and the demand has been made for a long time, but nothing much has been done to meet it. It was a pity that the request, made over so many years, for a service embracing Dundee was regularly refused by B.E.A. Now, when a private operator has decided to come in, the venture merits success. I could never see any reason for refusing this type of service to meet the intermediate demands of London, Edinburgh, Dundee, Aberdeen and so on.

That should be met particularly when we see that on the western side of Scotland Prestwick is getting nervous about its future. It is feared that Abbotsinch is attracting too much traffic and therefore Prestwick is suffering. It is a pity tat that feeling should be created at a time when there is a clamour for more services in Scotland. Prestwick on the western side could be used in a similar sort of bus-stop plan as exists in the east.

I hope that my hon. Friend will note that the numbers and problems at London Airport are increasing. Traffic is increasing. That will make the need for the third London Airport even more urgent. I hope that there will be no undue delay in getting ahead with the inquiry into the Stansted question because time is no longer on our side. In the interests of the expansion of aviation and of the aircraft industry in Britain, the third airport is a pressing necessity. I hope d ere will be no unnecessary delay in coming to a conclusion on this matter at the earliest possible date.

The aim of this Bill is to provide British European Airways with finance to buy the new equipment which it must have. That, of course, includes aircraft, but it does not appear to comprehend engines. The Minister put it very euphemistically when he said that B.E.A. has asked to buy the Trident 3B. That is where Ministerial imagination enters the field. All of us know, although one does not actually say so, that B.E.A. was told what it had to buy. It was not the Corporation's preference. The engine it wanted was not the 3B but the Rolls Royce 211.