WESTMINSTER WATCH GARETH MORGAN


South East airport expansion, it ain’t ’alf political. The great scourge of elections setting five-year horizons, while infrastructure needs depend upon 20-, 30- or 40-year visions, was meant to be eradicated by Sir Howard Davies’s Airports Commission. The theory being: make the assessment of need as impartial as possible; put in place a systematic, data-driven process that frees us from short-term posturing and the need to win seats; and, instead, focus on the true national interest. Simple. Until, that is, you remember that even if you outsource the thinking, the analysis and the recommendation-making, a politician at some point still has to make a decision.


For all that the Conservative leadership welcomed the general election victory, there was an immediate realisation that small majorities expose them to rebels on, for example, European Union membership, boundary reviews and, of course, airport expansion. The airport decision is going


to be rough on the governing party. Even if the eventual recommendation comes from an independent commission and is loudly welcomed by the business community, there will be a huge fight that follows. On one side there are those that simply oppose Heathrow.


34 BBT JULY/AUGUST 2015


MAKING A NOISE F


or a process that was meant to take the politics out of the decision around


The airport decision is going to be rough on the governing party


It matters not a jot that the Commission’s scenarios and projections showed most growth stemming from a hub airport expansion; it is trumped by local concerns about noise and air quality impacts. The Heathrow


ARE POLITICAL GAMES MUDDYING THE RUNWAY DEBATE?


naysayers include some serious heavy-hitters in Theresa May, Boris Johnson, Justine Greening and Theresa Villiers – all of them Cabinet members. In addition, the thorny issue of London Mayoral candidate selection is upon us. While the Conservative process lags behind that of Labour, the field has just been added to by Zac Goldsmith MP, perhaps the most high-profile (and single issue-focused) politician ranged against Heathrow. He also happens to be the only candidate in the Conservative field that, it is felt, has a chance against whichever Labour candidate emerges.


That is quite an array of political talent lined up against Heathrow, and that is why Gatwick’s trump card has always been that it is ‘politically deliverable’. Put aside any feelings about whether this is a good reason to decide on infrastructure of national importance and this is a significant factor in its favour. Gatwick has opponents of its own, but they don’t quite match up in a heavyweight showdown. The ‘Gatwick Nine’ MPs in the airport’s vicinity are mostly backbenchers who point to the moral case that, should Heathrow be recommended by Davies’s Commission, the proximity of Cabinet members to the decision maker should not trump national interest (for this read ‘their own local concerns on noise’). They have already made these views known to the Chief Whip and have called for known anti- Heathrow MPs to be excluded from decision making. However, if we are talking political deliverability, then the pro-Heathrow campaign has one ace up its sleeve – the Chancellor. The major proponent of Heathrow around the Cabinet table has never been stronger. A key architect of the election victory and the economic good news that led to it, he has political capital to spend. He has been putting it to good use already by ensuring that his allies hold a number of key government positions. It may be one versus four when the final Cabinet showdown comes, but I know who I’d rather have in Heathrow’s corner.


Gareth Morgan is a political lobbyist and director with Cavendish Communications (www.cavendishpc.co.uk). He is an advisor to the Guild of Travel Management Companies (GTMC).


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