Malcolm Robertson: Scotland must not be cut off from Heathrow hub

Published on Wednesday 26 January 2011 21:56

The importance of Scotland's access to Heathrow has been brought into sharp focus by BMI, which this week confirmed a review of domestic services to use slots at the airport for more profitable international routes.

It has been suggested that a change in the structure of airport charges at Heathrow is the catalyst for BMI's review.

But three days before Heathrow's decision on the structure of the airport charges was communicated to airlines, BMI's chief executive, Wolfgang Prock-Schauer, told flightglobal.com: "Our focus will be to further reduce our domestic flights and this capacity will shift to our continental Europe and Middle Eastern routes."

The airline's commercial strategy is a logical and entirely predictable consequence of the decision taken by the UK government to rule out a new runway at Heathrow.

That was a controversial decision for many reasons. Whether you agree with it or not, however, it is easy to see the negative implications for Scotland's access to the UK's only hub airport.

Slots at Heathrow are scarce, and the UK government has decided that there is no short-term prospect of more becoming available. We have long argued that a failure to build new capacity at Heathrow will encourage airlines to use slots for more profitable long-haul services, at the expense of destinations across the UK. BAA has no control over how slots are used.

Amsterdam's Schiphol Airport serves 19 UK destinations and Heathrow serves only six. Airports such as Charles de Gaulle in Paris, and Frankfurt - the home of BMI's owner Lufthansa - have good competitive reason to see Heathrow's network marginalised.

Direct connections with these European hubs are good for Scottish passengers, and for many years BAA has invested more money than any other organisation to support Scotland's direct international air routes.

However, we want Scots travellers to use Heathrow as a global hub and our new charging structure - which came about following a request from BMI and complies with new UK and EU rules - is designed to protect Heathrow's network and ensure fair and transparent charges based on cost differences.

Heathrow's total charges are fixed by the CAA, and the new charges added together will not increase our revenue, but will provide real incentives to build strong networks.

We don't have to look far to see how it can be done successfully.For British Airways, Heathrow represents the heart of an international network of routes, each made more economically viable by short-haul feeder services and the transfer passengers on board.

The business case is simple - a flight from London to Seattle is bound to be more profitable if those boarding in London are joined by passengers transferring from Aberdeen, Belfast, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Newcastle, or from European cities.

That coming together of short-haul and long-haul flights is the foundation of any successful hub airport, and is where Scotland's politicians and business leaders should be looking as they seek to protect these important routes.

The Heathrow airport charge represents only one element of BMI's costs.

BMI passengers also shoulder Air Passenger Duty, increased in November by the UK Treasury, rising fuel prices and the operating costs associated with an unusually large number of small planes - which together represent a greater burden than landing charges.

Our new pricing structure encourages BMI and its Star Alliance partners to use Heathrow as a hub of a network by reducing the charges for transfer passengers by 25 per cent.

In addition, we are investing 2 billion in a new Terminal 2 for the Star Alliance at Heathrow. Terminal 2 will locate BMI and its Star partners in one modern new building, giving them an opportunity to provide Scotland with fast, efficient connections to a powerful network of global destinations. For Scotland's sake, I hope they exploit that opportunity.

• Malcolm Robertson is director of communications at BAA