Archived press release

BAA AGM: Pinnochio Comes to Town

18 July 2003

UK based airport operator BAA will be exposed today for its economy with the truth, broken promises, spin and greenwash. A new report released today by Friends of the Earth shows that BAA is often misleading on key issues:

Breaking promises - Heathrow Terminal 5: During the Heathrow Terminal 5 public inquiry BAA repeatedly claimed that T5 would not lead to a third runway. BAA even wrote to residents and said: "T5 will not lead to a `third' runway" and "we do not want, nor shall we seek, an additional runway" [1]. Yet BAA's recent submission to the Government's air transport consultation concludes that a third Heathrow runway should be one of the Government's possible runway schemes.

Spin revealed - Stansted Airport: BAA promotes Stansted as, `The Airport in the Countryside', whilst at the same time claiming Stansted could handle around 85 million passengers a year with two extra runways. This would be beyond Heathrow's present capacity. Even the world's largest airport in Atlanta in the US handled just 79m passengers last year.

Economical with the truth? BAA and the aviation industry make extravagant claims about air travel's contribution to the UK economy. But there is no evidence that more runways are essential for the economy and little meaningful evidence is ever produced to back up these claims. The evidence that has been produced has been thoroughly discredited [2]. A recent re-run of the Government's own transport forecasting model shows that no new runways are needed anywhere in the UK. [3]

BAA greenwash: BAA's commitment to its own self-promotion has achieved its desired results. The company has a built up a reputation for its work on sustainability and reporting that is not matched by any real and lasting change. Much of BAA's work is superficially impressive but regardless of the individual efficacy of initiatives on waste, energy use, tree planting, sports events and donations to community schemes, nothing gets in the way of the company's ambitions and lobbying for relentless airport expansion, regardless of the growing local, regional and global impacts.

Hannah Griffiths, Corporates Campaigner at Friends of the Earth said:

"How are people meant to believe BAA when their words and actions are so inconsistent? We need to know that UK companies are doing business in a way that we can be proud of. BAA is yet another company exposed for letting people and the environment down. It's high time that the Government acted to stop BAA and other destructive companies from behaving badly by introducing new laws to make UK business responsible for its impacts on people and the environment."

Copies of Friends of the Earth's new report on BAA is available from the press office.

Notes

[1] BAA `Dear neighbour' letter to residents by Sir John Egan, April 1999

[2] The Contribution of Aviation to the UK Economy, Oxford Economic Forecasting (OEF), November 1999, was a study commissioned by the Government but largely paid for by the aviation industry. The report made large claims for the industry's role in the UK economy. These were found to be flawed because the study:

• failed to account for aviation's £9.2 billion a year tax breaks and public subsidies;
• did not factor in the growing environmental and social costs imposed on society by aviation; and,
• failed to prove any direct link between the development of aviation and the performance of the UK economy yet, still went on to presume that there was a link.

Despite being widely criticised the OEF report forms the cornerstone of the Government's approach to airports and aviation. Berkeley Hanover Consulting's report, The Impacts of Future Aviation Growth in the UK, December 2000, was especially critical of the OEF report. Contact SASIG for details - 020 8541 9459.

[3] In autumn 2002, Friends of the Earth and other members of AirportWatch gained permission from the Department for Transport (DfT) to rerun its transport forecast model on different assumptions, namely:

• that aviation fuel should be taxed at the same rate as motor fuel (45.8p per litre), and;
• that all air travel should be made subject to VAT at 17.5%;
• that duty free is abolished on all flights;
• it was also assumed that APD would be abolished;
• that these changes should be phased in gradually between 2005 and 2025.

These conservative assumptions reflect stated UK Government policy of ending aviations' privileged tax status. The total value of these tax measures is currently ?9.2 billion. The DfT re-ran its model on these assumptions, and the results were produced in February 2003. The results were dramatic and showed:

the total number of passengers using UK airports would increase at a much slower rate from 200 million in 2000 to 315 million in 2030, compared to the official forecast of 501 million used in the Government's 2002/3 consultation on the future of air transport in the UK.

As a result of the slower rate of passenger growth any rise in passenger numbers could be accommodated within the UK's existing airport and runway capacity. There would be no need for any new runway anywhere in the UK in the period to 2030.

Full details of the results of the DfT's rerun model can be viewed in The Hidden cost of flying at: www.airportwatch.org.uk/briefings/index.htm

If you're a journalist looking for press information please contact the Friends of the Earth media team on 020 7566 1649.

Published by Friends of the Earth Trust