Heathrow runway delay 'gutless' and bad for business

The government’s delay about whether to build a third runway at Heathrow has been labelled “gutless” by the British Chambers of Commerce’s director general.

Secretary of State for Transport Patrick McLoughlin announced on Thursday evening that the final decision about whether to build the new runway at Heathrow, expand the airport’s northern runway or build a second runway at Gatwick airport will be delayed until summer 2016.

That timeline coincides with the London mayoral elections, which takes place on 5 May next year.

A final decision had initially been promised to be made by the end of 2015, but the government now believed more work needed to be done on the environmental impacts of the options.

The British Chambers of Commerce’s John Longworth said businesses will see the move as “gutless”.

"Business will question whether ministers are delaying critical upgrades to our national infrastructure for legitimate reasons, or to satisfy short-term political interests,” he claimed, hinting that the government wanted to wait until after the London mayoralty elections.

“Businesses across Britain will be asking whether there is any point in setting up an Airports Commission – or the recently-announced National Infrastructure Commission – if political considerations are always going to trump big decisions in the national interest.”

But McLoughlin on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme on Friday the rejected the suggestion.

“I know that is what you would like to think,” he said.

“But the simple fact is we have known for a very long time when the mayoral elections were going to be.

“So if we deliberately wanted to say we weren’t going to make this until after the mayoral elections, we would have just set the timetable for another 12 months, and we didn’t do that.”

Conservative MP and candidate for London mayor Zac Goldsmith has said he would resign his seat if the government chooses the Heathrow expansion option.

Longworth said expansion at other airports is needed as well, and ministers need to “stop prevaricating and get on with doing what the country sorely needs”.