BAA defiant over third Heathrow Airport runway

BAA has vehemently denied suggestions that it has scrapped plans for a third runway at Heathrow Airport in light of Conservative Party opposition.

The airport regulator was responding to comments by Shadow Transport Secretary Theresa Villiers, who said the Tories had forced BAA to "give up" its expansion plans.

She claimed last week that the operator conveyed to her that it "will not be submitting a planning application before the election" – a charge it rejects.

The Conservative Party has made opposition to the proposed third runway at Heathrow Airport a key facet of its environmental and development policies.

Tory frontbenchers insist the country can meet greater demand for travel by developing a new network of high-speed rail links. But to Labour and many in the corporate world, expanding the hub is the only way of keeping business travellers loyal to Britain.

Heathrow currently operates at 99 per cent capacity and delays are a common occurrence, with even minor incidents having a significant knock-on effect.

Insisting that expansion is still on the cards, BAA said: "We remain convinced that a third runway is the only viable, costed and thought-through way of meeting the need for extra runway capacity to maintain this country’s global connections to the rest of the world."

It also described the process of drawing up a planning application as "complex," adding that it "was always going to take until after the general election".

The rebuttal is intended to quell rumours the operator has abandoned plans for a third runway, which were ignited when Ms Villiers told The Times: "It seems BAA has woken up to the fact that we mean what we say on Heathrow and that ... there will be no third runway."

Labour has been a vocal supporter of the third runway, but the Tories are joined in opposition by environmental campaigners and local residents' groups.

Heathrow currently handles 65 million passengers and £50 billion worth of cargo each year. The British Chamber of Commerce recently warned that the UK misses out on £1 billion of economic prosperity for every year that construction of the third runway is delayed.

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