Willie Walsh, the chief executive of British Airways’ parent company, has criticised Heathrow airport and David Cameron as the government considers building a third runway at the London hub.
The IAG boss accused Heathrow of wanting to build a “gold-plated airport to fleece its customers”. He said other options were being considered only to “satisfy the ego” of the prime minister who had “spoken before he understood” the runway debate.
He said IAG, the biggest airline operator at Heathrow, would consider moving its operations to Madrid or Dublin if a cost-effective alternative to the £17.6bn runway plan was not introduced instead.
The expected delays, with the government set to hold back on a definitive decision in its promised response to the Airports Commission’s recommendation to build a third runway, will vindicate Walsh’s view throughout the three-year process that the report would end up gathering dust rather than being implemented.
Speaking at the Aviation Club in London on Thursday, Walsh said he believed there would be only two runways at Heathrow by 2050. He said: “There is no political will to build a new runway and … yet again, the opportunity to harness aviation’s economic benefits for Britain will be lost.”
Asked about other options under consideration, such as an extended second runway at Heathrow or expanding Gatwick, which would avoid Cameron breaking his 2009 pledge to rule out any third runway, Walsh said: “I don’t think I should compromise, or put at risk the viability of my business, to satisfy the ego of a politician who should not have said that in the first place until he understood the implications of the statement that he was making.”
He reiterated that there was “no business case for expanding Gatwick. Very few airlines support the proposal and no one would move there while Heathrow remains open.”
A cabinet subcommittee was meeting on Thursday to finalise its response to the Airports Commission, but was expected to defer an ultimate decision.
Although he said he expected the government to avoid the decision, Walsh warned: “Any expansion at Heathrow must only be undertaken if it’s done cost-effectively – and the financing proposed in the Davies commission is anything but cost-effective.”
He said IAG estimated that landing charges would double at what was already the most expensive hub airport in the world: “£80 a return trip in airport charges will turn Heathrow into a white elephant.”
Walsh claimed that only about £182m, or 1%, of the proposed expansion was for the actual runway, and condemned the plans for a four-mile underground railway line to Terminal 2 and for an £800m underground car park.
He added: “Yet again, we see a monopoly airport supplier looking to gold-plate facilities and fleece its airlines and their customers. We won’t pay for it and we most certainly won’t pre-fund the construction of any new infrastructure.”
