Yeah, are you pretending that you don't know that having so many connections is the only way to maintain route frequency and hence competitiveness. Bagso, you're smarter than that. If they all fly via another hub, London loses a fair amount of frequency and so the guys paying silly money up the frony who allow me to fly for less go elsewhere. Think it through.....
Problem is that its the people paying APD plus tax in the UK are subsidising this 19m while getting bugger all in return.
What competitiveness is achieved by spend £x Billion on a new runway, how many real jobs occur......
Spending the £3 billion on R&D and development of real long term opportunities aids UK more than subsidising a transit stop.