The points everyone on the Heathrow side of the argument seems to be missing are, even if HAL achieves its aim, raises all the money itself and successfully runs a state of the art airport in the next 20 or so years, its management knows any failure or financial problem will immediately be covered by government because it is Heathrow. Didn't happen for Blackpool whose passengers now have to travel via Manchester or Liverpool.
Then there is the cost of the inevitable public enquiries, appeals and rehearings. Have these been costed in or will it be the taxpayer picking up the bill?
The whole project is predicated on Heathrow being the promoted as "the" gateway to the UK and, as part of this, regional airports are being left to sink or swim as best they might, their principal role being seen as feeding Heathrow.
As for the statement that Manchester and other places only now getting their act together and are twenty years behind London, that is the biggest load of rubbish I've read in a long time regarding the North. In the late 1970s until the mid 1980s I was responsible for generating business tourism for Greater Manchester, had an input into leisure tourism and into the development of Manchester Airport.
In eight short years before Thatcher killed the metropolitan councils I generated conference business, including a large number of high profile international conferences, which brought millions in revenue to Manchester. In 1986 alone the value of international events in the county was in excess of £6 million (over £12.3 million today) yet, compared to today the hotel stock was much smaller and the airport had far fewer links - even fewer when we started talking to organisers years before the events took place. What we started then has been developed over the last 30 years and Greater Manchester can now compete with any city in terms of hotels, tourism venues and centres of excellence in many disciplines.
For years before I started the conference operation the airport had been campaigning for more routes only to be baulked at every turn by BA and its predecessors and by ministers in a heavily regulated world. A visit by a junior minister in 1981 to discuss a way round BA's constant objections to route applications can be summed up in a single sentence from the home counties based minister "not many people in the North want to fly, those that can afford it can fly through London". That arrogance was not only displayed by the minister but also by BA which, at the time had flights from MAN to three destinations in the US and Canada. All originated in MAN but, though the distances covered were shorter than from London given the average track distances flown, the prices were higher by up to 15%. A similar arrogance is often displayed by southern contributors on here which can be summed up as "it's grim up north and they don't have much to spend".
The Greater Manchester Economic Development Corporation raised hundreds of millions of both private and government funding for the county. The Northwest Tourist Board and various other bodies across the Northwest worked together to develop growth and investment in a vast range of projects, events and new businesses. There are more millionaires per square mile in Wilmslow and Prestbury than in any similar area in the Home Counties.
The disolution of the Greater Manchester Council and Merseyside Council had a far more delitarious effect on the northwest than the the dissolution of the GLC had on London.
Trying to increase tourism to the area, I had to visit various British Tourist Authority offices in Europe and the USA in the 1980s. All were dedicated to the "Milk Run", i.e. London, Stonehenge, Stratford, Chester, Edinburgh and York. Time after time I was told that those were the only places people wanted to visit. When asked if they tried to sell anywhere else, the answer was always the same - "what else is there anywhere else for people to see".
Times have changed. I moved on years ago and live hundred of miles from the UK and cities around the UK now have exploited their historic and other tourism gems and the tourism marketing of the UK is much more balanced. The country has centres of excellence in a vast range of disciplines all generating business tourism. The hotel stock in the UK has expanded beyond recognition. I could only dream of the range of hotels Manchester now has.
The Greater Manchester Combined Authority has the potential to pick up from where the Greater Manchester Council left off almost 30 years ago. The airport is critical to the economic success of not only the county but the region. No one in Milan, Munich, Melbourne or any of the US states would countenance the sort of detrimental to the regions thinking that is behind the HAL proposal if applied to Rome, Berlin, Sydney or, for instance in Texas, if Austin were to be developed to the detriment of Houston.
The relationship between the plans for Heathrow and the regional airports threatens to turn the clock back and to cement Londoncentricity in the national phyche. By all means let the Heathrow plan go ahead as a fully commercial venture with government accepting it has to be totally impartial and the regions and their airports recognised as being on an equal, competitive basis.