In my personal opinion, there should be fairer, differentiated bands of APD...
- Central London/Major airports in affluent areas: LCY, LHR and maybe LGW should pay full APD (£13/26 - £76/146)
- Outer london and +20 million ppa airports like LTN, STN, MAN should pay 75% current APD (£9.75/£19.50 - £57/£109.50)
- +10 million ppa airports should have APD devolved 50%: EDI and after this year BHX (£6.50/13 - £38/73)
- +5 million devolved to 25% current rate: GLA, BRS, hopefully soon NCL, LPL, BFS etc. (£3.25/£6.50 - £19/36.50)
- Airports of less than 5 million ppa should have APD fully devolved OR pay a standard flat rate of say... £5 per passenger in all classes of travel over all distances, perhaps 50% delivered back to the airport as a development fee
- Another potential band for consideration could be full devolution for airports with less than 1mppa, and/or full devolution on all non London domestic flights
I'm not sure it needs to be as complicated as this - simply charging full APD for London airports, and discounts for the regions would be enough. The London market can take it, but the regions are a lot more price sensitive. Providing discount to the regions will also help reduce the pressure on LHR by encouraging more direct flights to the region.