A plan for Rachel Reeves to back a third runway at Heathrow and an expansion of Gatwick and Luton airports has been labelled “desperate”, as the chancellor faces opposition from within Labour.
Reeves is reportedly poised to make a swathe of announcements intended to increase economic growth in a speech later this month, including giving a political green light to the airports’ expansion.
The long-mooted plan to build a third runway at Heathrow, which is Britain’s busiest airport, is expected to be heavily backed by Reeves, along with bringing a second strip at Gatwick into full-time use and increasing the capacity of Luton, according to Bloomberg.
The chancellor has been searching for policies that will turbocharge growth, predicted to be 1.6% this year, as she also searches for deep spending cuts to make up for a rise in borrowing costs and a dip in the pound earlier this month.
The government trumpeted the expansion of Stansted airport at last October’s investment summit, when the prime minister welcomed a £1bn commitment from its owner, Manchester Airports Group, as a sign of getting “our economy moving … through the shock and awe of investment”.
Reeves is expected to back Heathrow’s expansion despite opposition from the energy secretary, Ed Miliband, who is understood to be against the plans which have long been opposed by green campaigners.
Miliband is responsible for keeping the UK within its carbon budget – the amount of carbon the country can afford to emit while still having a chance of meeting net zero emissions by 2050.
The seventh such budget is coming out this spring, written by the Climate Change Committee (CCC), which has previously decreed that “there should be no net airport expansion unless the carbon-intensity of aviation is outperforming the government’s emissions reduction pathway and can accommodate the additional demand”.
Reeves will also face opposition to the decision from London’s Labour mayor, Sadiq Khan. A spokesperson for Khan told the Guardian: “The mayor has a longstanding opposition to airport expansion around London – linked to the negative impact on air quality, noise and London’s ability to reach net zero by 2030.”
The move will also be unpopular with many backbenchers, both those with constituencies near the airports and those who campaign on climate action.
Clive Lewis, the MP for Norwich South, said: “The CCC has called for ‘no net airport expansion’ in the UK. That’s because it’s completely incompatible with the government’s own net zero strategy.”
Doug Parr, the policy director at Greenpeace UK, said: “Resurrecting the idea of a third runway at Heathrow in the hope that a strip of tarmac will nudge up the UK’s GDP smacks of desperation. The economic benefits are dubious at best while the environmental costs in climate damage, noise and air pollution are certain.
“Expert analysis has shown that the uptick in air travel over the last few years has failed to boost UK productivity or GDP growth while business journeys by plane are in long-term decline.”
Reeves is expected to argue that the government is bringing in a sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) mandate that will require planes to use greener fuels, with 2% of total jet fuel to be SAF by the end of this year, and this will offset any expansion.
Other mooted growth-boosting schemes include the Lower Thames Crossing road tunnel and a Universal Studios theme park near London.
The chancellor has long supported a third runway at Heathrow, voting for it in 2018 while the prime minister, Keir Starmer, voted against.
Bosses at Heathrow are expected to reveal new runway plans later this year, which are likely to be less ambitious than a previous iteration that would have crossed adjacent motorway lanes.
Under the previous government, parliament voted to approve a third runway in principle. The airport has yet to submit a full planning application.
Gatwick’s plans to bring its existing emergency runway into routine use as a second runway have been examined by planning inspectors and is due to be decided by the transport secretary, Heidi Alexander, by 27 February.
The similar development consent order for Luton’s expansion plans is due to be ratified or rejected by Alexander in April.
Gatwick and Luton submitted their plans in 2023 to the Planning Inspectorate, which typically spends at least a year examining any nationally significant projects. Inspectors then provide a detailed recommendation to ministers, who ultimately sign off on development consent orders.
A government spokesperson said: “We do not comment on speculation. We are determined to get our economy moving and secure the long-term future of the UK’s aviation sector.
“All expansion proposals must demonstrate they contribute to economic growth, which is central to our plan for change, while remaining in line with existing environmental obligations.”
