黑洞社区

The continued delay in government policy on where new airport capacity should be built is endangering the UK construction industry鈥檚 place as a global leader in airport design and building, experts have claimed.

Last week, Sir Howard Davies launched a review of the UK鈥檚 airport capacity, saying he wants to build a consensus about what should be done on the issue. However, the independent commission he heads is not scheduled to report until after the 2015 general election.

Alan Lamond, vice-chair of the British Aviation Group and director at architect Pascall + Watson, said the lack of clarity over the future of the UK鈥檚 airports was leading clients 鈥渢o question whether we are serious aviation players鈥�.

Our expertise is being eroded by the impasse that is being created

Alan Lamond, British Aviation Group

A recent survey by the British Aviation Group revealed that its members, which comprise 180 UK construction and service firms, have collectively worked on all of the world鈥檚 60 busiest airports.

鈥淭he British are world class in airport consultancy, in design, legal expertise and accounting. We are going to find our expertise being eroded by the impasse that is being created,鈥� Lamond said.

Michael O鈥機allaghan, director of aviation at contractor Morgan Sindall, said the lack of a clear UK aviation policy was deterring private sector investment in the UK鈥檚 aviation market, and the capacity constraints and lack of connections were creating in barriers to UK global competitiveness.

鈥淭his is negatively affecting our world leadership in the aviation sector. [鈥�] The continuing impasse will have further negative effects on [the UK鈥檚] world-leading engineering, architectural, construction and service-based aviation businesses.鈥�

He said foreign firms were better placed to pick up work in their own markets and UK expertise would be lost to foreign firms if that was where the jobs were. 鈥淵ou can only lose leadership once,鈥� he added.