Civil Aviation (Consumer Protection and Regulatory Reform) Bill [HL]

Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill Excerpts

3rd reading
Monday 20th July 2026 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill]

That the Bill be now read a third time.

[The Minister of State, Department for Transport (Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill) (Lab)]

My Lords, I will now make a short statement on the position regarding legislative consent on the Bill. The Government accept that legislative consent from the Northern Ireland Assembly would be required for Clauses 1, 5 and 11. These clauses cover areas that aim to modernise air passenger rights, strengthen consumer protection enforcement and enable updates to airport slot allocation. The Government have written to the Northern Ireland Executive on this matter, and my expectation is that these issues will be fully addressed during the Bill’s passage in the other place. We remain committed to sustained engagement with the devolved Governments for the remainder of the Bill’s passage. I beg to move.

Schedule 1: Direct enforcement of consumer protection legislation by CAA

Amendment 1

Moved by

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill]

1: Schedule 1, page 33, line 21, leave out paragraph (c)
Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment would remove provision that is unnecessary because the statement of policy prepared by the CMA under paragraph 16F of Schedule 5 to the Consumer Rights Act 2015 will apply to all direct enforcement authorities.

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

My Lords, the Government have brought forward a minor and technical amendment. Schedule 1 to the Bill currently amends Schedule 5 to the Consumer Rights Act 2015 to refer us to a statement of enforcement policy prepared by a direct enforcement authority. However, under paragraph 16F of Schedule 5, the statement will always be prepared by the Competition and Markets Authority and not a direct enforcement authority. The amendment therefore removes this provision to correct the drafting accordingly. I assure noble Lords that this is a very minor technical amendment that tidies the Bill without changing policy intent.

Amendment 1 agreed.

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Moved by

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill]

That the Bill do now pass.

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

My Lords, I am pleased that we are reaching the departure gate for this Bill’s passage through your Lordships’ House.

[Noble Lords]

Oh!

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

I know—sorry. There is only one more like that. The Bill is focused on strengthening consumer rights and protections, reforming aviation regulation and enhancing aviation safety. Your Lordships’ contributions have ensured that the Bill leaves this place in a stronger shape. This is particularly true with regard to improving the experience of disabled people and those with reduced mobility while flying. I hope that in turn the Government have shown that we are willing to listen to and work with your Lordships.

Moving to thanks, I first give my gratitude to my noble friend Lord Katz, who supported me on the Front Bench. I also thank the noble Lord, Lord Moylan; throughout the Bill’s passage, he has consistently assured the House that he supports its objectives. Indeed, he was so supportive that he felt obliged to test, challenge and interrogate almost every mechanism for achieving them. His contributions have, however, been thoughtful and constructive, and I thank him for that.

I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Grender, and the noble Earl, Lord Russell, for the prudent and measured perspective they brought to our debates—particularly on consumer rights and the importance of ensuring that the Bill commands public confidence. Although we have not agreed on every point, their contributions have been consistently informed, probing and constructive. I am grateful for the spirit in which they have engaged with both me and my officials during our consideration of the Bill.

The noble Lords, Lord Holmes of Richmond and Lord Blencathra, the noble Baronesses, Lady Brinton and Lady Grey-Thompson, and my noble friend Lady Kennedy of Cradley all campaigned effectively to improve accessibility and highlight the importance of inclusive transport, for which I give my thanks. This has resulted in the Government tabling a package of amendments that I believe will really improve the experience of flying for those with disabilities or reduced mobility.

There have been other contributions. The noble Viscount, Lord Goschen, the noble Lords, Lord Harper, Lord Grayling, Lord Young of Cookham and Lord Empey, and the noble Baronesses, Lady Foster of Oxton and Lady Finlay of Llandaff, have provided wise words and, as ever, I am grateful for their contributions. I have enjoyed discussing the merits of general aviation with the noble Lords, Lord Kirkhope of Harrogate and Lord Davies of Gower, and my noble friends Lord Barber of Ainsdale and Lord Tunnicliffe, who raised issues of importance. Finally, I extend my personal thanks to all the officials who supported me, especially the Bill team, policy and legal colleagues, the drafting team, parliamentary counsel and others.

In conclusion, the Bill has completed its passage through your Lordships’ House. It now takes off for the other place, and I would expect any return journey to involve only limited turbulence. I beg to move.

[Baroness Grender (LD)]

My Lords, I am grateful for the opportunity to speak at Third Reading. I begin by thanking the Minister for the constructive way in which he and his officials have engaged with this House throughout its passage. I also record my gratitude to noble Lords across the House for the contributions they have made to the Bill at every stage. The scrutiny that this House has brought to bear, often from very different perspectives, has strengthened this legislation. I do not think that improvement would have happened without it.

I particularly welcome the Government’s agreement to bring forward a consultation on the experiences of disabled passengers—an addition to the Bill that I hope will make a real and lasting difference. For too long, disabled passengers have been left without the convenience or dignity that ought to be a basic expectation of air travel. I am glad that this House has secured a firm commitment embedded in the legislation to examine and address that failure properly.

I also welcome the corrective amendment the Minister has tabled for Third Reading, which addresses a technical deficiency identified by the Minister since Report. That kind of responsiveness does not always attend legislation of this kind, and it should be acknowledged.

I return to the principle that has guided my and my colleagues’ contributions throughout the passage of the Bill: that reform of aviation regulations should be directed first and foremost towards improving the passenger experience. The protections we have secured for disabled passengers and the standards the Bill now sets are what I will be watching for closely as it is implemented. Passengers do not experience aviation policy as clauses and statutes. They experience it as to whether they are treated with courtesy when a flight is delayed, whether they can travel with the support they need and whether the system as a whole is built around their interests rather than around convenience for everyone but them.

Too often in the past, passengers have been an afterthought in regulatory design. The Bill is an opportunity to correct that imbalance. I hope the Government will treat this not as the end of that work but as a foundation on which future improvements can and should be built. I close by expressing my thanks in particular to my Liberal Democrat Peer colleagues who have contributed to the Bill. My particular thanks, above all, go to Adam Bull in our Whips’ Office, for his diligence and unwavering support throughout its passage, for which I remain deeply grateful.

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[Lord Moylan (Con)]

My Lords, this was a pretty dreadful Bill when it was introduced to your Lordships’ House, in terms of its conception but also its drafting. It leaves it in somewhat better shape, which is very considerably due to the fact that the Minister paid attention in Committee to the many amendments and proposals that were made, and came forward on Report with an astonishingly large number of amendments to change the Bill—all of which, it is fair to say, noble Lords felt responded to their concerns, and which they were willing to support. I thank him for that.

Also, as was just referred to by the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay of Llandaff, a large part of Committee was taken up with discussions of the treatment of disabled people in the course of flying. Amendments brought forward by the Minister characteristically represent an improvement in the approach that government will take to those issues in the future, for which I thank him.

I also thank his officials for their engagement and the Public Bill Office for its support in drafting the amendments we put forward. I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Grender, for her important contribution to the debate. I am sure I will have forgotten some, but I also thank my noble friends Lady Bray of Coln, Lord Grayling, Lady Foster of Oxton, Lord Harper, Lord Young of Cookham, Lord Reay, Lord Redwood, Lord Davies of Gower, Lord Holmes of Richmond, Lord Goschen and Lord Kirkhope of Harrogate for the experience and scrutiny they brought to our proceedings.

This is fundamentally an administrative Bill. As I say, it changes decision-making processes in the wake of our departure from the European Union. But we remain concerned that the Government have chosen to use the legislation to transfer not only those European Union powers but also powers that the Government themselves possessed to the Civil Aviation Authority, to be carried out in many cases—fewer now, as a result of the Minister’s amendments—with no external scrutiny, certainly no scrutiny from Parliament, that would indeed have occurred under the previous system. This is a retrograde step in terms of parliamentary scrutiny.

We are also concerned that the Government have said, quite explicitly, that they want to use their new freedoms in order to align more closely with the European Union. It is a very strange conception of Brexit that the Government seem to have developed. British aviation is a world-leading industry, and it succeeds because of innovation and competitiveness. It needs to have regulations made for it that are suitable for the success of British aviation.

There was also one amendment passed by your Lordships’ House on Report that did not have the Government’s favour. Naturally, one suspects, the Government will use the passage of the Bill through the other place to try to remove it, but I hope very much that they will not. I wish to thank the noble Lord, Lord Empey, in this regard. Although it was my amendment that passed, that was as a consequence of the numerical placement on the Marshalled List. He had an amendment achieving a similar effect, which related to the drop-off charges made at airports that have now become scandalously excessive. Families and other travellers are charged simply for trying to pick up or drop off somebody, very often with no feasible alternative for doing so. There may be a lack of public transport or it may be unsuitable for somebody to seek to travel to an airport other than by car, for example, because they are wheelchair-bound or have some other mobility impairment that prevents them travelling on ordinary public transport, even where it exists. The amendment that was passed calls on the Government to conduct a thorough review of airport drop-off charges. It is as simple as that; it requires nothing more legally. We will look at that at ping-pong—or perhaps we will never get to ping-pong because the Government will take the advice of your Lordships’ House and accept the amendment that was passed.

With that, I am sad to bring an end to my involvement with this Bill. I hope that it becomes a route—I will not make a silly pun—or path to better regulation of aviation. If it does, it will be very much because of the efforts of Members of your Lordships’ House.

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

My Lords, no more puns. I have two brief points. First, the noble Lord just referred to the new Clause 7; we will see what happens in the other place on that.

I am particularly pleased that the noble Lord, Lord Empey, spoke this afternoon. I am quite clear that what I said to him when he raised the point about the Secretary of State taking action to support regional connectivity was not in fact correct. I am very happy to correct the record on that and am pleased to confirm that the Bill’s powers on airport slots and schedules would enable the Secretary of State to take action to support regional connectivity if that were considered necessary. The Government’s current assessment is that such intervention is not required, but I am happy to put the record straight for the noble Lord. I thank all noble Lords.