Commentary Part 1 – Airports Schedule 8: Status of airport operators as statutory undertakers etc
212.Part 1 of Schedule 8 amends Part 5 of the AA 1986 and Article 2 of the Airports (Northern Ireland) Order 1994 (the “1994 Order”) to make provision for conferring the status of statutory undertaker on certain airport operators.
213.Under the AA 1986 an airport operator has statutory undertaker status if a permission to levy charges under Part 4 of the AA 1986 has been granted in respect of the airport, or there is a subsisting pending application and it is not for these purposes an excluded airport under section 57(2) of that Act. Under section 37(2) of the AA 1986 permission to levy charges is necessary where the annual turnover of the airport operator exceeds £1million per financial year in at least two of the last three financial years.
214.Part 1 of the Act will repeal section 37 of the AA 1986 and this financial threshold will no longer be the determining factor as to whether an airport is regulated. Therefore consequential amendments are needed to the AA 1986 to enable the status of statutory undertaker to be conferred upon airport operators and preserve the position in respect of existing airport operators which have had such status conferred upon them.
215.Section 57 of the AA 1986 is substituted with section 57A, which provides that a relevant airport operator will have the status of a statutory undertaker where a certificate has been granted in respect of the airport of which it is the operator. The CAA will grant such a certificate if the airport operator has applied for the certificate, has paid the relevant charge, and is eligible. An airport will continue to be eligible where the annual turnover of the business carried on by the operator at the airport exceeds £1 million in at least two of the last three financial years.
216.Airports owned solely or jointly by a principal council, an Integrated Transport Authority (as defined by the Local Transport Act 2008) in England or a metropolitan county passenger transport authority in Scotland are excluded from being an eligible airport.
217.A certificate may be withdrawn by the Secretary of State (in relation to an airport in England and Wales) or the Scottish Ministers (in relation to an airport in Scotland) if the airport no longer meets the eligible annual turnover in the relevant financial years. Before withdrawing a certificate the Secretary of State or the Scottish Ministers (as appropriate) must consult the CAA and the airport operator. The withdrawal of a certificate does not affect rights or liabilities accrued during the period when a certificate had been granted.
218.The Secretary of State may make regulations about the operation of new section 57A of the AA 1986 in cases in which there is more than one operator at an airport (see paragraph 5 of Schedule 8).
219.The Secretary of State may make an order substituting a greater sum than £1 million.
220.Separate arrangements exist in Northern Ireland for the conferral of statutory undertaker status on airport operators. Part 2 of Schedule 8 makes amendments to the 1994 Order for airports in Northern Ireland to achieve a similar effect to the Great Britain arrangements.