Theresa Villiers is one of the most highly respected Conservative colleagues in Westminster. Thoughtful and diligent, she's also in her quiet way, rather bold and radical.
Theresa is, however, coming in for some flak over the party's policy on a third Heathrow runway, most recently on Iain Dale's blog. I respect Iain tremendously, but on this I respectfully disagree. Personally, I think that the party's opposition to a third runway at Heathrow is right (believe me, if I didn’t think so, I say so!). The reality is that there comes a time when we can no longer keep cramming more and more 'planes and passengers into the same crowded corner of south east England.
Yet for taking this rather sensible approach, Theresa is taking on a lot of powerful corporate interests.
BAA - the company that makes us stand around in queues for ages and subjects us to the Heathrow hassle phenomenon - clearly loathes Conservative policy. Is it my imagination, or is there a rather nasty and personal campaign underway?
Conservatives are
rightly the party of free markets. But believing in free markets is
not the same thing as blindly supporting big corporate interests. Far
from being in hoc to the eco-lobby, Theresa has taken a measured stance
to ensure that passengers have more choice and competition. She was
one of the first to call for BAA's monopoly over so much of the airport
capacity in the south east to be broken up - an approach now backed by
the Competition Commission. Giving passengers the option of voting with
their feet to choose between airports run by different operator should
help all of us get a better deal and better customer service than BAA
currently offer.
On a final note, Iain refers to C-fit. It would be great to see a grass-root Conservative organisation making the case for more air travel. I agree with the aims set out by C-fit. But is C-fit quite the grass-roots campaign that it's portrayed to be? Who funds C-fit, its membership, or corporate donors?
Before laying into Theresa for promoting free market, Conservative principles, I think they should tell us?
