Lord Harper (Con)

My Lords, I support Amendment 102A, also supported by the noble Lord, Lord Davies of Gower, who is unfortunately not able to be with us today. He was here for day one in Committee, and he wanted me to place on record his support for this amendment. As the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, has set out, the airfield advisory team is something that existed and has recently been disbanded. It would be helpful for the Minister to confirm that that is indeed the case, give the reasons for disbanding it, and say whether, in the light of the amendment, he would reconsider that decision. My understanding is that it was a useful forum for the CAA and the Department for Transport to engage with airfield operators to discuss relevant issues, and for them to communicate with those operators, but, perhaps more importantly, for airfield operators to feed back their concerns and ask questions of the regulator and the department. Unless there was a very good reason for getting rid of it, having those forums for users of the services provided seems a very good thing. My understanding is that the airfield operators would very much welcome that advisory team being re-established. I would be pleased to hear what the Minister has to say.