Loganair, the UK’s largest regional airline, is to expand at London Heathrow and has renewed its calls to the UK Government to reform competition remedies to make slots at Heathrow permanently available for UK regional connectivity.
The airline has secured access to 30 additional pairs of slots each week at Heathrow under a lease arrangement with British Airways, which takes effect in May. The slots will enable Loganair to develop regional connectivity from UK domestic destinations to the UK’s premier hub, offering both point-to-point access into London itself and a broad range of new worldwide connections via Heathrow.
Details of the specific routes to be served will be announced in the coming days once all formalities have been completed. Details of the slot agreement were confirmed publicly by Airport Coordination Limited, the designated coordinator for UK airports.
The slot arrangement between the airlines comes as Loganair has once again asked the UK Government to initiate action with the European Commission to repatriate control of competition remedies dating back to 2012 under which these Heathrow slots were previously made available to other airlines – predominantly to fly domestic routes.
“We’re delighted to be growing our operations at Heathrow,” said Jonathan Hinkles, Loganair’s chief executive. “Having taken these important first steps ourselves to provide new connectivity to and from the UK regions under this arrangement, it’s now essential for the UK Government to initiate the process needed to reform competition remedies to provide access to Heathrow for the UK regions.”
Loganair’s campaign around the reform of Heathrow competition remedy slots began last month, and quickly gathered support from figures including John Holland-Kaye, the chief executive of Heathrow Airport; Willie Walsh, the director general of IATA; and Dr Liz Cameron, chief executive of the Scottish Chambers of Commerce.
Changes to Heathrow’s tariffs for regional aircraft operating on UK domestic routes took effect from 1 January 2023. The new tariffs are critical to the viability of Loganair’s plans to provide regional connectivity at Heathrow.
