The local economy

The issue: Air travel and aviation is important to the UK economy and contributes significantly to the country’s prosperity supporting regional infrastructure, logistics and travel. In an increasingly globalised world, international connectivity will become ever more important.

Heathrow is critical to the local economy. It directly employs some 72,000 people and supports thousands of additional jobs. It helps to attract foreign investment into the area, supports the tourism industry and contributes to the growth of ’high-knowledge’ industries.

Nearly half of those employed at Heathrow come from the five boroughs directly surrounding the airport – Ealing, Hillingdon, Hounslow, Slough and Spelthorne.

For further information economy please see our report:
Economic Benefits of Heathrow Airport.

Our approach: We want to optimise the contribution that Heathrow makes to employment, skills and business opportunities, particularly in these communities closest to the airport.

Heathrow’s priority area for its economic development role comprises the five boroughs of Ealing, Hillingdon, Hounslow, Slough and Spelthorne. Our approach to the social and economic development is guided by three strategies.

The economic development and regeneration strategy sets out six objectives:

• Help local businesses to capitalise on the economic advantages provided by Heathrow
• Improve the skills of local people in accordance with employers’ needs
• Promote Heathrow as a prime employment option for local people
• Make the Heathrow area a better place to live and work
• Engage business partners, educational institutions and other organisations in economic development and regeneration
• Work with key stakeholders so that policies and funding decisions reflect the needs and opportunities of the Heathrow area.

The Phase I local labour strategy, published in 2002, sets out how BAA Heathrow and its partners will work together to maximise the local benefits of the airport’s construction programme.

The Phase II local labour strategy, set to be published later in 2007, will focus on Heathrow’s operational jobs, providing a framework for BAA’s involvement in education, employment and training. Its overall objective will be to increase the proportion of airport staff who live in the five boroughs to 50% by 2012 compared to 45% today.

Our performance:
Education
We appointed an education manager in September 2006 in partnership with three local education business partnerships. Her key roles include working to engage other Heathrow companies in local education programmes and developing a pack on airport careers that will help to raise awareness of the range of jobs available at Heathrow.

ACTA, the Airport Construction Training Alliance, also developed an e-mentoring programme with Hillingdon and Hounslow education business partnerships.

Employment
BAA Heathrow supports two projects that help local unemployed residents to access airport employment:

• Routes to work, managed by the Heathrow City Partnership with financial support from the London Development Agency and BAA, provides customised training for people who want to work in retail at the airport or elsewhere. The Red Bus – a double-decker operated by BAA and its partners that forms an important part of Routes to Work – was on the road again this year, visiting areas of high unemployment to recruit retail staff
• The T5 Workplace Co-ordinator project links local residents to jobs created by the construction of Terminal 5. The co-ordinator works with a range of local charities, jobcentres and other agencies to identify potential candidates, prepare them for employment and support them once in work
• Together, these projects helped 154 people into work at Heathrow over the course of 2006/07.

Training
BAA Heathrow’s training programmes enjoyed a highly successful year. As well as the engineering advanced apprenticeship we provide for our own staff, we are increasingly managing nationally-accredited training programmes for other airport companies and their staff. In 2005, we launched an apprenticeship programme for Heathrow’s retail community, offering a range of qualifications for young people. This year, we secured a Train to Gain contract from the Learning and Skills Council to deliver National Vocational Qualifications to other airport staff. We also successfully secured our status as a Centre of Vocational Excellence in January 2007.

Across all our training programmes, we signed up 276 learners in the course of 2006/07, with 77 completing their courses by the end of March. We also supported the Heathrow Construction Training Centre, operated by Carillion, which provides construction apprenticeships in a range of trades. The Centre took on 21 apprentices in 2006/07, whilst 30 apprentices who had begun their course in earlier years completed the programme.

Business support
We want to provide opportunities to local suppliers to maximise our positive impacts at a local level. As part of this commitment, we have held annual ‘Meet the Buyer’ events since 1996.

‘Meet the Buyers’ helps small and medium businesses around the airport to pitch their products and services directly to the large companies based in and around Heathrow, as well as a range of local authorities and other public organisations. A range of information events and workshops are provided for local companies in the lead up to the event itself. This year a total of 495 companies took part in the 2006 ‘Meet the Buyers’ programme, with early indications suggesting that participating companies will win business worth £4.9 million.

Our plans:
Key priorities for 2007 include:

• Extending the Routes to Work programme into other airport sectors in order to increase the range of jobs available for local residents
• Launching the Phase II Local Labour Strategy that’s overall objective will be to increase the proportion of airport staff who live in the five boroughs to 50% by 2012 compared to 45% today
• Launching the Heathrow: Careers and Economy teacher resource pack
• Increasing the number of airport staff who participate in accredited training programmes
  Implementing the 2007 Economic Development action plan.