PRESS RELEASE: New research published into the economic impacts of COVID-19 on Heathrow.
Today, the Heathrow Community Engagement Board has released new research detailing the economic impact of reduced activity at Heathrow Airport commissioned from Oxford Economics.
Key findings from the report are:
In 2019 (prior to the coronavirus crisis), Heathrow supported an estimated 133,600 jobs across the six local authority areas—of which 76,000 were directly employed at the airport itself—amounting to nearly a quarter of gross value added (GVA) generated across the study area economy. Almost 60,000 residents of the study area were employed as a result of Heathrow, amounting to around 10% of resident employment.
As the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme has so far managed to protect against mass unemployment this year, the loss of employment associated with the airport is expected to peak in 2021. In the central scenario, this amounts to 37,000 fewer jobs than prior to the crisis, and 16,000 fewer residents employed.
The upside scenario anticipates a similar magnitude of impact through 2020 and 2021, before recovering thereafter. Both the central and upside scenarios see activity recovering to pre-crisis levels by 2023. However, the downside scenario reflects a deepening of the crisis, amounting to a loss of almost half of all Heathrow-related employment (62,900 jobs) by 2021, with a prolonged recovery extending beyond the study timeframe.
The study also considered the characteristics of workers most vulnerable to a loss of employment associated with Heathrow. The majority of job losses are expected to occur in the transportation & storage sector, which tends to support a high proportion of male, older, full- time and less well-qualified workers. Evidence on the characteristics of the on-airport workforce indicate that many tend to support economic dependents such as children, are in households that derive more than one source of income working at the airport, and have been employed at the airport for a considerable time, which may affect their abilities to find alternative work.
Rachel Cerfontyne, Chair of the HCEB, said: “This report reveals the stark reality facing the aviation sector and those who rely on it for their employment. With over 133,600 jobs dependent on Heathrow alone, a strong and coordinated recovery plan is needed to prevent large scale unemployment in the surrounding area. This is about much more than planes and holidays, it is about people’s livelihoods, the local economy and survival of local businesses”.
For background information on this research and about Oxford Economics, please click here: https://www.hceb.org.uk/blog/2020/7/31/hceb-commission-economic-impact-research-with-oxford-economics