Transport disruption caused by snow and ice chaos during the winter cost the UK economy around £280 million a day, transport secretary Philip Hammond has disclosed.
Heathrow failed to adequately manage the extreme weather between December 18 and 21 that almost brought the airport to a halt, he told the House of Commons Transport Committee.
The ability to introduce special timetables for aircraft during severe weather is essential, Hammond told MPs.
“This would avoid the unacceptable spectacle of passengers turning up for flights that were never going to happen and being held in substandard conditions in [Heathrow] terminals,” he added. But he conceded that “there will always [airport] disruption if we get 6in or 8in of snow”.
The bad weather had caused problems with the third rail carrying electricity to trains on railways in southern England.
While the network generally operated “quite well given the extreme conditions”, Hammond added: “The lack of communication was one of the key complaints that passengers had.”
The Met Office forecasting during the bad weather had been “broadly reflective” of what had occurred, he added.
Hammond said he had published a report by the Government’s chief scientific adviser Sir John Beddington which said that winters in the future were likely to be milder and wetter.
“This does not mean that there will not be severe weather events in the future,” he said.