From last week (May 23rd) France banned internal flights within the country where there is an alternative by train of less than two and a half hours. The idea for the ban originally came from a “Citizens' Assembly”” held in 2019 and the law will mainly affect flights from Paris Orly to the cities of Bordeaux, Lyon and Nantes, all well-served by trains.
The regulation also specifies that train services on the same route must be frequent, timely and well-connected enough to meet the needs of those who currently travel by air. The train route must also be able to absorb the increase in passenger numbers, which all sounds very sensible. People should be able to make the round trip in a single day, having spent at least 8 hours at their destination.
There will also be controls on the use of private jets for short journeys. Transport minister Clément Beaune said the country could no longer tolerate the super-rich using private planes while the general non super-rich public are having to make some sacrifices to support the net zero agenda.
Will other government’s follow the lead of France? Critics will no doubt say it is restricting free enterprise and limiting personal consumer choice, and there was understandably considerable pushback from airlines when France announced the move two years ago. The country also had to get the approval of the European Union. That was achieved: a European Air Services Regulation article states that a member state may, "where there are serious environmental problems … limit or refuse the exercise of traffic rights, in particular where other modes of transport provide a satisfactory service”.
Greenpeace was cautiously positive. Sarah Fayolle, the campaigning organisation’s campaign manager in France said there were both positive and negative aspects to the new regulations. Only three routes are affected – “it’s going in the right direction, but the initial measure is not very ambitious. We must go even further”.
Whilst I can understand the Greenpeace comment, this move by France is pretty ground-breaking really. It is one of the few examples where a government has taken a direct legislative step that will without a doubt reduce emissions – and is also unpopular with quite a high proportion of the voting public. So other governments including our leaders in the UK are unlikely to follow quickly. But eventually this sort of measure will be necessary if leaders (and their citizens) are serious about emissions.
And given the state of train services in the UK, that 2.5 hour rule wouldn’t rule out much! Sheffield to Manchester or any other trans-Pennine service? That can take days, never mind a couple of hours. And there is also a question of the cost of rail travel in the UK. I remember a few years ago, a friend of mine was doing pretty much a weekly 2 or 3 day round trip from Manchester to London to do a government procurement director role. And he was flying. I took him to task for this as we had a beer one evening, so he showed me the pricing options he faced. The West Coast Rail ticket was literally three times the cost of the air fare. The time taken wasn’t really an issue – by the time he got into London from Heathrow, plane versus train was pretty similar. But as it was taxpayer’s money he was spending, he didn’t feel he could “justify” the train. Crazy.
When it comes to private jets, it is not clear yet exactly what France will do. The government says it is not a question of a total ban, so it looks like heavy taxation and perhaps some restrictions are the most likely measures. Firms that use such planes could also be forced to publish details on their use of corporate aircraft. Paris / London is the most popular route for private planes in Europe, incidentally, and France now wants more discussion of these issues at European level.
We might assume that there will be pushback from the owners of private jets, and as many of them no doubt are also donors to political parties, that might prove to be an interesting debate! But the trend for more legislation to drive emissions reduction is likely to continue in this and other sectors.