It was the consumer rights champion Martin Lewis who first raised the idea that, if government wanted to find a way to connect with its citizens and improve the everyday life of the nation, it had to sweat the small stuff. So forget about global insecurity, climate change and macroeconomics for a minute and “find a hundred small things that piss people off” and fix them “in a way that people can see they’re fixed”.
He has developed his approach since, urging ministers to turn everyday frustrations into actionable policy with a movement called the Small Ideas Initiative, and his populist message has been embraced enthusiastically by Andy Burnham. “Every single unexpected payment, rip-off or hidden catch chips away at hope,” said the Prime Minister when he came into power in the summer. “That might sound dramatic – but it’s true. Every single one is another message that this country is built to catch people out rather than help them get on.”
So far, we have had the removal of VAT on electricity bills and the capping of bus fares, and a pledge from Burnham to address the issues to “make life easier and fairer over the long term”. It’s hard to argue that governing an inch at a time is a potential vote-winner. No one (apart from me, perhaps) wakes up in the morning worrying about the iniquities of our electoral system, but booking fees, subscription traps, bogus discounts, mandatory service charges – to name a few easily identifiable rip-offs – are the everyday features of modern life that, in Lewis’s words, piss us all off.
The matter of drop-off charges at airports is particularly interesting in this context. It is a small, hardly even significant, example of an everyday irritation. It may only impinge on our consciousness and our domestic budget, once or twice a year; it’s a relatively minor cost (maybe £7) and it’s entirely elective (it’s our own decision to take a flight, and there are other ways of getting to an airport). In no way can it be considered an egregious injustice.
Yet it has a totemic value for one important reason: we are being asked to pay for something that used to be free. And we instinctively know it’s a way in which big businesses (in this case, the private companies which own our airports) are exploiting the everyday consumer to generate revenue. This is evident in the relentless inflation of the charges themselves – at Gatwick and Stansted, prices for stopping for a few minutes outside the terminal have risen by 43 per cent, from £7 to £10, in the past year alone.
Such is the extent of bad feeling about the drop-off rip-off that the Department for Transport has just announced a year-long review of airport drop-off charges, saying it was “vital to ensure travel remains accessible and that passengers are treated fairly”. According to the RAC, none of the 10 busiest airports in the European Union charge for drop-offs, and while UK airports say that these so-called “kiss and fly” fees are a way of encouraging people to use more environmentally friendly modes of transport and to cut congestion at terminals, I think we know what the real story is.
Karen Dee, chief executive of the trade body AirportsUK, inadvertently gave the game away when, in defending the charges, she said that “money raised through premium services form a part of the airport business model”. So there we have it. Dropping off someone and their luggage outside an airport is now considered a “premium service”.
This assertion goes right to the heart of the issue. Last year, the owners of Heathrow Airport, for example, made £575m in pre-tax profits and distributed £550m to its shareholders. Now, we know how capitalism works, and Heathrow, in my experience, is an airport that, by and large, operates efficiently. But the fact that its business model is now dependent on passengers paying for something that was free of charge until five years ago is, unsurprisingly, a source of public resentment. The total annual revenue for British airports from drop-off charges is estimated to be £300m.
Doing something about airport drop-off charges is not on its own going to win Burnham the next election. But he is definitely on the right track to tackle the petty impositions that we Britons might consider a tax on living. So how about the Government turning its attention to, for instance, parking at hospitals, booking fees for concerts, and paying to use public conveniences? And my particular bugbear: putting air in our car tyres. Since when did fresh air come with a cost? Lewis is right: there are probably 100 things in daily life that piss us off, and the Government can make itself popular by tackling them, one at a time.