Airport ‘has a heart’ says Cowan

MANCHESTER Airport strategy chief Andrew Cowan says the company’s role as a driver of economic growth is compatible with its desire to fulfil its social corporate responsibilities across the region.

As well as assuming the role of chief strategy officer of Manchester Airports Group, which also includes Stansted, East Midlands and Bournemouth airports, Cowan is also current chair of the advisory group for Business In The Community.

And he is comfortable with the notion that MAG was justified in pushing ahead with the £800m Airport City development in the face of inevitable opposition from the environmental lobby.

“We have symbiotic relationship with the whole region as an airport,” said the 48-year-old native of Morecambe in Lancashire.

“If you work on that premise you need to take into consideration the social economic and employment perspective.

“Of course it’s important to take people’s views into account, but you can’t get away from the fact that developments like the that (Airport City) will create tens of thousands of jobs, connectivity across the region and inward investment.

“My role at BITC is an extension of the one I had when I was chief operating officer for MAG, before I took up the strategy position.

“All the things we are doing are trying to improve the deprived communities. In the North West we’ve probably got more than half of 1% of the most deprived areas in the UK.

“We’ve got to focus our efforts on where the greatest need is. I believe the way you improve people’s lives is by creating employment.

“We’ve now got people doing voluntary work in the community, projects to give people aspiration and reason,  where they end up inspiring and motivating people.”

Cowan was speaking as MAG achieved its highest ever score of 97% in the BITC Annual Index, earning an outstanding four-star rating for its commitment to acting responsibly to its employees, neighbours, customers and suppliers.

The independent BITC Index is a rigorous process which assesses hundreds of companies against a diverse range of factors, from how engaged board and senior management are with responsible business issues and the link between remuneration and CSR performance.

Meanwhile, Cowan is continuing to keep a keen eye on the long term expansion of MAG.

“We are now carrying 48 million passengers a year as a group, our highest ever number and we are growing by a million a year,” he said.

“On the Manchester site we employ 20,000 people. Per million passengers we carry, it equates to 1,000 workers.

“If we grow by a million passengers a year, it equates to 1,000 extra people working here a year.

“We are focused on expanding as airport, investing in our airfields, increasing our car parking capacity and our route network.
 
“We are flying to 200 destinations in 80 countries and that continues to grow, having just added Hong Kong route of Cathay Pacific, we’ve got long hauls into America and put a second A380 into Dubai.
 
“There is no need for passengers to travel to London for long haul flights, with 15 flights a day going to the US and 12 into the Middle East.”