Looking back over the year since we last reported on our collective and ongoing work to be a more responsible business, I am really pleased at the progress we have made. I said then that it’s our people who will always make the biggest difference, and employee power has made the past year into one of real achievement.
We have featured as one of Europe’s Climate Leaders in the annual Financial Times & Statista listing since it was set up four years ago. This year we were their top ranked company out of some 400 surveyed, which is an astounding accomplishment.
The ‘A’ rating we have been awarded by CDP for our environmental stewardship puts us in the top 2% of companies globally for leadership in corporate transparency and performance on climate change. In a world where such progress is fraught with challenge, I’m very proud of the leadership we are showing.
In pursuit of our environmental goals, we are now close to completing major solar installations at our air traffic control centres, which we expect to contribute up to 21% of their energy requirements. We continue to support the UK industry’s moves towards sustainable aviation fuels; and to work with Europe’s SESAR programme exploring solutions to wider industry challenges including non-CO2 issues such as contrails.
Focus on our people including the next generation has never been higher, with our ED&I programme making strong progress, the Early Careers team winning the Best Onboarding Experience at the National Graduate Recruitment Awards, and the launch of our Future Minds programme for young people.
Listening to what motivates our employees, and their desire for us individually and collectively to ‘give something back’ to the communities we work within, we have bolstered our charitable funding for local causes, and we have further developments in the pipeline.
The past year has delivered traffic levels now very close to those before the pandemic, but the impact of climate change, and the disruptive weather patterns associated with it, is very different from what it was just five short years ago. As a result, we have not been able to maintain our score on the flight efficiency measure in our regulatory framework, which highlights above all, the need to collaborate more widely across our industry as traffic continues to increase to balance capacity with flight efficiency.
Speed is of the essence in our modern world and aviation will continue to be critical to global trade and connectivity. The ongoing challenge for the aviation industry is how to fly smarter, reduce emissions and increase efficiency and resilience, and we will continue to play a leading role in delivering on those commitments.
