EXPANSION of Stansted was thrown into doubt today (Wednesday August 20) after the Competition Commission said that owner BAA may have to sell three of its seven airports - including the Essex hub.
The watchdog is recommending that the company should have to flog two of its three London airports - Heathrow, Gatwick and Stansted - and either Glasgow or Edinburgh in Scotland to foster competition and a better service for airlines and passengers.
BAA described the regulator's verdict as "flawed" and said that the forced sale of airports would be "counter-productive".
Chief executive Colin Matthews said: "The commission's findings state that the lack of runway capacity is a main reason for what it calls the current poor standards of service and the lack of resilience at times of disruption, which results in regular delays.
"By calling not just for a fundamental restructure of BAA but also for a review of the Government's Air Transport White Paper, the commission risks delaying that delivery of new runways and making better customer service less, not more, likely.
"We will be seeking urgent clarification from the Government of how it believes this report's findings can be reconciled with the air transport policy it established in 2003 and its current review of economic regulation."
He declined to comment on the future for individual airports but said that it had "no intention" of selling Heathrow, its largest airport.
The commission will now consult on its recommendation and make a final decision next April, which is also the month when a public inquiry is due to start into BAA's plans for a second runway at Stansted.
Publishing the preliminary findings of its inquiry into BAA's control of the UK's largest airports, the commission said the current ownership structure was having "adverse consequences" for passengers and airlines.
BAA has been fiercely criticised for poor customer service and delays at its airports, particularly Heathrow.
The commission said many of the problems of recent years were due to the "common ownership" of Heathrow, Gatwick and Stansted, which account for nearly 90 per cent of London departures and arrivals.
"BAA has argued that there is no scope for competition to develop so long as there are capacity constraints," said Christopher Clarke, who headed the inquiry.
"We take the opposite view. Unless the market is opened up to competition, there is a serious risk that the current capacity constraints will persist."
The commission said that BAA was likely to be allowed to keep control of Southampton and Aberdeen airports, its two smallest airports, because they did not present competition concerns.
Mr Matthews said that he accepted the report's concerns about "poor service" and "frustration" for passengers, but added that the break-up of BAA was not a quick fix to the problems.
"We note, however, that this is not the end of the Competition Commission process and we will continue to point out to the commission the many areas where we believe its analysis is flawed and its remedies would be disproportionate and counter-productive.
"Just as the Government is about to make the decisions that could lead to the first full-length runways being built in the South East since the Second World War, the commission risks creating uncertainty, delay and confusion at exactly the wrong time."