Sydney Airport Corporation Limited changes course: Company expresses new interest in Badgerys Creek

THEY argued for years that Sydney doesn’t need Badgerys, but now ­Sydney Airport Corporation could snap up the rights to build it.

THEY have argued for years that Sydney doesn’t need Badgerys Creek, but now ­Sydney Airport Corporation Limited could snap up the rights to build and run it.

With the Federal Government giving the multi-billion-dollar project the green light, Sydney Airport Corporation Limited yesterday changed its tune on Badgerys.

Speaking at the Sydney ­Airport AGM yesterday, chairman Max Moore-Wilton suggested the contract to build and run Badgerys was too valuable an opportunity to pass up.

Mr Moore-Wilton said Sydney Airport would engage with the government on a “constructive and commercial basis” on planning for the new airport and pointed out that his company had “first right of refusal” to operate a second airport in Sydney.

“It’s a very valuable right,” Mr Moore-Wilton said.

Sydney Airport had a ­responsibility to its shareholders “to see how we can work with the Federal Government on developing a sound business” plan to develop and operate the new airport.

The Sydney Airport owners obtained the right of first refusal when the airport was sold by the Howard Government for $5.4 billion in 2002 to a Macquarie Bank-led consortium.

Before Prime Minister Tony Abbott confirmed the government’s plans to start construction on the second airport in 2016, Sydney Airport was never an active supporter of the project.

It has argued that a ­second airport would not be ­required in Sydney for another three decades.

“Sydney airport is not full,” it said in a previous statement.

“Without any change to runways, curfew or cap, Sydney and NSW will not require a secondary airport before 2045.’’

Sydney Airport chief executive Kerrie Mather declined to provide any view yesterday on what the new airport could look like — and the airlines it could service.

Ms Mather said it was “too early to say” and that it was up to the government to decide on the “nature and scope” of the new airport, due to open in the mid-2020s.

“Putting a new airport into an existing network is a complex task,” said Ms Mather.

She added that the government would need to undertake detailed studies and planning on Badgerys Creek.

“We have long supported the selection of a site at ­Badgerys Creek,’’ she said.

Shareholders at the Sydney Airport meeting, however, were not so enthusiastic.

“Every time I read about it I get the shivers,” one shareholder said.