PART IINTRODUCTORY

Interpretation

2.—(1) Subject to paragraph (4), the Interpretation Act (Northern Ireland) 1954(1) shall apply to Article 1 and the following provisions of this Order as it applies to a Measure of the Northern Ireland Assembly.

(2) In this Order—

“the 1982 Act” means the Civil Aviation Act 1982(2);

“airport” means any area of land or water designed, equipped, set apart or commonly used for affording facilities for the landing and departure of aircraft and services and facilities for use in connection with the landing and departure of aircraft and includes any area or space, whether on the ground, on the roof of a building or elsewhere, which is designed, equipped or set apart for affording facilities for the landing and departure of aircraft capable of descending or climbing vertically;

“airport operator” means the person for the time being having the management of an airport, or, in relation to a particular airport, the management of that airport;

“the CAA” means the Civil Aviation Authority;

“the Companies Order” means the Companies (Northern Ireland) Order 1986(3);

“the Department” means the Department of the Environment;

“licensed airport” means an airport licensed under an Order in Council under section 60 of the 1982 Act (Air Navigation Orders);

“modifications” includes additions, omissions and amendments;

“operator”, in relation to an aircraft, means the person for the time being having the management of the aircraft;

“regulated airport” means an airport in respect of which—

(a)

a permission to levy airport charges is in force under Part IV; or

(b)

there subsists a pending application for such a permission made in accordance with Article 29;

“statutory provision” has the meaning assigned to it by section 1(f) of the Interpretation Act (Northern Ireland) 1954(4);

“subsidiary” has the meaning assigned to it by Article 4 of the Companies Order.

(3) For the purposes of this Order, a hovercraft within the meaning of the Hovercraft Act 1968(5) is not an aircraft.

(4) For the purposes of this Order, section 20(2) of the Interpretation Act (Northern Ireland) 1954 applies with the omission of the words “the liability of whose members is limited” and, where the affairs of a body corporate are managed by its members, applies in relation to the acts and defaults of a member in connection with his functions of management as if he were a director of the body corporate.