Air passenger movements will grow by 4 per cent a year to 227.9million by 2025-26, according to a report released yesterday by federal Infrastructure Minister Anthony Albanese.

Last year, the number of international passengers alone arriving and departing from Australian airports rose by 6 per cent to almost 22.8 million - the highest number carried in a single calendar year.

Mr Albanese said the largest forecast growth was expected in Perth, likely to reach 17.7 million passengers by 2025-26 - an indication of Western Australia's resources boom and the shift of workers to the employment-hungry state.

The report, entitled Air Passenger Movements Through Capital City Airports to 2025-26, says the growth prediction is based largely on a positive economic outlook for Australia and its trading partners. Mr Albanese said the report's long-term predictions posed a fundamental question for government and the aviation industry to increase their capacity.

"Already many of our major airports are operating at close to capacity during peak times; pilots, engineers and air-traffic controllers are in short supply; flight delays and cancellations are becoming more frequent; and planes account for at least 2 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions," he said.

Mr Albanese said the report emphasised the need for a national aviation policy, which the Government had already committed to. "More than ever, there is a need for national leadership and a national strategy for aviation, one which looks to the long term, and closely links the development of aviation to the economic development of the nation," he said.

A second major airport for Sydney will be considered as part of a historic review of the nation's aviation sector, a proposal that has been promised by federal governments - Labor and Coalition - for more than 30 years, but has been regularly defeated by opposition from the affected communities.

Mr Albanese has released a discussion paper ahead of a green paper in September. A white paper, setting out a two-decade plan for aviation, will be available in the middle of next year.

Mr Albanese said he believed there had been no strategic plan looking at the industry, "the way that it related to economic development, the way that it related to the communities involved around our airports".

"This is the legacy inherited by the Rudd Labor Government, the product of the previous government's indifference towards the aviation industry and its importance to Australia's economic development within the era of globalisation," he said.

by Patricia Karvelas, Political correspondent | The Australian

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