It has been a big week for Scottish airports.

Last Monday, Prestwick Airport revealed that it had made a fifth consecutive annual profit.

This is particularly notable, given there has been no shortage of critics lining up to carp about the Scottish Government’s 2013 rescue of the airport and subsequent advancing of £43.4 million of loans.

The detractors might not want to hear this, but this looks like a good call indeed by the Scottish Government given the airport employs hundreds of people directly and supports thousands of jobs indirectly.

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Crucially, its continued operation is crucial to the large aerospace cluster which has grown up around the airport.

And now Prestwick Airport has delivered five consecutive years of profit.

Hopefully, given all this, some of the airport’s detractors might rethink their criticism of the Scottish Government for rescuing what is clearly a very important strategic asset.

Sadly, given much of this criticism is tied up in political and related ideology, we should not hold our breath waiting for people to put their hands up and say there were wrong.

The airport, known officially as Glasgow Prestwick Airport, last Monday announced a £3.2m operating profit for the year to March 31.

It described this as “a significant achievement that reflects the strength and resilience” of its “diverse business model”.

Last November, the airport announced an operating profit of £2.1m for the 12 months to March 31,2023, up from £1.9m in the previous financial year.

The airport is to be congratulated on its resilience, especially given the slings and arrows which have come its way over the years as a result of criticism of the Scottish Government’s rescue and financing decisions.

Such bellyaching has seemed to overlook entirely the importance of the employment supported by the airport. And it has also tended to ignore the major economic contribution of Prestwick Airport.

As noted in my column in The Herald last Wednesday, Prestwick Airport’s passenger operation is “a shadow of its former self” and “it is clearly decades since the heyday of Prestwick Airport, previously Scotland’s hub for transatlantic flights”.

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That makes the now quite lengthy period of continuous profitability all the more impressive, surely.

Prestwick Airport’s management has had to be innovative.

The airport highlighted good progress on cargo operations, including a strategic partnership with Royal Mail which aims to attract e-commerce cargo flights to Prestwick.

And its relationship with budget airline Ryanair looks to be delivering well for both parties at the moment.

As noted in my column: “In this regard, it has been encouraging to see Ryanair establish an aircraft maintenance, repair and overhaul facility, employing in excess of 600 people, at Prestwick Airport.”

The column concluded: “It is always uplifting to watch the many cargo planes, some of them huge, as well as the Ryanair flights taking off from and landing at Prestwick Airport. There are also a fair number of military flights serviced by the airport.

“And there is no doubting the scale of the aerospace cluster around the airport, and its importance to the local economy and to Scotland…The airport that some detractors wanted to see abandoned when it hit tough times, and which has a right to feel aggrieved at being used as a political football by some, is harnessing its huge potential as it looks to the future.”

We should all be glad that this potential is being realised, and you would imagine there is much more for which to aim, whether the airport remains under Scottish Government control or finds itself in the hands of a private-sector owner again.

There is much to celebrate in what has been achieved by Prestwick Airport, in often difficult circumstances.

Last week also saw the announcement of the sale of Glasgow and Aberdeen airports owner AGS, which is being acquired by one of Canada’s largest pension investors for an enterprise value of £1.53 billion. AGS also owns Southampton Airport.

My column on this blockbuster deal, in The Herald on Friday, observed: “Acquirer AviAlliance, the wholly owned airports platform of the Public Sector Pension Investment Board (PSP Investments), was certainly making all the right noises as it announced its purchase of AGS Airports, which also owns Southampton Airport, from Ferrovial of Spain and Macquarie of Australia.”

The column noted the enthusiasm of AviAlliance, as it set out its vision for Glasgow, Aberdeen and Southampton airports, was strikingly similar to that expressed by seasoned French operator VINCI when it announced its purchase of a 50.01% stake in Edinburgh Airport from Global Infrastructure Partners earlier this year.

Among the priorities highlighted by AviAlliance were expansion of the airports’ route networks and further improving the “passenger experience”, as well as investment.

Scotland’s airports have bounced back impressively from the nightmare of the coronavirus pandemic.

They have a good platform on which to build.

It would be difficult to overstate the importance of further building of connectivity, through new routes and services and increased flight frequencies, to leisure and business passengers and local economies.

Hopefully from a Scottish perspective, AviAlliance will enable a tailwind for Glasgow and Aberdeen airports on this front when it moves into the cockpit, and VINCI at Edinburgh will build further on the very impressive growth seen at that airport in recent years.

And, who knows, maybe we might even hear even less carping over Prestwick Airport as it hopefully continues to deliver good progress.