Four Liberal Democrats and two Tory MPs have written to Heidi Alexander to pre-emptively complain about Reeves’ plans to expand Gatwick, Heathrow, and Luton aeroports. It’s the usual NIMBY guff:
“Life is blighted every single day by the noise of take-offs and landings at Gatwick Airport… We urge you to delay your decision on the Northern Runway Project until proper monitoring infrastructure is in place and the true impact of noise on the lives of our constituents is properly understood.”
The two Tories are local MPs Tom Tugendhat and Andrew Griffith – the latter being the Shadow Business and Trade Sectretary. The first sign of Tory opposition to Reeves’ plans, with the party’s overall position unclear…
Reeves is supported by a collection of Labour MPs known as the Labour Growth Group and opposed by three major Labour figures – Miliband, Khan, and Burnham. That said – Miliband has insisted he would not resign over the issue this time while Khan rolled back on his “legal challenge” rhetoric when it comes to Heathrow, so the picture is confused…
The net zero-obsessed Climate Change Committee says there can be no more added capacity while Downing Street’s line remains that any expansion has to “contribute to economic growth” while upholding “existing environmental obligations.” That one won’t hold…
The Chancellor has an event penned in for next Wednesday in Oxford where she is due to make an announcement relating to the Oxford-Cambridge Arc. These rifts will deepen Guido hears the aeroport expansions are also firmly on the docket…
UPDATE: Andrew Griffith tells Guido he is “‘all in’ on airport expansion” but “no global competitor divvys up capacity between three sub-scale aerodromes. That’s the old growth sapping politics of compromise. As I have long said, if we seriously want a global-growth hub, the answer is a massive and long overdue expansion of Heathrow.” Do it, just not in my etc etc…
Read the full NIMBY letter below:
“We are writing to you as the elected representatives of the countless towns and villages in Kent, Surrey and Sussex where life is blighted every single day by the noise of take-offs and landings at Gatwick Airport.
We wish to draw your attention to the lack of proper independent noise monitoring around the airport, which we feel makes it impossible for the Department to make an informed decision about further expansion. We urge you to delay your decision on the Northern Runway Project until proper monitoring infrastructure is in place and the true impact of noise on the lives of our constituents is properly understood.
It is clear that aircraft noise isn’t being comprehensively or accurately monitored. In most of our constituencies there is only one active noise monitor and in some there is no noise monitoring at all. This is even though Gatwick Airport has a statutory obligation to monitor noise and report aircraft in breach of airspace noise restrictions.
Furthermore, all these monitors are privately operated by Gatwick itself, with limited independent oversight. The airport is marking its own homework – there is no transparency on how data is being collected or how the locations for these monitors have been determined. Additionally, should the Government push ahead with its airspace modernisation plans flight paths will be altered, and many of these devices will become redundant.
The World Health Organization’s guidelines, upon which the Civil Aviation Authority’s noise policy is based, considers overall continued volume of noise, which exceeds 55 LAeq during daytime, to be a serious annoyance, and 45 LAeq during night, to be a serious disturbance to sleep.
However, Gatwick’s implementation of noise contours, which records the overall continued volume of noise produced by aircraft in the areas under their arrival and departure routes, only extends as far as Helen’s Castle and Ellen’s Green at either side of the runway.
The little monitoring which is taking place paints a worrying picture. A noise monitor located over 17 miles away from the runway in Rusthall, Tunbridge Wells recorded aircraft noise in excess of 60 decibels over 500 times in November and over 1500 times during each of the summer months last year.
The Government must decide by the end of February whether to approve an expansion proposal, which would bring Gatwick’s Northern Runway into use. If this proposal goes ahead, Gatwick would more than double in size – with passenger numbers increasing to over 80 million per year. Gatwick would continue to serve short haul routes; but significantly expand its long-haul capacity – effectively becoming a second Heathrow.
Our communities already suffer from Gatwick’s business model – which places an emphasis on short- haul low-cost carriers that arrive late at night and depart early in the morning. In summer, Heathrow permits only 3,250 movements per month at night whereas Gatwick allows over 11,200.
Opening the Northern Runway will only mean higher volumes of long-haul traffic, worsening the effects of noise on the health of our communities. However, the absence of noise monitoring devices means there is no reasonable evidence to support any assessment of the expansion’s impact on noise pollution.
We therefore urge you to delay the decision-making process on the proposal to bring the Northern Runway into use at Gatwick Airport until independently controlled noise monitoring has been established across the whole flight path and in all affected towns and villages. The Department should then wait for at least a full year’s worth of data to be available before making a decision. Yours sincerely,
Mike Martin MP – Member of Parliament for Tunbridge Wells
Chris Coghlan MP – Member of Parliament for Dorking and Horley
Alison Bennett MP – Member of Parliament for Mid Sussex
Tom Tugendhat MP – Member of Parliament for Tonbridge
John Milne MP -Member of Parliament for Horsham
Andrew Griffith MP – Member of Parliament for Arundel and South Downs”
Paula Barker, Liverpool Wavertree MP backing Andy Burnham, told Times Radio there wouldn’t be trouble from the markets under Burnham:
“The markets will have to fall in line.”