Wandsworth Council Back In Court Over Heathrow
Challenging expansion by outlining 'vital flaws' in the Government's decision
Local authorities committed to protecting their residents from the damaging effects of Heathrow expansion will go to the Court of Appeal today (17th October) to outline vital flaws in the Government’s decision to give the go ahead to a third runway at the West London airport.
The councils – Wandsworth, Richmond upon Thames, Hillingdon, Hammersmith & Fulham and Windsor and Maidenhead – will say that that the Government failed to properly consider the full impact of expansion on noise, health and the environment and that the Airports National Policy Statement should therefore be quashed.
The boroughs are joined in the appeal by the Mayor of London and Greenpeace.
Lawyers for the group will spell out how the Government’s deliberate failure to identify the whole area that could be affected by noise from a hugely expanded Heathrow fatally undermined the decision to go ahead.
Ministers consulted on a single set of speculative flightpaths. The councils say that if it was not possible to identify actual flightpaths – as the Government and the airport claimed– they should have identified all the areas where flightpaths might be located. Papers disclosed in the case show the Government was worried that if it did reveal the true extent of the risk then support for Heathrow expansion would be lost.
The Government also failed to apply its own policy on noise limits. In June 2018 it had decided that the threshold should be 51 units of noise measurement. But in deciding if Heathrow should go ahead it applied a higher threshold of 54.
This change had the effect of dramatically reducing the numbers assessed to be disturbed by noise – thus again concealing the size of the population likely to be affected and minimising the number of people alerted to the threat of intolerable noise.
The councils will say that the Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) which is the process by which detailed environmental considerations are built into plans was also defective in failing to consider how the Airports National Policy Statement (ANPS) backing expansion at Heathrow related to all relevant local plans - including the Hillingdon Local Plan and the Mayor’s London Carbon Plan.
They will also argue that the Secretary of State was wrong to reject Gatwick as an alternative to Heathrow on the grounds that expansion at this location might threaten a species of orchid.
Cllr Ravi Govindia, Leader of Wandsworth Council, pictured above said,“The third runway will have devastating consequences for the health of Londoners. It is also becoming clearer by the day that expansion will play havoc with the Government’s zero carbon targets.
“The latest advice to the Government from the Climate Change Committee, which includes reduced assumptions on aviation growth, makes it clear that current planned additional capacity in London, including the third runway, is likely to leave at most very limited room for growth at regional airports.
“Heathrow’s insatiable desire for growth is bad news for airports everywhere else in the country – and bad news for people wanting to fly from their local airport. The Government should be ordered to tear up its ANPS and start again taking account of what we now know about climate change impacts and the effects of tougher zero carbon targets on the rest of the UK.”
Cllr Steve Cowan, Leader of Hammersmith & Fulham Council, pictured above, said: “The Government has chosen to deliberately ignore the huge environmental damage Heathrow’s proposed third runway will cause. Meanwhile, its own figures demonstrate Britain will gain a negligible return on the £18billion of taxpayers’ money the government is proposing to throw at this scheme. There’s plenty of greener, better initiatives that such huge sums could be spent on which would produce the economic growth our country needs.”
The Court of Appeal will begin hearing the appeals from the councils and other groups on 17 October. The hearings are expected to conclude on 23 October.
Wandsworth councillors are united in opposing the expansion of Heathrow, and Wandsworth council is one of the Local Authorities taking the legal action and Cllr Paul Ellis and Cllr Fleur Anderson attended the Solidarity Rally, organised by the No 3rd Runway Coalition outside the Royal Courts of Justice this morning.
Protest at the High Court with Cllr Steven Cowan, Leader of Hammersmith and Fulham Council, Ruth Cadbury MP, Cllr Fleur Anderson
Cllr Fleur Anderson, who is Labour Parliamentary candidate for Putney, said ‘I fully support this legal action and hope it will be successful. The tide is turning, and opposition to the third runway is growing. We’ve had enough of the noise already and this increase will be intolerable. The plan will have a devastating impact on South West London – it will double the number of flights, increase the airport by 950 acres (larger than other whole airports) and be the biggest car park in Europe with car parking spaces for 55,000 cars. The court has not fully taken into account the impact on noise, air pollution and children’s health and I hope will do so now.
‘Prime Minister Boris Johnson has backtracked on his opposition to Heathrow and promise to lie down in front of the bulldozers, but there are plenty of politicians, NGOs and residents ready to keep protesting for as long as it takes.’
The action comes a week after Willie Walsh, Chief Executive of British Airways owner IAG, which operates half of Heathrow flights, said that he does not believe that the third runway will be built because of the spiralling cost of the expansion and the environmental impact.
October 17, 2019