Heathrow runway ‘gets go-ahead’ — flashmob this Saturday

A flash­mob action is planned for this com­ing Sat­ur­day:

Min­is­ters have approved a con­tro­ver­sial plan to build a third run­way at Heathrow, the BBC under­stands.

Despite oppo­si­tion from res­i­dents, envi­ron­men­tal cam­paign­ers and many of its own MPs, Labour is set to con­firm the deci­sion offi­cial­ly on Thurs­day.

Lead­ing busi­ness and union fig­ures back the project, say­ing it will cre­ate jobs and boost the UK’s com­pet­i­tive­ness.

But crit­ics have said it will irrepara­bly dam­age the UK’s cre­den­tials on tack­ling cli­mate change.

Labour unease

The gov­ern­ment has long argued, in prin­ci­ple, that it is in favour of the scheme, sub­ject to noise and air pol­lu­tion lim­its, and under­tak­ings about access and traf­fic con­ges­tion.

Along­side the com­mit­ment to a new run­way, Trans­port Sec­re­tary Geoff Hoon is expect­ed to announce increased invest­ment in pub­lic trans­port, includ­ing a new high-speed rail link from the air­port to cen­tral Lon­don.

There has been deep unease with­in Labour ranks about the deci­sion, with sev­er­al cab­i­net mem­bers report­ed to be uncon­vinced about the project and more than 50 MPs open­ly opposed.

In an effort to appease its crit­ics, BBC polit­i­cal cor­re­spon­dent Jo Coburn said the gov­ern­ment would announce new safe­guards for lim­it­ing emis­sions with air­lines using the new run­way required to use the newest, least pol­lut­ing air­craft.

Busi­ness Sec­re­tary Lord Man­del­son defend­ed the gov­ern­men­t’s com­mit­ment to envi­ron­men­tal con­cerns over Heathrow.

He said: “It’s a clas­sic dilem­ma — we want to forge ahead in imple­ment­ing our cli­mate change ambi­tions when oth­ers are not but we don’t want to lose our eco­nom­ic com­pet­i­tive­ness in the process. We want to do both these things.”

But back­bench Labour MP John McDon­nell, whose con­stituen­cy includes the air­port, said the fight against the expan­sion was only just “begin­ning” and oppo­nents would “use every mech­a­nism pos­si­ble” includ­ing legal chal­lenges, to stop the run­way going ahead.

“If the gov­ern­ment is not will­ing to lis­ten to Par­lia­ment or the peo­ple then there is no oth­er option but to mobilise the largest coali­tion of pub­lic oppo­si­tion and protest to halt this dis­as­trous pro­pos­al in its tracks,” he said.

The Con­ser­v­a­tives say a new run­way would be an “envi­ron­men­tal dis­as­ter” and have pledged to reverse the deci­sion should they win the next elec­tion.

Shad­ow trans­port sec­re­tary There­sa Vil­liers said approval of the scheme would show Gor­don Brown was “deaf to the con­cerns of his own par­ty and mil­lions of peo­ple liv­ing under the flight path”.

The Lib­er­al Democ­rats have urged min­is­ters to invest in high-speed rail links instead.

Asked about the deci­sion on Wednes­day, Prime Min­is­ter Gor­don Brown declined to guar­an­tee MPs a vote on the issue.

Should the gov­ern­ment give the go-ahead, he said there would be a debate in Par­lia­ment and that the scheme would have to be grant­ed plan­ning per­mis­sion.

This is like­ly to be a lengthy process, with work on a new run­way unlike to be com­plet­ed before 2019.

Pub­lic protests

Protests have been grow­ing in antic­i­pa­tion of a deci­sion, which was due to be made in Decem­ber but was delayed amid reports of divi­sions with­in gov­ern­ment over the issue.

About 700 homes will have to be demol­ished to make way for the run­way, which will increase the num­ber of flights using Heathrow from about 480,000 a year now to 702,000 by 2030.

Cam­paign­ers have bought some land ear­marked for the con­struc­tion of the run­way in an effort to frus­trate the expan­sion plans.

Envi­ron­men­tal cam­paign­ers say pro­ceed­ing with the new run­way will leave the gov­ern­men­t’s legal com­mit­ment to cut car­bon emis­sions by 80% by 2050 in tat­ters.

“Expand­ing Heathrow would shat­ter the gov­ern­men­t’s inter­na­tion­al rep­u­ta­tion on cli­mate change,” said Andy Atkins, exec­u­tive direc­tor of Friends of the Earth.

“We need bold and urgent action to cre­ate a low-car­bon econ­o­my, not more back­ing for the cli­mate-wreck­ing activ­i­ties of the avi­a­tion indus­try.”

But the gov­ern­ment believes the new run­way will not vio­late its EU com­mit­ments on air and noise pol­lu­tion, point­ing out that new air­craft being built will reduce emis­sions sig­nif­i­cant­ly.

‘At risk’

Sup­port­ers of the run­way say Heathrow is already oper­at­ing at full capac­i­ty and the UK econ­o­my will lose busi­ness to the rest of Europe if it does not go ahead.

They point out that rival air­ports such as Paris, Frank­furt and Ams­ter­dam already have at least four run­ways and that Heathrow is at risk of falling fur­ther behind.

For­mer Labour MP Lord Soley is the cam­paign direc­tor of Future Heathrow, which rep­re­sents groups in favour of expand­ing the air­port.

He told BBC News that Heathrow brought jobs and “pros­per­i­ty” to the sur­round­ing areas and in an “ide­al world” the expan­sion would not be need­ed.

“But the ide­al world does­n’t exist and it isn’t true to say that Heathrow isn’t at risk.

“It is at risk and if it con­tin­ues to decline, then the con­se­quences for west Lon­don and the Thames Val­ley will be very, very seri­ous indeed,” he said.

British Air­ways, the largest air­line at Heathrow, has said expand­ing the air­port is the only “cred­i­ble option”.