Crispin Blunt comments on Gatwick Airport Ltd leafleting households around Gatwick about supposed ‘benefits’ for local residents of Gatwick expansion:
“First of all, Gatwick should not be campaigning during the election period. Now is the time for parliamentary candidates to be putting their case to the electorate, without interference from Gatwick.
“Genuine engagement by Gatwick with local communities would be welcome, yet last year we saw the airport supposedly consulting on their runway options at the same time they were actually making their final submission to the Airport Commission.
“Gatwick’s priority should be to sort out the implementation of the concentrated (PRNAV) departure flight paths, which are causing an explosion of complaints from residents newly affected by noise.
“I completely reject Gatwick’s assertion: ‘A second runway at Gatwick isn’t just the best option for Britain; we truly believe it’s the best option for our local area too’.
“The Airport Commission has already estimated the additional benefit to the economy of expanding Heathrow rather than Gatwick at around £100 billion and Heathrow would create four times the jobs spread across the UK. This is a significantly better option for Britain.
“Locally, whatever Gatwick tries to promise, it is unable to solve the essential overburdening of the local infrastructure that a second runway would entail. How would Gatwick hope to find a sufficient workforce of over 120,000 more jobs (the population of Cambridge) centred on or located at Gatwick when there are only 23,000 jobseekers in a very wide travel to work region around Gatwick today? There would need to be a very considerable level of migration into the area, adding to the already severely strained housing pressures and transport infrastructure. The A23/M23/M25 roads are beyond capacity and the Brighton Mainline is already the busiest commuter line in the country and no new track is proposed under Gatwick’s plans.
“Far from being the best option for the local area, Gatwick expansion would be a disaster.”