Lib-Dems ready to drop Gatwick runway ban from election plans

 
The Lib Dems are moving towards scrapping its blanket ban on airport expansion in the South-East

The Liberal Democrats are set to use their election manifesto to open the door to a second runway at Gatwick while still opposing a bigger Heathrow.

The party is moving towards scrapping its blanket ban on airport expansion in the South-East. It could be replaced with a series of tests on climate change and local pollution, as well as on levels of noise suffered by communities around airports.

The manifesto process, being overseen by senior MP David Laws, is still at the committee stage of drawing up key policies to be put to members for approval at the party’s annual conference in the autumn.

“We will announce our policies in due course but I cannot envisage the circumstances in which we drop our opposition to the expansion of Heathrow,” said a senior Lib-Dem source.

“We will not endorse an expansion in airport capacity which would increase current noise pollution for the hundreds of thousands of residents living beneath the flight path, or which would break the Committee on Climate Change’s recommendations on aviation, which are needed to meet our carbon reduction targets,”

Lib-Dem leader Nick Clegg is likely to face opposition from some members to ditching the ban.

However, maintaining it would be a snub to Sir Howard Davies, the former London School of Economics boss who is chairing a commission into Britain’s future airport needs.

In an interim report in December it shortlisted Gatwick or Heathrow as expansion options and is still considering the case for a “Boris island” hub airport in the Thames Estuary. Sir Howard also concluded that the South East needs one new runway by 2030.

The Deputy Prime Minister has hinted he may support a second runway at Gatwick, highlighting “the case” for expansion of the airport.

The Conservatives are also expected to drop their opposition to a third runway at Heathrow, which was part of their green agenda in 2010.

Three young Londoners have won a £10,000 prize for their short film raising environmental concerns over a third runway at Heathrow.

Anti-expansion campaigner Hugh Grant praised the “beautiful and powerful” film.

The top 15 films chosen from 50 entries were screened to 800 people at the Richmond Theatre last night.

The 60-second film Heathrow Won’t Listen, created by Tom Murray, 22, Andy Chan, 25, and Dan Grant, 22, follows a family in their back garden as the sounds of piano music, children’s laughter and genteel conversation are gradually drowned out by the roar of an aeroplane overhead.

It will now be used as a viral campaign video to raise public awareness.

To see the winning submissions, visit no-ifs-no-buts.com.

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