The Airport’s decision to appeal against the hard-pressed Council will gobble up funds desperately needed for social and community services. So why is the Airport persisting with the appeal against the Council’s rejection when its top management is forecasting unsustainable losses?
‘Bristol Airport’s Chief executive David Lees said 273,000 people had travelled to and from the Airport in August – plummeting from the near one million at the same time last year [down 76%]. The airport also now only has routes to 80 destinations – down from 120 in 2019 [down 33%]. The news comes a month after Bristol Airport confirmed plans to cut nearly 100 jobs after suffering from the fall in demand for air travel caused by the pandemic.
The airport, which directly employs around 400 people, is reducing its workforce by 23 per cent, according to a letter to Airport staff. The airport told employees it would make a “very significant” loss this financial year and its position was “unsustainable”.’ [1]
So the Airport’s barmy push for growth is almost incomprehensible in the current economic climate when jobs are being cut and passenger numbers have plummeted with little prospect of short-term recovery….
The truth is that the Airport monkey and the pension fund organ grinder [2] are desperate to outflank local democracy and upcoming green legislation that will constrain their toxic operation. A technical victory at the appeal could also salvage short-term benefits such as the right to schedule night flights across the summer and expand car parks into the Green Belt, enhancing the asset value of the land.
The Airport continues to claim that expansion will benefit the economy without regard for the harm to health, wellbeing and the environment. Let’s remember that the Council, supported by independent analysis, rejected the Airport application because of ‘the detrimental effect of the expansion of the Airport on the region and the wider impact on the environment outweighs the narrower benefits to Airport expansion’ (Council Leader Don Davies).
The Airport may hope it would benefit for ‘rationalisation’ of regional Airports into a number of hubs in the Government’s Aviation 2050 policy, yet to be published. The Airport shouldn’t hold its breath. Exeter is best placed for the South West as a whole and Cardiff can offer international standards such as international runway length, rail and motorway access and many other features that are simply a pipe dream for Bristol Airport. Public transport links with London Airports are improving.
The management still place their hopes in magical thinking and corporate witchcraft but North Somerset Council taxpayers and all of us dependent on Council services will pay the price of the appeal: legal costs, further cuts to public services, increased aviation traffic and noise pollution, damage to the wildlife habitat, the natural environment and the Mendip landscape.
PLEASE TAKE ACTION: contribute to the fund-raising appeal just launched to fight the Airport at the Public Inquiry
[1] https://www.business-live.co.uk/economic-development/bristol-airport-urges-government-take-18846315 [2] Bristol Airport is wholly owned by the Ontario Teachers Pension Fund
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