Boris Goes After Royal Family but Not London City Airport for Policing Bill

FTF were fascinated to read an article in the Evening Standard today quoting the Mayor is to 'fight for the MET's £5million royal wedding bill'.

This does surprise us. Since Boris Johnson became Mayor he has not once showed the same concern about London taxpayers money in relation to London City Airport. Between 2004 and 2008 London City Airport cost London taxpayers £24million. This was for services provided to the airport by the Metropolitan Police.

The airport were asked by Len Duval (Greater London Authority member), when he was Chair of the Metropolitan Police Committee to contribute to some or meet all of the cost. Mr Duval quoted that the airport would not even discuss the matter. Therefore the airport continues to cost us London taxpayers millions each year as it refuses to pay ANYTHING TOWARDS IT'S SECURITY COSTS , essentially denying London Communities the services they pay for.

The Mayor of London may wish to provide his reasons for why he is going after the Royal Family for a one off £5million security bill for the Royal Wedding, but has failed to even raise the issue or seek the millions of pounds that London City Airport continue to dodge paying.

In view that the same report states that: 'The Met police is in financial dire straits, with a £30.4million cut in its Home Office grant this year having resulted in a freeze in officer recruitment and the loss of 955 posts' it is an absolute disgrace that the Mayor has continued to allow this free for all attitude for London City Airport security costs to continue.

Press Release: Mayor Boris Johnson To Review Support for London City Airport Expansion

At yesterdays London Assembly Mayors' Question Time (1) the Mayor of London, Boris Johnson stated that 'in retrospect he realises that his decision to support the flight expansion at London City Airport  needs reviewing'. He went on to say he felt very anxious about the impact of extra flights over London and that the 'consequences of the expansion had been unexpected and we need to look at the impact of aviation over huge areas of East London'. The Mayor also indicated that he had written to the Civil Aviation Authority expressing his concern and requesting further information over the near collision (2) between a Heathrow 777 and London City Airport Cessna in July 2009.

Anne-Marie Griffin, Chair of Fight the Flights welcomed the news stating "We have been expressing our concerns about the impact of the expansion of London City Airport for over 2 years to the Mayor. We felt that the Mayor had been ill advised but it is now clear that he is acknowledging the full impact of extra flights over London, particularly over East London.What is important now is to see what action the Mayor takes and we'd certainly welcome the 'fresh thinking on aviation expansion' which the Mayor referred to".

The Mayor was also asked regarding the pledge(3) he made at the Ilford Environmental Question Time in early 2009, to support a call for a public review (4) of the London City Airport Flight path changes by the Civil Aviation Authority. Griffin said "the Mayor does acknowledge his pledge and response to the FTF question, however he appears to have moved the goalposts by commenting that he would ensure that the review 'would be useful to the public and get the facts into the public domain'. That simply isn't the same as calling for a public review. The CAA are still reviewing the flight path change behind closed doors so the Mayor still has time to put Londoners first and insist that the review is a public one".

End

Notes for Editors:

(1) http://www.london.gov.uk/who-runs-london/the-london-assembly/webcasts

(2) http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/standard/article-23875801-jet-in-near-miss-with-heathrow-airline-over-london.do

(3) http://londoncityairportfighttheflights.blogspot.com/2010/01/boris-backs-call-for-public-review-of.html

(4) http://londoncityairportfighttheflights.blogspot.com/2010/08/caa-update-on-post-implementation.html

For further information:
FTF spokesperson 07984 300558  

Website: http://www.fighttheflights.com/
Blog: http://londoncityairportfighttheflights.blogspot.com/


Press Release dated 16/9/10

Are NATS Misleading Boris Over London City Airport Flight Path Changes?

Months ago, the Mayor of London, Boris Johnson was asked by FTF to pledge his support for a public review into the flight path changes which the CAA and NATS had already implemented, but which the CAA are carrying out a 'private review' of. The Mayor did indeed pledge his support for a public review.

We asked Boris to ensure that this private review would be a public review. Boris replied on 14 May, however the response indicates that he may have been misled or perhaps there has simply been an misunderstanding regarding the situation with the CAA's 'private review'.

The Mayor responded:

National Air Traffic Services (NATS) announced in October 2009 that it will be undertaking a new consultation, on behalf of the CAA, on revised proposals for aircraft routes and airspace management in the area of South East England, referred to as Terminal Control North. This follows the consultation undertaken in 2008.

My officers have spoken to the stakeholder relations team at NATS. However, at this stage I have no further information regarding the scope of the proposals, as NATS does not expect the consultation to start before September at the earliest, due to the need to undertake further analysis.  NATS will be consulting the local authorities affected by the proposals, and I have given a commitment that I will work with the London Boroughs and the London Assembly to ensure that these proposals are widely and robustly considered. I will also work with NATS to ensure that these proposals are more widely publicised.

Well that all sounds great. However the key point that we asked the Mayor to ensure was that the CURRENT private review which the CAA are already carrying out on the London City Airport flight path changes was made public. This point has failed to be addressed and instead it appears that NATS may have misled the Mayor by indicating that a re-consultation is going to happen in September.  So now the Mayor believes that NATS are going to reconsult on the LCY flight path changes which were implemented in 2009. 

They are not and FTF have been told this by the Director of Airspace Policy at the CAA. So why has NATS misinformed the Mayor in this way?.

NATS are indeed to re-consult on the other flight paths from airports in the South East which were included in the original TCN document, as we have written before, but not the LCA flight path which was implemented last year, and which has caused no end of disturbance and upset to thousands of East London households.

So despite Boris's pledge, we haven't seen any evidence in the response to confirm that the CAA have been asked to carry out a public review rather than a private one, and we now also see the Mayor being misled into believing that the very flight path which has been so controversial is to be reconsulted upon - when it is not. 

Why not contact the Mayor and ask him to fulfil the pledge he made to a packed Ilford auditorium at the Mayor's Environmental Question Time? You can email him: mayor@london.gov.uk

Boris, oh Boris - Are you listening?

Back in January Boris Johnson, Mayor of London pledged his support for a public consultation on the CAA review of flight path changes.

Since then we've written to Boris to try and find out what he's been doing to ensure that the CAA don't carry out a private consultation of their own, but a public one, where the residents who have to suffer the consequences of the CAA's decision get their say.

So far we're not convinced Boris is listening as we, nor any other residents have heard so much as a twitter from Boris over his pledge for a public consultation of the flight path review.

Let's hope Boris decides to reply to the residents soon, otherwise all those residents who packed out the auditorium in Ilford at the Mayor's climate question time might just end up thinking his pledge was worth very little.

Come on Boris, get a move on.

Regeneration sinks around London City Airport

London City Airport keeps saying they are good for the local economy and that it attracts investment into the area. Perhaps they can take credit for the failure of the £1.5bn Silvertown Quays regeneration. Europe's largest Aquarium project (Biota!) is sinking! It has been given a 90 day notice by the London Development Agency.

Newham Council has approved expansion even though the brand new Building 1000 remained empty for 5 years, failing to attract a single corporate client. In the end Newham Council bought this building at cost of £100m (or so). And another 3 similar buildings were never built! So in all the airport allegedly appears to have cost £400m for the Royal Docks business park plus £1.5bn for Silvertown Quays.

The following is from the Evening Standard, but some other media sources are being more optimistic saying that Silvertown Quay Ltd would find an investor within the deadline. But the project has been dithering since 2002.... It they could not get off the ground during the boom, can they succeed during such a time?

Just how much say did Mayor Boris Johnson have in this?

Evening Standard Item:

Plans for a £1.5 billion development in east London which was set to include Europe's largest aquarium were in tatters today after the owners of the site pulled the plug on the deal.

The scheme for the land adjacent to London City Airport was meant to feature a sandy beach as well as 5,000 homes. But landowner London Development Agency has withdrawn from an agreement with its partners, the Silvertown Quays consortium, after the plans failed to progress in seven years.

Planning permission was given for the 68-acre site in April 2007 but the scheme, designed by

Sir Terry Farrell, fell victim to the property slump.

Contributed by a Newham resident.

Take the City Block - It'll offer more protection than Boris

Whilst Boris Johnson continues to wax lyrical about being green with yet another new initiative (which clearly will have some good merits) whilst supporting London City Airport flight expansion, (and a further breach of EU air quality levels) it makes you wonder just how far politicians like Boris will go in pretending to have green policies.

So Mayor Boris makes £4million available for his new eco-innovation fund - whilst London City Airports security costs of £5.5million a year continue to be paid by the London taxpayer. Why not add another £5.5 million to the 'eco innovation fund' Boris, and make the privately owned, but publically subsidised London City Airport pay their own bills for a change?

It just doesn't add up, the money, or Boris's perpetual spin about being concerned about improving Londoner's quality of lives and their environment.

What we need is protection and this would be welcome in the form of a London Mayor who listens to the residents and defends communities quality of lives, not his friends in big business. But at least Boris has appeared to have discovered that jobs can be created by being greener in business, it's just a shame he didn't think about that when he used jobs as his excuse for supporting LCY expansion, which was by no means a good move for the communities or environment.

As far as Boris goes, we can't help but feel that the tube of cream that one of our residents bought from a cosmetics counter, with a 40SPF factor offering 'ultra protection' is likely to offer more benefit, to the average member of the public in East and South East London, than Boris is anywhere near as likely to offer.

The product boasts "hours of protection from environmental aggressors". Oh yes, that's just what we need plenty of in East London, protection from 'environmental aggressors'. Could we stretch the hours to days, weeks or years though?

But just how many tubes of this product would protect us from the 'agressors' of our environment, London City Airport, LB Newham and Boris Johnson, Mayor of London? There's so many of them, all of them guilty of greenwashing spin whilst supporting the continued growth of environmental pollution in East London.

Tubes to the ready. Subsidies for the cost of the product protection- up to £5.5 million annually are expected to be offered by our revered government to continue to appease the aviation industry and make residents think they might actually be taking their concerns seriously for once.

A Residents Report - The State of London's Environment: Ignored by "The Money"

Last Saturday I spent the day at the Queen Elizabeth Conference Centre for The State of London Debate - arranged by the Mayor of London to increase the accountability of the GLA to Londoners.

On the whole I was impressed with the speakers, with the exception of Jo Valentine of London First and Stuart Fraser, Economic Development London Councils, who did not impress me at all. What struck me was their rather out of date attitude vis-a-vis the current problems of aviation noise and pollution in London. It seems they have an over-arching aim to make London the best city in the world in which to live, work and invest. Well obviously they have not cast their eyes over recent statistics with regard to air pollution in London; which is clearly not one of the best places to live because it is now known as the dirtiest, noisiest and most polluted capital in Europe.

In fact London's dirty air is responsible for the deaths of over 3,000 people a year. London's emissions are well above those that have been set by the EU and the United Kingdom is about to be fined.

I was disappointed that not only did neither Jo Valentine nor Stuart Fraser seem to grasp the serious challenges that London is facing with regard to the air and noise pollution suffered by millions, they showed no evidence of understanding that London needs innovative approaches and practical solutions to the problem. In fact they both reminded me of uninformed and not very creative dinosaurs.

In addition, the reply that Jo Valentine made with regard to a question on litter was actually quite disturbing. She stressed that it was very important indeed to clear up the areas of London that visitors would pass through during the Olympic Games. However, the other areas seen by and lived in by Londoners on a daily basis were not mentioned by her at all. Presumably, since only local people would see them they were not nearly as important and any litter and mess could be safely ignored.

Therefore I would hazard a guess that Jo Valentine is not a community person.

Seachanges

__________________________

FTF comment:

Fraser and Valentine are both from banking backgrounds and clearly put profit before people. Valentine of London First (otherwise known as Money First), has been a long time supporter of London City Airports growth and appears not to be concerned about the negative effects of such business expansion on residential communities at all.

These individuals are clearly not concerned at the flawed and missing data that the airport has provided over the years, nor has Valentine acknowledged that the airport has failed to meet even 50% of it's most conservative prediction of the amount of jobs it would create in the last 10 years.

Valentine thinks that LCA is good for Newham: just 120 directly employed jobs have been given to Newham residents in over 20 years of the airport running. This is compared with an ever increasing amount of residents in east and south east London being affected by the 57DB+ noise contour. Upon any expansion almost 100,000 residents will be affected by these excessive noise levels.

Will Fraser and Valentine be two of those residents we wonder? If they were, would they still choose to ignore the social, over the profit? Lets hope their children don't have to sit in a class room that is disturbed by a flight roaring over every 90 seconds, and their development being affected, lets hope also that they don't have to deal with the illnesses associated with excessive aviation noise and pollution levels.

Newham residents haven't gained much at all from this airport that has been allowed to grow beyond the limits promised faithfully to the communities of East London: Newham is still one of the most socially deprived boroughs in the country, and tops a lot of other 'negative' categories in healthcare and childrens educational development. It also has one of the worst housing shortages in the country.

So obviously 20 years is not enough for the airport to have shown the 'trickle down' effect - so businesses answer is? To expand more, to socially experiment more, on one of the poorest boroughs in London. And lets not forget that this 'experiment' cost London taxpayers £24million pounds over the past 5 years.

Boris Johnson Uses 'Hear Say' Not Evidence As Justification For Expansion At London City Airport

Ever wondered why Boris has such double standards and likes to try and bury his decision to support London City Airport expansion at every opportunity?

Well we thought we'd ask where Boris gets the statistics he keeps throwing out at residents when he is challenged on his decision to support expansion at LCA. Boris is particularly keen to use the stick and carrot of jobs....but really Boris, this FOI request (see beneath) and answer from your office appears to indicate that you have no such evidence to support what we know are incorrect and unsubstantiated claims that you keep throwing out!

We find it quite dissapointing that this FOI response indicates that he simply bases his decisions on 'hear say'? No wonder he's got so many double standards, he needs to start dealing in evidence and the facts. Can't say this is the type of behaviour that builds confidence or trust - but then Boris seems willing to sacrifice anything for his double standards over London City Airport - even his credibility. Boris can keep trying to bury the LCA issue - but Heathrow will not save his face as double standards are not attractive and objectors to the expansion are not going anywhere.

1) At the Mayors Question time Boris Johnson claimed that the "expansion of London City Airport would provide 1000 new jobs". Can I have a copy of all documentation that the Mayor has seen to support this claim PRE this request.

The Mayor received a verbal briefing before PQT, so the Greater London Authority holds no such documentation.

2) Can I also have a breakdown of the 1,000 jobs and a time line for the jobs?

The Greater London Authority does not hold this information.


Yours sincerely


Zoë Newcombe
Mayor’s Office

FLASH MOB BORIS - Wake Up Boris!

Boris Johnson - the un-green mayor with double environmental standards!

COME AND FLASH BORIS

NEXT Thursday 5 March 2009

Time: 5.45pm prompt for 6.pm flash.
Outside York Hall

5-15 Old Ford Road

Bethnal Green

E2 9PJ

Wear your 'no to expansion t shirts, or any red top and bring your banners.

A united campaign, and a united event of all anti expansion/environmental campaigns

Swiss Air pilots from London City Airport - Welcome

Newham & LCA Keep it in 'the family' - UPDATE - Cllr Alec Kellaway Looks After His Interests

Click on the image to enlarge.

When Cllr Alec Kellaway wrote in to support London City Airport's growth - he strangely omitted to say that he owned over £25K of shares in WPP.

WPP is a subsidiary of Hill & Knowlton - the PR alledged mercenaries - who have reportedly been paid a six figure sum - to 'push the application through' by London City Airport.

We feel a Standards Board complaint coming on.

Now just fancy that!

How Would LCA Flight Expansion Affect You?

If permission is granted for the additional flights 40, 384 flights over 260 weekdays, the airport will be allowed to operate an additional 155 flights per day. (quote from John Austin, MP)

THINK:

• An ADDITIONAL 155 flights per day TOTALLING TO AN ESTIMATED 447 FLIGHTS PER DAY.


• 447 NOISE EVENTS EVERY DAY measuring 80dbs and above for over 60,000 residents in the noise contours


• 100,000's MORE RESIDENTS affected by noise disturbance below 80dbs, COVERING 5-6 BOROUGHS.


• This means a flight would have to TAKE OFF CONSISTENTLY EVERY 2 MINUTES AND 14 SECONDS OVER A 16 HOUR OPERATING DAY to achieve the annual flight capacity that LB Newham have approved.


• In reality flights take off in batches, with 90 seconds in between each flight. Newham approved LCA in 2007 (WITHOUT CONSULTING THE COMMUNITIES) to put as many flights out in any one day as they wish (but adhering to their current annual limits), THIS MEANS THAT ON THE BUSIEST DAYS RESIDENTS WILL EXPERIENCE A FLIGHT EVERY 90 SECONDS FROM 07:00 to 22:00.

Why not let them know how you feel about this - DEMAND a public inquiry.

Coming Soon - Boris Johnson Rewards Goodings Failure

Mayor of London Tells Sir Robin - Follow the Rules. Don't be a Poodle!

Clearly when Fight the Flights went to City Hall, they made a clear presentation of the irresponsible, negligent and collusive behaviour between Newham Council and London City Airport. What's more we were able to provide the evidence. Not spin, like Newham and City Airport deal in, but hard facts and evidence.

So now we see Sir Robin Wales receive a clear message from the Mayor of London - enforce and start doing the job of monitoring the disingenous, weasel worded airport, rather than being their poodle.

Newham and London City Airport are clearly under growing public scrutiny, about time too. And there's more to come......

Enjoy the letter: click it to enlarge.

Fight The Flights Goes To City Hall

Fight the Flights took the campaign to City Hall today. In a meeting which lasted almost two hours with Sir Simon Milton, Deputy Mayor and his colleagues, the real facts, and appalling behaviour of London City Airport and of the LB Newham towards residents was shared. A presentation was given to Sir Simon highlighting the key issues and failures of both parties concerned.

Issues such as the consistent breaches of noise and air monitoring, the 6 year delays on noise insulation by LCA and Newham failing to take any action to protect the communities were discussed alongside the issue of the flawed data presented in the application.

We didn't expect to change the Mayor's mind - but in the Mayor of London's eyes 120,000 flights is where it stops. In addition Sir Simon's officers will ensure that the Mayor of London's ambient noise strategy is adhered to and they have already taken steps towards meeting our request.

Newham Waits For NATS Report

The NATS report on the Thames Gateway Bridge and safety, which has held up the decision on LCAs expansion is still in progress. No Newham Planning hearing of the application can go ahead until the Mayor of London's office has received the report. In the meantime the Government Office for London is continuing to receive large amounts of evidence from residents in support of a call in of the application.

We will post any news on this as soon as we receive it.

Deferral of Decision and Mayor states hard to justify more than 120,000 flights

All the fun of the circus was had at the Newham development control meeting yesterday!

We all committedly (those of us who could get the day off work) went along to Stratford Town Hall, with plenty of support from Hacan, FOE, residents, and some very welcome climate camp members on their way to Kingsnorth, and the press, to hear the London City Airport flight expansion application decision.

In what could only be described as a farce, we were all sat down in the Chamber and told:

1. The chair wasn't able to be there so the deputy chair Cllr Pat Murphy was to act in his absence.
2. Cllr Murphy then declared a conflict of interest and left the chamber.
3. The rest of the planning committee then voted for a temporary chair.
4. The temporary chair then read out a message from The Mayor of London's office to ask a decision to be deferred, or that the Mayor would have to make a request to the Secretary of State to 'call in' the application in on the grounds of a safety report that is currently being carried out for the proposed (?) Thames Gateway Bridge.
5. The decision was taken to defer, rather than face a public inquiry at this stage (!), until the report is available and the safety aspects considered.
6. Some residents expressed their annoyance to the committee for wasting their time and in having to take a day off work to attend, another requested that the committee consider holding the meeting at the more usual time, in the evening, and give more notice to residents.

In addition the Newham case officer was absent as he was on a long haul flight that day....it just doesn't get any better.

The Mayor has supported the application to expand to 120,000 flights on the basis of what we see as flawed information. We have been advised that in a judicial review it would be seen that way too: no reliable actual noise or air pollution data for a period of years, and employment figures pulled out of a hat by LCA (remember 406 directly employed staff become 2000 staff when LCA say it has 'created' the jobs!!), and a lack of detailed information on the environmental effects on the communities across the whole of London. Some of these points were raised as weaknesses by the GLA planner in the GLA planning report but the Mayor appears to be happy to make a decision over Londoners health, safety and the environment regardless of the lack of detailed information.

However The Mayor also stated that flights above 120,000 would be hard to justify, so regardless of what happens at the next meeting - that throws a bit of a spanner in LCA's masterplan for greed not need!

The re-scheduled round maybe in a months time, and we still await a decision from GOL. The best thing were the glum faces, after the LCA PR machine had been feeding the national media that Newham were set to approve the application at yesterdays meeting. Shame they didn't have a crystal ball that time. And what happens if the report on the bridge comes back and says 'no more planes'?

Oh dear, it just never goes to plan for LCA and LB Newham!!