HC Deb 29 July 1963 vol 682 cc17-9
24. Mr. Brockway

asked the Minister of Aviation what reply he has made to the proposal sent to him by the Noise Abatement Society that London Airport should be transferred to near the mouth of the Thames.

Mr. Marten

I will, with permission, circulate the reply in the Official Report.

Mr. Brockway

In view of the inevitable expansion of aircraft travel which within a few years will make even London Airport inadequate as an international centre, would it not be possible to develop an airport at some seaside area where the intolerable noise caused to people in the neighbourhood of an airport could be avoided? Could not this be done?

Mr. Marten

There has been a great study of this question of the need to have a third London Airport to take the overflow of aircraft from London (Heathrow) Airport, and the report of the Interdepartmental Committee on this is at the moment being considered. It will no doubt be published in due course; mean while, it would be premature for me to comment upon the recommendations. I would ask the hon. Gentleman to wait.

Mr. J. Wells

In view of my hon. Friend's answer to Question No. 20, asked by my hon. Friend the Member for Twickenham (Mr. Gresham Cooke), indicating that he was unwilling to pay compensation to people whose houses were near London Airport before the airport existed, I hope that my hon. Friend will think very deeply before he moves a new London Airport to Kent or to Essex.

Mr. Speaker

That is a statement, not a Question. There is nothing to answer.

Following is the reply:

6th June, 1963.

Dear Mr. Connell,

You wrote to Julian Amery on 15th May about your plan to reprovide London (Heathrow) Airport on Foulness Island.

Your proposal is much more far-reaching than merely laying down runways and taxiways, etc. on a new site. It would mean writing off well over £50 million capital that the taxpayer and the airlines have put into Heathrow and the use of a large amount of national resources to reprovide them elsewhere. There would also be an immense social problem. Some 30,000 people are employed at Heathrow, and most of them live nearby. Unless they are to be deprived of their jobs, it would be essential to facilitate their transfer to the neighbourhood of the new airport. There are also many people living near Heathrow whose livelihood depends wholly or partly on the employment and business created by the airport. All these people would be vitally affected by your proposals. We should also have to consider the demands on housing and other social services in the area near Foulness, as the new airport would have to operate on the same scale as Heathrow.

A transfer of the kind that you have suggested would therefore constitute a major social upheaval with incalculable consequences. Foulness, anyhow, is not a suitable site for a major airport. We have, as it happens, examined the possibility of building a new airport in Foulness, not to replace Heathrow but to take the overflow of the London area's traffic when both Heathrow and Gatwick are operating to capacity. Foulness has had to be ruled out, even for this supplementary role, on several grounds. With a major airport at Foulness, Southend would have to be closed and its considerable traffic transferred to the new airport. This would mean that right from the start Foulness would be unable to take both Heathrow's and Southend's traffic, and the London area would thus need another very large airport at the same time. Even if we could find a suitable site—which our current studies show to be extremely difficult—the full cost of this extra airport would fall on the taxpayer. A major airport at Foulness would also mean closing the firing range at Shoeburyness. Many millions of pounds of public money have been spent in developing this range, which plays an essential part in our defence plans. Even if an alternative site were available for the range—and I understand that there is none—we could not justify the abandonment of such a large public investment and its duplication elsewhere.

I would also mention that Heathrow, which incidentally makes a profit of over £1 million a year, could not cease operations before both the airport replacing it and the monorail link with Central London were completed. Your consortium would therefore have to lay out sums of the order of £100 million on the airport, airlines' maintenance bases and the monorail, before beginning to receive a return.

I think that I have said enough to show why I could not encourage your consortium to devote time and effort to an impracticable scheme. I regret that I am therefore unable to support your request to the Secretary of State for War for permission to make soil tests on Foulness.

Yours sincerely,

NEIL MARTEN.

John Connell, Esq., F. Inst. D., M.S., M.A., M. Inst. M., AFF.R.S.H.

Noise Abatement Society,

6. Old Bond Street, W.I.