Heathrow: Wrong time, wrong place

The decision to give the green light to Heathrow expansion is likely to haunt Labour for years to come. The columnist Polly Toynbee put it well: “Whenever Labour tries to say or do anything green, the groundswell of protesters will shout back ‘Heathrow!’ End of argument.”

Politically, too, the decision appears near-suicidal. The Conservatives (and the Liberal Democrats) have said they would scrap all plans to expand Heathrow. Since the detailed plans for expansion would not be ready for approval until after the next general election, it would be the next government, not this one, which will take the final decision. In the words of one Tory councillor in West London, there would be “clear blue water” between the two main parties in the run-up to the election. Analysts believe it could cost Labour up to a dozen seats – enough to make a real difference in a close contest.

So why did Gordon Brown and the transport secretary Geoff Hoon defy almost half the Cabinet and over 50 rebel Labour MPs to give expansion the green light? Since his days in the Treasury Brown has been swayed by the voice of the aviation industry whispering in his ear. It has argued that, if Heathrow does not expand, business will locate to other European cities, such as Paris, Frankfurt and Amsterdam, which have larger airports and, as a result, Britain will lose out in the globalised economy. There is no independent evidence to support this assertion. The fact that only 241 non-aviation firms in all of Britain chose to express any opinion in last year’s consultation on the government’s plans for Heathrow hardly suggests that business is clamoring for a third runway.

But Brown has refused to take off the blinkers. He’s compounded his error through a belief that a third runway is the kind of large-scale project which is vital to drag the country out of recession. This is the mind-set of a man who can’t adapt to the realities of the 21st century: a world threatened by runaway climate change, where cheap oil is coming to an end, and faced with a recession which spells the end of untrammeled globalisation.

There are viable alternatives to the expansion of Heathrow. Over a quarter of the flights which use the airport are to destinations in the UK or near-Europe which could be served by a fast, affordable rail service. The French, Germans and now the Spanish have shown how investment in fast rail can cut short-haul flights. Fewer short-haul flights at Heathrow would free up slots for the expected increase in flights from the growing economies of China and India. And then there is video-conferencing. Recent research from WWF showed that almost 90 per cent of the UK’s major firms expect to fly less and use video-conferencing facilities more in the next few years.

But the exploration of alternatives is being taken further and deeper than just rail and video-conferencing. Progressive elements within the trades union movement are now talking about the “just transition” from jobs in unsustainable industries to those in more sustainable ones. And few industries are more unsustainable than aviation.

It is not surprising that, in this changing world, Brown’s eagerness to cling to the outdated concept of a new runway has not only made him look like an anachronism, but has given a buoyant self-confidence to the vibrant movement which opposes the runway. Armed with sound arguments on economics and climate change, it believes it can win. The fight against Heathrow is becoming an iconic battle. Never before has such a wide-ranging coalition opposed plans to expand an airport: local residents; trades unions; local authorities; politicians of all parties; national environmental and development organisations; direct action activists; and countless individual environmentalists. As the Daily Telegraph—not a paper famous for its left-leaning credentials—noted, “There is an anger and a potential rebellion than runs from eco-warriors through to merchant bakers.” Against this vibrancy, Gordon Brown and Geoff Hoon look like yesterday’s men peddling the solution of the day before.