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Monday, 27th February 2006

Photo Opportunity: Tuesday 28th February 2006, Ivy Leaf Social Club, Coventry Road, Sheldon, 7pm-9pm: local residents, campaigners and councillors gather for a public meeting. Airport Managing Director Richard Heard gives a presentation and takes questions from the audience.

Public Meeting: Blight? Noise? Jobs? Compensation? What Will Airport Expansion Mean For YOU?

Tuesday 28th February 2006,
Ivy Leaf Social Club, Coventry Road, Sheldon
7.30pm-10.30pm

This Tuesday local people blighted by the proposals to expand Birmingham International Airport (BIA) will have an opportunity to put their questions to the Airport's Managing Director, Richard Heard, at a public meeting in Sheldon. Mr Heard will share a platform with Conservative and Liberal Democrat councillors and activists from the four local residents groups who organised the meeting. [1]

Tuesday's meeting follows on from a previous public meeting at the Ivy Leaf Club in October 2004, shortly after the Airport Company issued for public consultation the first draft of its non-statutory compensation package. The scheme is designed to compensate homeowners for the impact on the value of their properties resulting from the expansion proposals, which include a new second runway, an extension to the existing runway and a third passenger terminal.

The second version of the compensation package, published on 31st October 2005 as part of the Airport Company's Draft Master Plan, 'Towards 2030: Planning a Sustainable Future for Air Transport in the Midlands', has done little to assuage the concerns of residents, campaigners and the local planning authority. At a meeting on 20th January 2006 at Solihull Council's Civic Suite, the Council's Regeneration and Community Safety Scrutiny Board asked BIA to note the 'continuing inadequacy of the proposed compensation package' and to reconsider its proposals again.

Catherine-de-Barnes residents and Chair of Solihull Opposing Additional Runways (SOAR) Dave Cuthbert said:

"In 2004, when the Airport Company published the first draft of this property blight compensation scheme, Solihull Council identified thirteen separate areas where the proposals could be improved. Of these thirteen the Council considers only one to have been adequately addressed by the Airport Company in the new draft. After meeting with BIA several times over the last two years to discuss the compensation plan, the question on many of our minds is: just how much is up for negotiation here?" [2]

Elmdon resident and Save Eldmon Action Group (SEAG) supporter Lester Beeson said:

"We are pleased that Richard Heard has agreed to attend the public meeting. Although the Airport Company has been consulting widely over the last four months many questions remain unanswered. I would encourage everyone in the local community who is concerned about these proposals to come along to the Ivy Leaf on Tuesday. With only a month left before the close of public consultation on the Draft Master Plan, this may be one of the last chances we have to make our voices heard before the compensation schemes are set in stone later this year."

Secretary of Birmingham Airport anti-Noise Group (BANG) James Botham said:

"With the Government soon to review its 2003 Air Transport White Paper, in which the Department for Transport gave its seal of approval to the airport expansion proposals we currently find ourselves fighting, Ministers should be taking a close interest in what is happening here in Birmingham. The truth is beginning to dawn on many of those involved with this process that attempting to adequately 'compensate' local people for the havoc airport expansion on this scale will create is a hopeless task. The Government must withdraw the current White Paper in favour of a truly balanced approach to airport development, one that puts effective environmental protection on an equal footing with the economic and social benefits of air travel."

Editor's Notes

[1] The groups organising the meeting are:

The provisional agenda for the meeting is as follows:

[2] The first draft of BIA's compensation package was considered by the Scrutiny Board on 10th September 2004. The Board identified thirteen areas where the schemes could be improved on, and on 7th October 2004 Cabinet resolved to seek revisions to the schemes on the thirteen areas. This year's report of the Board's Director of Community and Economic Regeneration (20th January 2006, para.6.9.3) states that the Board considers only one of the thirteen areas ('definition of "to the north of the proposed runway is" in relation to property indices is unclear') to have been addressed by the latest version of the compensation proposals.

Three of the thirteen areas the Board considers to have been 'partly addressed': 'use of two different Land Registry indices is divisive'; 'schemes lack flexibility'; and 'technical jargon makes the schemes difficult to understand'. The remaining nine points were considered 'not addressed': 'Use of noise contours as scheme boundary'; 'Use of two noise contours is confusing'; '57dB(A) should be used [as the scheme boundary]'; 'Uncertainty remains in communities outside the noise contours'; 'Removal expenses are included in some schemes, but not others'; 'Offers for properties within 15% of asking price deemed acceptable by BIA, not by sellers'; 'Delayed trigger dates prolong uncertainty'; 'Discretionary clauses, e.g. "pressing need to move" are problematic'; and 'No disturbance allowance - unlike Channel Tunnel Rail Scheme'.

In response to public pressure, in 2004 the Airport Company set up a Community Compensation Working Group chaired by Peter Rayner, a former senior British Rail operations and safety manager and advisor to the Commons Transport Select Committee. Representatives of BANG, SOAR, SEAG, Friends of Elmdon, several local residents associations and parish councils, along with Solihull and Birmingham councillors were invited to meet with BIA's Head of Corporate affairs John Morris and Finance Director Joe Kelly to discuss the compensation proposals. BANG, SOAR, SEAG and Friends of Elmdon will use the feedback they receive from local people at the public meeting when the Working Group meets for the seventh time on Thursday 6th March 2006 at Birmingham Airport's Diamond House to draw up a consensus response to the current draft of the compensation package.

Read BANG's submission to the Generalised Blight Schemes Working Group

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