Fuelling climate change: Croydon Mayor Jason Perry (right), on a visit to Gatwick Airport, gets all excited when he sees a big aeroplane about to take off
‘Signing off on a new runway at Gatwick is not just reckless, it is fundamentally incompatible with Britain’s legally binding climate obligations’. Yet Croydon’s Tory and Labour politicians are in full support of the airport expansion. By PAUL LUSHION, environment correspondent
‘Burn, baby. Burn’: Chancellor Rachel Reeves doesn’t mind if she’s wrecking the economy or the planet
Croydon’s duopoly politicians have been unanimous in welcoming airport expansion at Gatwick, as they have embraced estimates of the second runway helping to create 14,000 jobs in the region and being worth £1billion per year for the economy of south-east England.
But others, those with a better grasp on how perilous the future of the planet really is, viewed the decision differently: “A disaster,” was one description.
Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander approved the plans on Sunday, giving a green light for the £2.2billion privately-financed project which could see aircraft taking off from the airport’s second runway before the next General Election.
Gatwick handles about 280,000 flights a year. It says the plan would allow that number to increase to almost 390,000 by the late 2030s.
Chancellor of the Exchequer Rachel Reeves is backing the project, saying the second Gatwick runway is part of the government’s plan to “get Britain building again”.
But rather than “Build, baby. Build”, the slogan for the Gatwick scheme is surely “Burn, baby. Burn”, as the increase in air traffic will only increase the nation’s carbon emissions, the greenhouse gases which are causing the climate emergency we now witness on a daily basis.
It was Zack Polanski, the Green Party’s new leader, who described the decision as, “A disaster”.
Stating the obvious: Green Party leader Zack Polanski
The decision to expand an airport “ignores basic climate science, undermines Britain’s legally binding net zero commitments, and entrenches a system of privilege where a small, wealthy minority pollutes while everyone else pays the price”, Polanski said.
Sarah Jones, the MP for Croydon West and a junior minister in the Starmer government, meanwhile, was very much on message.
A day earlier, Chancellor Reeves had majored on the benefits the expansion would bring for… package holiday-makers.
“This extra runway at Gatwick will mean that people going on holiday will have a greater choice of destinations, it will mean lower costs for a family holiday.” Never mind the summer droughts, deadly floods in Aisa, the super tornadoes or the tropical islands slowly slipping below the oceans as a direct consequence of the climate emergency.
MP Jones said of the Gatwick decision: “It is good news for Croydon that the government has approved Gatwick’s expansion plans… Gatwick Airport is just a short journey from Croydon, and this second runway will give families greater choice.
“It will also create thousands of new jobs – benefiting people in our borough and beyond – as well as bringing in billions in investment to our economy.”
Before becoming an MP, Sarah Jones had worked in public relations for… Gatwick Airport. Her constituency office advised that Jones had no role in the decision to approve Gatwick expansion.
Yet sitting in the transport secretary’s in-tray since 2018, at least, are proposals to unblock “the Selhurst Bottleneck”, a drag on rail travel between London and the south coast which the proposed Croydon Area Remodelling Scheme would fix, freeing up rail capacity for passengers to and from Gatwick.
When MP for Croydon Central (before last year’s boundary changes), Jones had been a supporter of “CARS”. Yesterday, she was unable to share with Inside Croydon whether there is any joined-up transport policy that will deliver better rail links for Gatwick’s second runway.
Jones’s Labour colleague, backbench MP Natasha Irons, has taken on some parts of the old Croydon Central constituency in her new Croydon East seat. While embracing the Gatwick announcement with similar burn-the-planet enthusiasm as her Labour colleagues, Irons has recognised the need for some public rail investment in her constituency.
Missing the point: growth at what cost, and for whom?
“Gatwick has agreed that more than half of air passengers must travel to the airport by public transport,” Irons said. “That’s only possible if we improve services on the Brighton Main Line and at East Croydon and Norwood Junction stations. I will continue to fight for these upgrades.”
For plastic guttering salesman and part-time Mayor, Jason Perry, airport expansion can mean only one thing: more sales of plastic guttering!
“The expansion of the Gatwick airport runway is absolutely fantastic news for Croydon,” Perry said.
Perry claims to be “working really closely” with the airport, and like the borough’s Labour MPs, reckons airport expansion will create more skilled jobs for the people of Croydon.
Gatwick is reckoned to contribute £265million to Croydon’s annual economy already, and supports 3,680 jobs in the borough.
Always quick to jump on any passing gravy train, even when it has been approved by a Labour government, opportunistic Perry is claiming the expansion means that “thousands of new jobs and millions in investment are now within reach”.
He said: “Croydon is a key gateway in the Gatwick Airport Economic Zone – powering skills, logistics and growth.” And raising the global thermometer just a little bit more.
Green leader Polanski addressed the obvious issues with encouraging increased air travel. “Growth at what cost and for whom?” he said.
“The truth is that airport expansion won’t make life better for ordinary people. It means more pollution, more noise in people’s homes, and more greenhouse gases driving us deeper into climate breakdown.
“This isn’t about enabling families to fly once a year on holiday. This is about a tiny few, the elite, being able to fly more and more, regardless of the cost to people or the planet.”
In this country, 70% of flights are taken by just 15% of people. And 57% of Britons don’t fly abroad at all.
False economies: ‘Even the supposed economic benefits don’t stand up to scrutiny’, according to Zack Polanski of the Green Party
Polanski highlighted the “climate reality”. He said: “Aviation is one of the fastest-growing sources of greenhouse gas emissions. Signing off on a new runway at Gatwick is not just reckless, it is fundamentally incompatible with Britain’s legally binding climate obligations.
“No amount of greenwashing or promises of future technology can disguise the basic fact: you cannot tackle the climate crisis while simultaneously expanding airports.”
Polanski claims that figures presented by the supporters of expansion fail to include carbon emissions from the actual flights.
“Even the supposed economic benefits don’t stand up to scrutiny… Airport expansion undermines both our long-term prosperity and our environment.
“Instead of pouring billions into aviation, we could invest in clean, affordable rail, both domestically and across Europe… Labour’s choice to greenlight Gatwick tells you everything about their priorities. This is politics stuck in the past, a tired, 20th-century answer to a 21st-century crisis – an obsession with growth at all costs, regardless of who pays or what gets destroyed in the process.”
Read more: 39 trains are stopped in the Croydon Bottleneck in two hours
Read more: Gatwick’s bigger, new rail station promises to cut delays
Read more: Brighton mainline rail improvements to be axed in Tory cuts
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