Gatwick Airport: Growth and Noise Mitigation

Lord Soames of Fletching Excerpts

Wednesday 10th January 2018 Westminster Hall

[Tom Tugendhat (Tonbridge and Malling) (Con)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered growth and noise reduction in Gatwick Airport.

Thank you, Sir Christopher, for allowing me to address this Chamber. I am delighted to have the privilege of congratulating you on your well-deserved honour, which recognises your lifetime of service.

The issue of aircraft noise is incredibly important to me, and I am afraid that many in the Chamber will have heard me speak about it many times. It is also important to all the residents of Tonbridge, Edenbridge and surrounding villages—indeed, I have received more correspondence on this issue than on any other since I was elected. That is unsurprising for those of us who live under the flightpath in the beautiful villages of west Kent, which are the most beautiful in England, as we all know—I declare an interest because our home is there. The impact of aviation noise on the economic prosperity and environmental sustainability of our communities has been severe.

Why am I raising the matter now, when many villages in Kent, Sussex and Surrey have been experiencing noise from flights for half a decade or more? In 2013, the introduction of the aviation policy framework meant a dramatic change to the flightpaths of the Gatwick airport approach. Many of the villages around Tonbridge, Edenbridge and Malling are now overflown as they have never been before. I therefore wish to focus on what Gatwick and the wider industry are doing or not doing to reduce noise from approaching aircraft as the airport continues to grow.

It is great that there are busy airports in this country, proving the case that you have made many times, Sir Christopher: that we are a global country open for business with the whole world. It is wonderful that communities from across the world are using the airport, but the impact on communities who live under the flightpaths are also of great concern to us all, and we should take into account the impact of each aircraft that arrives or leaves.

I am well aware of the London airspace management programme and of the importance of getting it to properly reflect the views of communities. The global implementation of P-RNAV—precision area navigation—will require more to be done to reduce noise, but it will not be implemented until the early 2020s. Communities such as ours need action to address the problem now.

This may surprise you, Sir Christopher, but extraordinarily enough, I would like to acknowledge the change in attitude from Gatwick airport. Not only does it say that it is helping with the work of the London airspace management programme, which I welcome, but it has listened more in recent days and its attitude has improved dramatically since I first met its representatives in 2014.

The arrivals review was much needed and proposed some good ideas. I am grateful for the work done on it by Bo Redeborn and Graham Lake, whom I am glad to see in the Gallery today, and for the community representation, but it needs to go further. For example, modifications have been made to the whine of the Airbus A320 that many of us will have heard. I am sorry that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, who worked so hard to achieve those modifications, is not present, but I know that he is on Government business abroad—he is in our thoughts, and I know we are in his. The modifications are welcomed by all communities, but they are not enough and they were even agreed before the arrivals review was completed.

Recommendation 11 of the review would have provided a fair solution, utilising both sides of the airport equally on days with no wind, but it was rejected. It should have happened as part of the commitment to implement the review in full. It has also been admitted by almost all those involved that recommendation 10—widening the swathe—will not alone cure the problem, so we clearly do not have the solution to the noise issue.

Growth comes at a price to the communities affected. The impact of both arrivals and departures is heard for many miles around on all sides. Complaints continue to increase and new protest groups have sprung up all over Kent, Surrey and Sussex. These folk are protesting not because they want to, because they have nothing better to do or because they have a history of direct action, but because aircraft approaching Gatwick are having a serious impact on their lives, their health, their children’s development and their right to enjoy their properties in peace.

[Sir Nicholas Soames (Mid Sussex) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this important debate. I know that he has done a great deal of work on the matter and that it has caused grave difficulties in his constituency. Does he agree that one of the problems of dealing with Gatwick—indeed, with any airport—is that people must be able to trust the information that they get from it? In East Grinstead in my constituency, there are constant complaints about erring off the straight and narrow. It is clear that trust has broken down between residents and the airport. What suggestions does my hon. Friend have for a remedy? Does he agree that it is a very serious problem?

[Tom Tugendhat]

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for expressing that essential point. The noise management board, which is part of the solution, has begun that work, but of course it cannot solve the problem alone. As he would expect, I will come on to the Department for Transport and its role in restoring trust. I welcome his points.

I remember David Wetz, who lives in Chiddingstone, telling me last summer that he was unable to enjoy his daughter’s birthday celebration properly outside because normal conversation simply was not possible in the garden. That is a disgrace. It is not a matter of nimbyism. It is about people wanting to live a normal life without having a motorway built over their heads.

As representatives in Parliament of communities such as Chiddingstone, we are responsible for representing their interests to the Government—I pay tribute not only to the right hon. and hon. Members present, but to the many others who have joined groups with us. It is clear that we need to enforce a better balance between the interests of the aviation industry and of local people affected by noise. Successive Governments have designed policies that seek to achieve that balance, but we must consider whether Gatwick is complying with them and whether the Department for Transport is enforcing them in its role as noise regulator.

The key policy—it is a welcome policy—on noise is the 2013 aviation policy framework, which clearly stated Government policy on aviation noise as

“to limit and where possible reduce the number of people in the UK significantly affected by aircraft noise”.

--- Later in debate ---

[Nick Herbert (Arundel and South Downs) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Christopher, and I congratulate you on your elevation. I welcome the initiative of my hon. Friend the Member for Tonbridge and Malling (Tom Tugendhat) in calling this debate. As he explained, the background to it is a significant increase in the number of flights to and from Gatwick airport. Since 2013, the number of flights has increased by 12% and the number of passengers has increased by 22%. That has resulted in an increase in noise not just in the immediate vicinity of the airport, but in rural areas, such as the one I represent in Arundel and South Downs, in the approach to the airport for both take-off and arrival.

As my hon. Friend explained, the Government’s policy is that future aviation growth should share benefits between the industry and local communities. Therefore the question is: how is growth that has already taken place and future growth to be shared with the communities that many of us represent? So far as we can see, there has been no such sharing. There is no doubt that the increase in growth has been good for elements of the local economy, for those who are using the airport, including me, and for the country as a whole, but it is difficult to see a benefit for local communities, which calls into question whether the Government’s key objective is being fulfilled.

The Government’s second objective is to limit and where possible reduce noise. The second question is, therefore: to what extent has noise even been limited, let alone reduced? What precisely is their policy to ensure that the objective is met? That policy can be expressed only through the operation of Gatwick airport, and it is not at all clear that its noise management board is doing anything other than providing a talking shop where community groups are encouraged to make their representations known. Adjustments can be made to flight paths, approach lanes and so on, but there is no strategy to reduce noise. There are no metrics by which the airport can be held to account for that noise reduction. That is the key point: there is no plan.

The Government have effectively conceded that point, because their response to the concerns raised on our community’s behalf by various community groups and by my hon. Friend the Member for Tonbridge and Malling on behalf of a number of us was to say, “There will be an aviation strategy that will look at how noise can be reduced.” It is wonderful to know that there will be an aviation strategy; it would be good to know when that aviation strategy is coming. My hon. Friend the Minister has been hard at work today—first thing this morning he was doing a debate on a different matter, which I also attended—but it would be good to know when the strategy is coming. Will he say a little more about how that might affect the reduction in noise that the Government are committed to? For all we know, that aviation strategy might be months or years down the line. We do not know what it will say on noise. At the moment, there is meant to be a policy to reduce noise. I return to the key question: why is there not a plan that Gatwick airport, which is making a great deal of money from this expansion in aviation—I am not criticising the expansion at all—must subscribe to that sets out how it will reduce noise?

[Sir Nicholas Soames]

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend and to my hon. Friend the Member for Tonbridge and Malling (Tom Tugendhat), because they have both made powerful points. I first took part in a debate on aviation noise 34 years ago, when Gatwick was in my constituency. We had to deal with the BAC 111, which made a noise like a screaming banshee. It is true to say that aircraft noise is much mitigated now. The point that my right hon. Friend makes is terribly important, because it requires only a tweak, not major change, and the absolute enforcement of discipline in terms of the pilots.

[Nick Herbert]

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend. Only he could introduce phrases such as “screaming banshee” into a debate. He draws my attention to another point. Part of the increase in flights from Gatwick has been in long-haul flights, which are a relatively new development and mean much bigger planes. Even if the newer planes are less noisy, residents and groups such as Communities Against Gatwick Noise and Emissions and the Association of Parish Councils Aviation Group—one of its representatives is a constituent—are saying that there has been an increase in noise as a consequence of the new flights. Will the Minister tell us more about the aviation strategy and when that is coming? Specifically, why is there not a plan ahead of that strategy that Gatwick is required to adhere to, setting out metrics for how the increase in passengers and flights over the last few years will be mitigated through noise reduction and how future growth will ensure a reduction in noise? It is no good just saying that there will be a strategy in the future; our communities want action now.