Airlines bid to ground Cliffe plan
BRITAIN'S airlines, led by British Airways and Virgin Atlantic, will tell Transport Secretary Alistair Darling this week that Government proposals for a major new airport at Cliffe on the north Kent marches should be ditched.
Freedom to Fly, the coalition of Britain's aviation industry that also includes Heathrow, Gatwick and Stansted airports operator BAA, will deliver a letter to Darling this week saying that a greenfield development at Cliffe is 'simply unsustainable'.
Darling is currently consulting on a White Paper to work out where new runways need to be located to secure London's pre-eminence in aviation and economic terms.
By ruling out a development at Cliffe, Freedom to Fly says it is trying to offer an olive branch to environmental groups Friends of the Earth and Airportwatch and prevent them using the courts to delay the consultation process further. In the winter Darling's plans were derailed by green lobby tactics that secured a High Court injunction to force the Government to reconsider plans for a runway at Gatwick.
