To receive and consider the above report.

Councillor Dudley explained it was a very important decision for the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead but it is not one that has been arrived at suddenly. The Council had been campaigning tirelessly for years to protect residents against the effects of any expansion at Heathrow Airport. The Council was extremely supportive of what was a world class airport and the Borough wanted a better, not bigger airport.

Cllr Dudley stated that since 2008 there had been seven motions to Council relating to Heathrow. In January 2015, the Council commissioned Ipsos Mori to conduct research in respect of the views of the residents of the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead and at that time, the research came back broadly negative on the expansion at Heathrow Airport and significantly positive on the expansion of Gatwick Airport. The decision on the expansion of Heathrow Airport was imminent and due any day, in July 2016 the Council wanted to refresh the research from Ipsos Mori which was included in Appendix A. The questions asked of residents within the survey were very straight forward. Cllr Dudley was surprised that despite the amount of public relations work that had been done, that over the course of an 18 month period from January 2015 to July 2016, there was very little movement in the views of residents. The research took place across the Borough and came out with the position that was negative against the expansion at Heathrow and positive on the expansion of Gatwick Airport.

The Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead had joined together with the London Borough’s of Hillingdon, Richmond and Wandsworth; and the four local authorities together represented almost one million residents in the west of London. All four Local Authorities were united to protect those residents. There had been extensive dialogue with the government over the course of the last few months, and a letter had been sent to the previous Prime Minister in February 2016 which was also included in the report along with other correspondence. The Royal Borough and the three other local authorities were now awaiting the decision.

The London Borough’s of Hillingdon, Richmond and Wandsworth, along with the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead had not arrived at the decision to request a judicial review suddenly, they had been building up to it reluctantly over the course of the last few years but, it may never happen and Cllr Dudley stated he sincerely hoped the judicial review would not need to go ahead because the expansion at Heathrow Airport would not go ahead due to legal challenges, inability to satisfy environment and health and other significant factors that it wasn’t a choice to choose something that would never happen. So there was only one viable choice in front of the government at present which was the expansion of Gatwick Airport, which itself would still affect residents in that area and no one wanted to see people adversely affected anywhere but, it would only affect one tenth of the people it would affect should the expansion go ahead at Heathrow Airport.

In 2006, Cllr Dudley was part of the team that took BAA private and then refinanced it in 2008, he remembered the view of government at that time which was very strongly that they wanted the BAA monopoly dismantled and other assets to dismantle a dominant market position. Cllr Dudley dealt with that as a banker for years so, from his perspective, it made no sense at all to return to a position where government themselves had wanted to move away from which was a dominant market position. And on competition grounds as well, there should be two world class airports and that competitive choice for airlines and passengers, that is what the government wanted to do when they took BAA private and he could not understand why the government would reveres that direction as it did not make sense.

Cllr Dudley explained that the recommendations which included the potential spending of tax payers money, a total of £50k for the judicial review. To put that in context, there were in the region of 65,000 to 70,000 households within the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead; therefore, the proposed action would cost each household less than £1 to protect countless thousands residents who already were adversely effected by Heathrow Airport and with the expansion, the airport would be a mile closer to the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead and would adversely effect even more residents than at present to an even greater degree.

Cllr Jones who was not a voting Member of the Panel explained that in her opinion Heathrow expansion was not deliverable. The expansion would have a serious impact on residents. Noise levels in Old Windsor were already above World Health Organisation guidelines and further expansion and extra flight paths would be to the serious detriment to the residents she represents and the area that would effect would expand further into the Borough. Another reason the expansion is undeliverable was traffic congestion; the arterial routes were already congested and with the M4 and M25 with extra traffic which had not been considered, she felt the whole area would grind to a halt and people trying to get around and get to their places of work, the expansion would effect them immensely. Cllr Jones added she had lived in the Borough for 40 years and she was a supporter of Heathrow Airport as it was but, she did not support the expansion.

Cllr D Wilson stated that as a Maidenhead Councillor and Lead Member for Planning, he took the view along with Cllr Beer who was heavily involved with the Heathrow Airport Consultative Committee (HACC), and the Local Authorities Airport Noise Council, to prepare a letter to the then minister for Housing and Planning, Brandon Lewis and also sending a copy of the letter to the MP for Maidenhead, who was now the Prime Minister, Teresa May; the letter was to explain issue the Royal Borough would face with the potential expansion at Heathrow and a third additional runway. Part of the proposal was to increase the amount of housing required to fill the jobs they are proposing to make. Part of that would mean an additional 5,000 houses would need to be built within the 14 neighbouring authorities that surrounded Heathrow Airport, on top of demands already placed through the Strategic Housing Market Assessment. That sort of volume of housing when the Borough is already trying to meet its objectively assessed need figure which was 712 dwellings per annum, the commission in 2014 recommended 5,000 of those dwellings should be placed in each of the Boroughs surrounding Heathrow. Cllr D Wilson added there were a number of constraints within the Royal Borough such as Green Belt land, Crown Estate land, Special Sites of Scientific Interest, the Thames Basin and Special Protection Area and also the functional Flood Plane; all of those areas constrained where development could take place and he wanted to alert the Secretary of State as to the reasons of what the implications were likely to be if they were to  grant the third runway. Cllr D Wilson was very pleased he was able to send a copy of the letter to the then home secretary who was no the Prime Minister as it highlighted the issues faced in the Royal Borough and from that perspective, it was important to alert them to the particular issues.

Cllr Dudley wanted it on record that the Member of Parliament for Windsor, Adam Afriyie had fought a long campaign and had undertaken to continue with that campaign to protect his constituents. Councillor Dudley thanked him for his hard work and contribution.

Cllr Bicknell commented that some years previously, he was the Chairman of the Aviation Forum and Adam Afriyie attended several meetings of the Forum. He felt people needed to understand that it was about real lives that were affected. He understood the commercialism, and he understood that Heathrow was running at 98.5% capacity and from a business point of view, Heathrow felt that they needed to increase that; which meant increasing the number of flights and the number of passengers travelling through and that would automatically multiply the use of the infrastructure to support that level of activity. With regards to the night flights, there are children in the Borough that go to school and turn up to class tired because they had been woken up at 4am by aircraft noise, there are lots of technical reasons that he was aware of where the airport were limiting the number of night landings and take offs they were allowed to do but, for technical reasons, aircraft were getting around that which meant take offs and landings were happening at all different times of the night which woke children up and had an adverse impact on residents. Cllr Bicknell stated there was a danger of wrecking those children’s chances in life and it was not just about money and land grabbing from an overall view. Cllr Bicknell understood it that Heathrow had no intention of reducing or stopping any of those night flights. When looking at both sides of the proposals, it was about real people and real residents and the Ipsos Mori Poll showed the opinions. Gatwick made sense; he was currently Lead Member for Transport and a fast link between Heathrow and Gatwick, would take less than 30 minutes would not be a noticeable inconvenience to someone travelling. Cllr Bicknell confirmed he was very much in favour of the recommendations in the report and supported the proposals; although he hoped the situation would not come to that.

Cllr Dudley stated one of the Borough’s local papers was running a poll on the expansion at Heathrow and currently, residents were voting 73% in support of legal action; which was a significant democratic mandate.

The Legal officer explained to the Panel what the legal process was of a judicial review. The judicial review was a type of court proceeding which will challenge a decision made by a public authority, which in this case is a public government. It was important to understand the court will review whether the decision was made properly, taking into account the very important legal criteria and if a court finds it had not taken into account important criteria, in this case evidence such as noise and the extra pollution and deal with it properly, the court could quash the decision and send it back to the decision maker. They can not exchange the decision for what the court thinks best.

Alison Alexander, Managing Director & Strategic Director of Adults, Children and Health Services stated that the potential judicial review was across four local authorities so it was important that the authorities worked collectively and there was consistency. So what was being agreed was that there was a group across the four authorities that had officer representatives on and the Leaders of the four Council’s had conversations and there would be a memorandum of understanding to confirm how the four authorities would operate and then there would also be an internal working group Chaired by the Leader of the Council with the Lead Member for Environment Services, the Principal Member for Legal Services and HR and the Chairman of the Aviation Forum so that there was that forum so if approved today, the delegation was given to make decisions moving forward against any action that the Council took.

Cllr Beer stated he had represented the Borough on HACC for 17 years, he Chaired the Local Authorities Aircraft Noise Council for 9 years and been a member of it for 17 years, and that committee dealt with all environmental problems and it had been represented by the Lead Environmental Officers for approximately 16 Councils; it was a very active and well informed forum. It worked very closely with 2M which was very active in taking on the challenge of Terminal 5 which produced a number of safeguards for residents such as noise insulation for people worse effected by aircraft noise. Cllr Beer stated he attended quite a few of the open meetings of the Airport Commission and he pointed out there was no community representation there at all and was told their views would be taken on board at a later date. The problem with Heathrow is that it has outgrown its space and everything related to it. The figures state that there are 260,000 flights per year which was 54% growth than what was there currently. New aircraft took twice as many passengers than at the time of Terminal 5 being built so there were enormous numbers of people using the airport and travelling to and from it. Heathrow said it wanted 40% of its passengers to travel to and from the airport using public transport; they were now saying they wanted that to increase to 60% using public transport but, Heathrow never achieved the 40% so Cllr beer was not sure how Heathrow were going to increase public transport users to 60%.

Cllr Beer explained that he had teamed up with Cllr D Wilson to address the housing issues; the initial reports of the commission said it would be enormous numbers possibly up to 70,000 dwellings but the commission did not know, but on page 141 of the commission’s report, on each of the runway proposals at Heathrow and Gatwick, they only had one page on housing and they said it would be a considerable challenge to local authorities and they did not address it. One of the latest reports from the Commission states there are 100,000 people unemployed in West London already living there so there wont be the need to build extra housing. It was ludicrous.

Cllr Dudley thanked Cllr Beer on behalf of residents for the tireless work he had undertaken over the years.

Cllr Alexander a third runway would mean total disruption to the residents of his ward. He explained he moved to Windsor two years ago from where in Hertfordshire he spent 23 pleasant years where in his garden aircraft would fly over at 23,000ft off towards Stansted. The only difference now was that the planes flew over his garden at 2,300ft in a straight line when they came in from the west.  Cllr Alexander stated he had great affection for the London Borough of Hillingdon as he was born there; he had relations in Ickenham and Ruislip and there were concerns regarding construction disruption a third runway would cause; bearing in mind, they could also get HS2. The delivery of HS2 around Ickenham along with the delivery of a third runway at Heathrow, it could end up with a construction perfect storm. And that was a real concern and not something that should be ignored. Gatwick is the right proposal. Cllr Alexander saw a plan approximately ten years ago looking down on Heathrow in the middle with hub airports around the edge in the form of Luton, Gatwick and Stansted with a road system that linked it with roadways and carriageways that would have cost a fraction of what it would cost for the expansion at Heathrow.

Cllr David Hilton stated residents would chose he came to speak in support of the recommendation in the report and he spoke for them. He wondered if Members were aware that the only noise limits measured at Heathrow were 6.5km from the point Aircraft started to roll on the runway. No other constraints and the regulator had no powers to constrain or moderate aircraft noise. So, shamefully, residents in Windsor, Old Windsor, Ascot and the Sunnings had absolutely no protection. Residents understood the impact of aircraft noise and for them, a third runway at Heathrow was a frightening prospect. He applauded the determination and responsibility of Cllr Cox and Cllr Dudley in presenting the paper and for the Council overall for speaking out on behalf of the residents who knew that the council would do all it could to afford them some protection.

Cllr Hilton explained that he attended Heathrow’s Community Noise Forum and spoke to people from Runnymede, Spelthorne, Surrey Heath and Bracknell and they wished their local Council’s took this issue as seriously as the royal Borough did. Cllr Hilton wholeheartedly support the Council’s recommendations.

Cllr Bateson said she echoed what Cllr Hilton said and added that when she bought her house, she bought it in Ascot because it was not directly under the flight path but now, it was very noisy as it was directly under the flight path. Therefore, she could understand what the residents of Wraysbury, Horton and Windsor had been going through for many years. Children waking early in the morning due to morning flights. And in the evening, there were the very late flights going over at 11 or 12pm as well as the early morning flights at 5 or 6am. The other issue was the congestion and it was not just the congestion on the M25 or the M4 but, where the South of the Borough reached round to the M3, that was used by residents in the South of the Borough and that was badly congested without the expansion. Cllr Bateson added there were already three runways at Heathrow as one of them used to be used when there were high winds, although not in use anymore so, theoretically there are three runways at Heathrow but Gatwick only had one runway. Sensibly, Gatwick was the right choice for expansion.

Cllr Dudley read out a statement from Councillor Colin Rayner which stated he gave the Council his full support to fund legal action against expansion at Heathrow and he was there to protect his residents.

Cllr Bowden stated there were mentions of a land grab, and he wanted to provide some technical detail on that. Runway three would be one mile closer to the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead, so West Windsor and the Whole of Windsor, aircraft would be 300ft lower, noisier and more often. The three runway operation for Heathrow meant there would be parallel operations there on either the centre and the offset runway or on either side and it would also increase the mixed mode and alter the alteration which took place on westerlies which took place at three o’clock each day over the Hounslow area. To achieve the runway, they would need to build a tunnel under the M25 that would be eight lanes wide and would need to go over an additional hill to exit to cut clear the M4; which would create congestion and pollution problems. Cllr Bowden added to the residents, not to use the A4 as that would need to be diverted and also the Stanmore Road which would be used permanently by freight vehicles, passenger vehicles as well as other road users and would act as a diversion route for the M4 and M25. Terminal 5 would be extended and double in size. To facilitate the new runway, the waste and energy plant at Colnbrook would need to be removed and relocated. The BT Data Centre would need to be moved, the detention centre in Harmondsworth would need to be moved along with a number of hotels as well as a substantial number of residential properties. That was trying to offset by increased rail access by Heathrow for passengers which was feasible from the western side but, did not seem to know anything about the four level crossings at Clapham Junction or, the level crossings in Sunningdale. Cllr Bowden added he had been a resident since 1973 in Staines and then 20 years in Windsor, he knew about the airport, he accepted that and the aircraft but, Heathrow was big enough as it was and it could not get any bigger.

Robert Barnstone, Stop Heathrow Expansion, stated his group was based in Harmondsworth which was the village facing demolition. A lot of the residents were completely reassured that their local authority along with the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead and the other two local authorities were standing up for their homes, their livelihoods, their places of worship and their schools and he echoed the comments made by Cllr Hilton that people that happen to live in local authorities such as Slough and Spelthorne that very strongly support the expansion at Heathrow feel unrepresented and a lot of residents had been in touch to say they were pleased with what the local authority was doing.

Cllr Dudley stated he felt there had been a full discussion around the report. The mandate to propose the judicial review was that there were 57 Councillors within the Royal Borough, and all 57 Councillors irrespective of their politics stood in May 2015 on a mandate of no expansion at Heathrow Airport so there was unanimity across the Borough. The Conservative group had two manifesto commitments which were to maintain the lobby against Heathrow expansion and to continue the campaign against Heathrow expansion and to protect Windsor from night flights and more aeroplanes. Therefore, every conservative Councillor stood on a mandate to prevent the expansion at Heathrow Airport. Cllr Dudley added the Council had locked together with three other local authorities who represent one million people. The Council was initially approving from the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead £50,000 of funding for potential legal action against expansion. The Borough was ready to take such legal action if a decision was taken to expand Heathrow Airport. The Council did not need to do that because a decision was yet to be made and the Borough sincerely believed that the only deliverable option was expansion at Gatwick Airport. The Council would not spend the money if the government chose to expand Gatwick.

Cllr Dudley asked all Members present who were not Members of the Panel if they supported the recommendations, they unanimously agreed.

UNANIMOUSLY RESOLVED: That Cabinet:

1.    Delegates authority to the Leader of the Council and Managing Director in consultation with an internal ‘Heathrow/JR working group’, chaired by the Leader and including the Lead Member for Environmental Services & Parking, Principal Member for Human Resources and Legal, Chairman of the Aviation Forum, Managing Director, Strategic Director of Operations & Customer Services, to build a robust Judicial Review case against any decision made by Government to expand Heathrow Airport and to give instructions for the issue of legal proceedings if appropriate.

2.    Approves (if required) sharing of the Royal Borough’s position to the Aviation Forum, scheduled for 3 November 2016.