PRESENT: Councillors George Bathurst (Chairman), Malcolm Beer and John Lenton.

Also in attendance: Richard Bolt, Robert Buick, Councillor Wisdom Da Costa, Nigel Dailes, Sally Hayes, John Holdstock, M Jamieson, Paul Jennings, Duncan Reed, Councillor Dexter Smith (Slough Borough Council), Jane Snell, Dan Whiteway, Councillor Lynda Yong

Officers: Rob Cowan, Louisa Dean, Craig Miller, Chris Nash.

ITEM 1 – WELCOME

The Chairman welcomed the Forum. The Forum and attendees introduced themselves. The Chairman informed the Forum that the meeting would be audio recorded.

ITEM 2 - APOLOGIES FOR ABSENCE

Apologies were received from Andrew Davies.

ITEM 3 - DECLARATIONS OF INTEREST

Councillor Malcolm Beer declared a personal interest as he was affected by the aircrafts which flew over Old Windsor.

ITEM 4 - MINUTES

RESOLVED: That the minutes of the meeting of the Forum held on 26 August 2014 be approved subject to the following amendments:
At the foot of page i, “…equal to 25% of a property’s unblighted value” was amended to “was in addition to” which was 125% not 25%.
At the second paragraph of page ii, the effected area would be far greater than Ascot and Sunningdale as was minuted.
At the fourth paragraph of page ii, “it was suggested the Chairman draft a letter…” be amended to “it was agreed the Chairman draft a letter…”
At the seventh paragraph of page ii, “the use of a technical working group was also suggested” be amended to “the use of a technical working group was agreed”.
At the fifth paragraph of page iii, “He suggested a special addition be published early” be amended to “He suggested a special edition be published early”.

Councillor Malcolm Beer stated that he did not believe the tone of the minutes accurately reflected the tone of the meeting. However he believed this would be to much to try to alter.


ITEM 5 – MATTERS ARISING

Chris Nash, Team Leader - Environment Protection, provided an update regarding item 7 of the minutes, entitled Runway Alternation. He stated that there was an update regarding the Cranford Agreement. The Cranford Agreement was described as a government commitment to abolish. There was an appeal against a planning application submitted by Heathrow which was refused by the London Borough of Hillingdon. This had been given a timescale by the planning inspectorate, the deadline for which was the week beginning 17 November 2014.

It was noted that RBWM had historically made representations to Hillingdon and it was advised by Mr Nash that the Royal Borough should, with the agreement of the Forum, make representations to the planning inspectorate. Mr Nash stated that he would circulate a draft of the representations electronically outside of the meeting if this was agreed by the Forum.

The Forum agreed to Mr Nash preparing a draft of the RBWM representation and electronically circulating the draft for comment to the Forum before submitting it to the planning inspectorate.

Councillor Beer stated that his interpretation of the closure date for submissions was in fact the coming Monday (17 November 2014) but it could be the following Wednesday (19 November 2014). The point was however that the deadline was imminent. The application to alter a couple of the feeder routes to the runway was refused by Hillington on the basis that there were not enough safeguards in regard to the extra noise mitigation. Hounslow in fact were very supportive of that because one of their schools, which was within Cranford and a short distance away from the end of the runway, would have been absolutely impossible to use. Therefore, if the planning application was granted, Hounslow would have to pay for a new school.

It was noted that the school was not made the subject of any observation or complaint when other measures were expressed for Heathrow, like the third runway or alternations. Previously, no one had mentioned the school was there and it was only now, when dealing with the Cranford Agreement, that the school had been used as a piece of evidence to support their viewpoint.

The Forum also noted that there were errors in Heathrow Airport’s own submission. Firstly, they stated that the Cranford Agreement originally stopped only take-offs flying over Cranford when in fact it stopped any flights over Cranford. It was only subsequently that landings were permitted when the school was already in situ. To resolve one of their own problems when the northern runway was extending to the west, it became more popular for take off, as a result there were more landings on the southerly runway which already had maximum take-offs to the east. It was then that runway alternation was introduced. Critically, to resolve their own problem the school was not considered a problem but once the situation was used to resolve other people’s problems the school became a problem. Secondly, since the Cranford Agreement was implemented, the northerly runway had been extended approximately two thirds of a mile to the West. Thus, the natural point of take-off would have the aircraft much higher over Cranford than was originally envisaged. It was believed these points needed to be included in any submission made.

The Forum questioned whether individuals should make their own submissions in addition to the RBWM submission. There was disagreement as to whether a single submission from the Borough was the best approach. One view expressed was multiple submissions would appear to be a very spasmodic approach. It was noted that the Forum had previously agreed to a single submission. Councillor Beer believed duplication and even triplication of objections was the best approach as one response did not ‘ring the bell’ quite as much. Therefore Residence Associations and Parish Councils should get involved as well. However it was important that there was agreement from the various objections.

Councillor Beer also stated that the problems with aircraft noise had shifted from the time the Cranford Agreement was initiated as take-off was the big noise maker due to the difficulty getting the planes up in the air. Nowadays however landings were noisier than take-offs. Therefore the emphasis had changed over the years. Another point that made it essential that RBWM produced a very strong response was that the two London Boroughs, Hillingdon and Hounslow, were very strongly opposed to the removal of the Cranford Agreement. There was also a very strong residents’ group in Ealing which would probably ‘gee up’ Ealing Borough to also oppose it. RBWM would be the only ones to reap the benefits which Windsor and Maidenhead would get, i.e. relieving the town centre of West Windsor of constant landing flights and disperse those by 50%, and Councillor Beer’s own community of Old Windsor, and also Wraysbury. Therefore the Royal Borough needed a powerful submission and Councillor Beer asked that the Aviation Forum support having a barrister or someone of that ilk to speak for them at the enquiry. If all that was submitted was a couple of letters to read, there would not be any clout behind it, therefore somebody with some status was needed to state the case and disagree with the barristers instructed by the London Boroughs. Councillor Beer stated that this was the biggest single issue to affect the community for years and it was important that the opportunity was not missed.

The Chairman stated much of what Councillor Beer had said had already been agreed at a previous Aviation Forum meeting, though it did no harm to reiterate the points again. The Forum had previously discussed instructing a barrister to make RBWM’s case and producing a proper submission. This was the reason the matter was not on the agenda for the current meeting. What needed to be done now was to produce the submission.

Mr Nash clarified that there were seven key points in the original submission. These were the changing character, no respite on easterly take-offs with 650 aircraft movements over Windsor on those days, the need to share the burden equally while acknowledging that Old Windsor and Wraysbury would have as much as 50% of the burden. Also, highlighting the dangers of mixed mode, the noise parameters surrounding it and advocating the need for the cap to remain in situ. In addition, the Forum could agree to the inclusion of the need for the Cranford Agreement to be abolished, highlighting that the Agreement stopped all flights over Cranford, not just take-offs. The submission should also refer to the very firm commitments in Heathrow’s own action plan which could be used to bolster the RBWM submission. Furthermore, RBWM would request attendance at the enquiry.

It was noted the rather than just using words, the submission should also include numbers. For example, between 1 and 21 September, there were 9000 movements coming on nine-left, and there were just over 900 coming on nine-right. There were two days during that period when there westerlies and it showed a totally even distribution. That demonstrated the problem by putting numbers to it. Councillor Wisdom Da Costa agreed to pass on the collected data to Mr Nash to be included in the submission.

Councillor Beer noted that the previous submissions sought enhanced mitigation measures for Wraysbury and Old Windsor. At the present time only a portion of Wraysbury and the sewage works in Old Windsor benefitted from mitigation and was not much help to the community. Councillor Beer believed there was a special case in that the Borough side of the airport was a quiet community and the ambient noise levels were low and therefore it should be requested that the thresholds be lowered to 55 decibels instead of the current 57 decibels which was applied to the busy London communities.

It was believed that, if Residents’ Associations were to make their own submissions, could submissions be made at appeal if a submission had not been made to the original application. The Chairman reiterated that current noise levels were unacceptable.

RESOLVED: Chris Nash, Team Leader - Environment Protection, prepare a draft of the RBWM representations and electronically circulate the draft for comment to the Forum before submitting it to the planning inspectorate.

ITEM 6 – CAMPAIGN AGAINST R3

The Forum received an update from Chris Nash, Team Leader - Environment Protection and Louisa Dean, Communications and Marketing Manager regarding the RBWM Campaign against Runway 3. It was noted that Ms Dean had taken over the role of Communications and Marketing Manager on 1 September 2014.

Ms Dean stated that the Forum needed to decide what the campaign needed to focus on. Ms Dean referred to the 5 points noted in the agenda papers, these were:

Raising awareness of the flights trials,
Promoting the Aviation Forum and any other Borough meetings related to Heathrow,
Promoting that RBWM is against runway 3 at Heathrow and any further expansion,
Promoting RBWM’s stance in favour of the abandonment of the Cranford Agreement, and
Promoting noise compensation for residents.

It was noted that press releases had been produced and the website had been updated. Ms Dean stated that funding would be required for a more engaging and worthwhile campaign.

The Chairman reminded the Forum that he asked officers to look at the various campaigning bodies such as LAANC and 2M who were moribund. He believed that work needed to ‘go up a gear’.

Councillor Lynda Yong requested that ‘Ascot Matters’ and the Ascot Neighbourhood Watch be included in circulating information. On the same issue, it was requested that the West Windsor Residents Association website be utilised as it was very active. The Chairman stated that the focus needed to be on influencing Members of Parliament and the political environment. He highlighted that many years had been spent focusing on technical things but now work needed to move beyond that.

Councillor Da Costa described the techniques being used to campaign as ‘local authority-ish’ and non-aggressive. He questioned how campaigning could be more aggressive. Ms Dean highlighted the need for cooperation for getting the message out. Councillor Da Costa believed that funding was required to make the campaign more aggressive. It was noted that this was the intended course of action however the Chairman cautioned that this would depend on funding being secured.

Duncan Reed, a regular attendee, noted that residents felt powerless. He described attending a recent Windsor Business Forum at which a Heathrow representative had presented. Mr Reed expressed concern that the representative had been cocky. It was noted that once the message had been sent out, residents were to complain so Heathrow were swamped with complaints. Also, central government needed to be lobbied so a majority of Parliament were against expanding Heathrow. It was noted that the message still needed to go out that residents needed to complain each time they were disturbed, not just once. Councillor Yong highlighted that Around the Royal Borough was the best way to do this. Councillor Da Costa believed that the Local Authority needed to log data on their own database.

It was suggested that the noise line be reintroduced to maintain residents’ interest in continuing to complain and also to monitor how many people have complained. Mr Nash noted that the Borough’s website had been revamped and included a report and issue button allowing logs to be made electronically. The relevant information was available at http://www.rbwm.gov.uk/web/aviation_get_involved.htm. It would be up to the campaign as to how the information would be used. It was noted that budget had also been secured for two new aviation noise monitors which would be installed in the imminent future, located on the roof of York House and Old Windsor Parish Hall. All updates would be on the website, with a link on the front page.

It was noted that the West Windsor Residents’ Association had challenged the last Back Heathrow Campaign. It was suggested that the Forum do the same and publish the information through a press release.

John Holdstock, a regular attendee, noted that, through the Neighbourhood Plan process, there was a number of Residents’ Groups in Windsor and they needed to be mobilised. Also, he highlighted a debate on the matter on Berkshire Radio had taken place earlier in the year which had generated good coverage. Mr Holdstock noted this could be done again.

Michael Jamieson, a regular attendee, stated that although he welcomed the developments mentioned at the current meeting, he was disappointment at the Borough’s overall response over the last 4 or 5 years. He believed such ideas should have been implemented 3 years ago as it was January 2009 when the Secretary of State stated the Cranford Agreement essentially no longer existed and Heathrow had to abolish it and make new arrangements. Heathrow however had sat back and let things carry on. The Aviation Forum should have got their act together a lot sooner. Mr Jamieson believed there was a danger that a reasoned objection to the appeal needed to be done within a week and he hoped the Forum did not miss the boat.

Councillor John Lenton noted that it was important not to mix up the different campaigns concerning Runway 3, the abolition of the Cranford Agreement and other Heathrow developments. He re-iterated that the Forum did not wish to see the closure of Heathrow and did not want to disrupt it. However the Forum did not want Heathrow to build runway 3 towards the Royal Borough. Furthermore, it was Borough policy to support a new runway at Gatwick Airport. Councillor Lenton also noted that debating which areas of the Borough got the worst of the present noise which had taken far too much publicity.

It was noted by the Forum that flights across Eton Wick were full planes crossing the Atlantic filled to capacity with cargo and people, unlike flights coming in across Windsor and Debworth which were empty. However Runway 3 would result in the transportation of more passengers across the Atlantic making it impossible to live there because of the noise. The Chairman noted that the noise was also unacceptable in Central Windsor. Councillor Yong believed that the weight of the planes was the issue due to the volume of freight being moved, with 70% of all England’s freight being transported out of Heathrow. This made the planes heavy and fly low. Another runway would increase the amount of freight being transported. The Chairman noted that this undermined Heathrow’s argument that they needed a Hub as they were expanding for their own benefit.

Councillor Beer stated that at the beginning of the year, Heathrow announced they had received more than 70% seat capacity on their airlines for the first time. He pointed out that a third of the seats were vacant and if these were filled less planes would be required. He noted that the London Borough of Richmond upon Thames had a very comprehensive noise line which must require a lot of funding, and their reports were submitted with the Heathrow Airport Committee papers every meeting. They had an enormous number of responses because their noise line was very accessible. The Back Heathrow Campaign stated that if Boris Island was adopted Heathrow would have to close, Councillor Beer believed this to be untrue and that this should have been disputed. A further campaign was published shortly afterwards, still ‘singing the same song’ even though Boris Island had been scrapped. He believed Heathrow were trying to frighten people because everyone knew someone who worked at the airport and didn’t want to jettison them on to the scrap heap. Councillor Beer noted that the objections needed to be copied to the Airports Commission because Heathrow would just say they had received a lot of complaints but would not publish them in detail. The Airport Commission were the people making the recommendations and so they were the people whose cage the Aviation Forum needed to be rattling while they were still finalising their recommendations.

Councillor Beer stated that as soon as the Commission’s recommendations were made, that was the time the Borough needed all its guns primed and ready to fire and that should be done now in anticipation. Councillor Beer also noted the Wide Noise project, in which comments made had expressed annoyance. Councillor Beer believed that this information should be used and analysed to produce a report rather than just state the project was not conclusive or scientific.

It was agreed by the Forum that the response to the Back Heathrow Campaign should be incorporated into the response to Airport Commission rather than a separate response. Mr Nash noted that this would consider the Back Heathrow Campaign to be a Heathrow Campaign under another guise. Councillor Lenton warned that care needed to be taken with how to handle Slough as the Slough MP supported the expansion of Heathrow.

It was stated that one of the biggest mistakes over the past couple of months had been preventing Councillor Beer from providing an article for the ‘Around the Royal Borough’ publication which was the obvious medium for circulating the message. Ms Dean stated that she had written a whole page dedicated to aviation issues to be published next month. It was noted that there were many issues which the Council had to communicate to residents of which aviation was only one. Councillor Beer stated that he was told by the Lead Member for Community Partnerships his input was not required despite attending 165 meetings at Heathrow.

Mr Holdstock expressed concern that Councillor Beer was not more involved as he possessed expertise no other Councillor possessed, and was deeply committed to the issues. He stated that residents wanted to know they were being well represented and guided people who were knowledgeable. The Chairman believed that there had been a lot of input and he had forwarded on a number of emails from Councillor Beer. Councillor Lenton noted that the target was the Airports Commission who did not read Around the Royal Borough. He believed the Forum needed to target where it could hit home. It was stated however that the Forum had a duty to the public and the public were not getting a lot of the available information because of the exclusion of input from Councillor Beer.

ITEM 7 – ASCOT TRIALS FEEDBACK

The Forum received an update from Chris Nash, Team Leader - Environment Protection, regarding the Ascot Trials.

It was noted that, since the last Forum meeting, there was a public meeting on 13 October 2014 where various representatives from Heathrow, the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) and National Air Traffic Services (NATS) attended. At that meeting it was announced trials were to be terminated at the end of play on Tuesday 11 November 2014.

It was communicated at that meeting that the Borough received no formal consultation about the trials. It was noted that trials were for take-offs only. This was described as unacceptable as the Local Authority should have been made aware of the trials prior to their commencement. Since then, Members and officers had written to the CAA requesting a legal response as to why this was the case. There were also questions over the legality of the trials extending over 90 days.

During discussions, it was questioned whether the newly founded Heathrow Noise Forum was made aware or formed any part of the consultative process. Mr Nash informed the Forum that he had obtained a copy of the HNF’s terms of reference which indicated that the HNF was to echo the views of Local Authorities but it did not state that it should be a consultative route for the airport to inform other Local Authorities. There was only one Local Authority with a seat on the HNF membership. As such, officers had written to the CAA asking for the best way for future communications to be escalated down. It was noted that the CAA was scheduled to publish their best practice guidance for the communication of environmental noise impact in the autumn. An aviation environmental portal had also been discussed as a means of communicating trials in future. Mr Nash informed the Forum that he intended to provide an update when this guidance was published.

Councillor Beer noted that he had queried the fact that Heathrow had said there would be trials at the Heathrow meetings. They had stated on two occasions that they would let everybody know before the trials started however they did not publish the details. Councillor Beer believed it was controlled outside of Heathrow’s remit with the CAA and NATS. Councillor Beer stated that two flight plans had been split into two and as a result flights were going through the middle over Old Windsor. He noted that in trying to cure one problem Heathrow had made things much worse for everybody.

Councillor Beer noted that the HNF had replaced the Noise and Track Keeping Group which had been attended primarily by environmental officers from the Local Authorities and the Heathrow flight management team. Councillor Beer stated that perhaps the environmental officers had been too frank and honest. The ongoing freedom of operation trials, which had taken place a few years ago, had proven to be totally ineffective and a waste of time only because the environmental officers had closely scrutinised the information. It was noted that, to Heathrow’s credit, they had put all the facts on the table to be analysed. Councillor Beer believed the HNF had been set up because the Noise and Track Keeping Group was too inquisitive. Questions were raised as to the whether the HNF complied with requirements for consultation under the Civil Aviation Act.

There were 12 people on the Noise Forum, three of which were from Local Authorities. One of these representatives was from Hounslow who was very good and one was from the Greater London Authority however nobody knew who he was and what he knew about Heathrow. The third Local Authority representative had yet to be appointed. Councillor Beer stated that they were not consulting with the community and the HNF was a smokescreen.

Councillor Yong stated that the next planned trial had now been cancelled. Further trials would take place next autumn. Councillor Yong also noted that the public meeting was very well attended with all 800 available seats occupied, which showed the strength of feeling amongst residents. The community was described as engaged with the problem. The outcome of the meeting was residents felt BAA were very disingenuous. Residents had complained about the low flying aircraft and BAA said their monitoring of the height of flights showed they were not flying below 3,300 feet over Ascot. However they failed to tell people that Ascot was 300-400 feet higher than Heathrow which made the flights over Ascot very low. Councillor Yong expressed a desire for the Borough to take more of an interest in the weight of the aircraft, and lobby for aircrafts to be fined. She noted that airlines made more money from increasing the amount of freight they transported and as it was disrupting communities, that money should therefore go back to the communities via fines. In response, it was noted that mechanisms were in place to fine airlines for exceeding noise limitations. Councillor Lenton noted that fines could not be given to airlines for following the routes they were given by air traffic control.

Councillor Lenton also noted that Heathrow had been taken by surprise by the reaction to flights over Ascot. He noted that he had spoken to the deputy public relations director who stated she had been amazed by the response. Councillor Lenton stated that if the trials had been announced, they would have had screams about noise before it even happened. The fact that the reaction was spurred by real noise as opposed to apprehensions certainly had its effect.

It was noted that the changing of the routes was to allow for modernisation which the Chairman believed to be code for increased volume. Nr Nash stated that the change was driven by economics rather than the tidying up of air space. It was estimated that modernisation of the air flight strategy would mean by 2020 it would deliver £150 million worth of savings to the aviation industry with approximately £200 billion in cumulative benefits by 2030.
It was noted that, prior to trials, aircraft had to take off at a 45 degree angle, however the goals had been to reduce that by up to 30 degrees. This would allow for three times as many flights to take off in the same time frame. It had been shown that Heathrow had not had any queues in their take offs. It was questioned that if that had been successful, did Heathrow still want a third runway.

Councillor Beer stated he attended a meeting of London Airspace Management Programme (LAMP) on behalf of Local Authorities Aircraft Noise Council (LAANC). LAMP was a 10 year programme to try to clear up the mess over the south east of England with too many planes in the air at one time, to allow for more planes. This was part of the European strategy which was linked to what was going on in America as it was an international world. He noted that the project was not entirely profit motivated.

He noted that he obtained information regarding the trials over Old Windsor. He described the movements like three swarms of bees across the flight paths. The heights of the flights varied between 1500 feet and 5,500 feet. He did not see why there should be such variation. It was noted that there were 5 sound monitors along the line of Coppermill Road, Wraysbury.

Councillor Beer noted that LAANC was not moribund. He described LAANC as the most powerful Local Government organisation. He noted that he had been working on the website for LAANC which was now live.

ITEM 8 – AIRPORT COMMISSION RESPONSE

The Forum received an update from Chris Nash, Team Leader - Environment Protection, regarding the Airport Commission Response.

It was noted that the Airport Commission would enter into purdah at the end of December 2014 through to June 2015 so as not to involve itself with the general election. It could therefore be assumed that the final consultation would be received imminently on the three potential options. Howard Davies, the Chairman of the Commission, had indicated that he had received further detail he was expecting. It was also noted that the Thames Estuary ‘Boris Island’ proposal had been omitted from the list.

RBWM had already made submissions to the Airport Commission regarding the current issues affecting the Borough. Mr Nash recommended the Technical Group should meet as soon as the consultation came out and consider the key themes on the agenda.

Mr Nash noted that the key themes should be identified by the Forum with a view to being discussed at the Technical Group in further detail. Historically, the themes commented on included:
The cap on the number of flights.
The Borough was against runway 3 completely.
The abandonment of the Cranford Agreement.
Increased mitigation for residents who were affected.
Noise policy in terms of inconsistencies in the Aviation Policy Framework.
The need for an effective study such as ANARCE (incorporating the Wide Noise feedback).
Connectivity and the over-reliance on the Hub argument.
The Independent Noise Authority advocated the need for tighter regulation on Heathrow.
Effect on the housing demand throughout the Borough and green space.

It was noted that the date of the Technical Group meeting would be released imminently.

Councillor Beer believed technical detail was necessary to support argument. He noted there would be an increase of 26,000 flights per annum which was an increase of 54%. He also noted that there would be 120,000 extra workers. He stated that the Borough had a housing crisis already and questioned where the extra workers would live. He stated that if they were well paid they would displace people of limited means and if workers lived outside the community this would require extra transport. He believed the housing issue to be more important than noise.

Mr Holdstock stated that the 120,000 workers would come with their families which could total a third of a million people. He felt the whole driver of expansion was the desire of Heathrow Airport Limited and British Airways to improve their business and that they had wrapped up the case in a cause to improve the country’s competitiveness abroad. He described the matter as an utter nonsense. Mr Holdstock questioned whether resources were available to take apart the real business case for the country and separate out the interests of Heathrow Airport Limited and British Airways. The Chairman stated that he entirely agreed with Mr Holdstock’s comments. Additionally, it was also noted that traffic infrastructure was already unable to cope with current traffic levels.

Councillor Lenton stated there was a political game going on. Politicians were keen to state how many jobs a project would create rather than stating how much value the project would add. He believed that Heathrow was not so inefficient as to require as many as 120,000 additional workers to service a 3^rd runway. He believed the number of additional workers would however be more than the area could cope with.

It was noted that the Borough supported Gatwick Airport on economic grounds. This was not to say RBWM supported Gatwick’s proposals in the entirety. The Borough’s position was, on economic grounds, the Gatwick proposal made more sense than Heathrow’s proposals. Councillor Lenton believed it would be foolish to argue the detail of how Gatwick could be constructed. He noted that the market was changing as there was an increase in business for low cost airlines, for example Norwegian Airlines offered transatlantic flights from Gatwick.

Craig Miller, Community Protection and Enforcement Lead, questioned who the Technical Group would be. It was noted that Councillor Lenton would chair the group and Councillor Beer would also be involved. West Windsor Residents Association stated they would be willing to take part. Councillor Yong requested she be sent an email which she would circulate to a wider distribution which included retired pilots.

RESOLVED: Chris Nash, Team Leader - Environment Protection to set a date for the Technical Group.

ITEM 9 – PARTNERSHIP BODIES

The Forum also received an update from Councillor Beer regarding the recent activity of LAANC (Local Authorities Aircraft Noise Council). It was noted that LAANC was very busy, progressive and aggressive. Most of the senior technical officers from the London Boroughs were involved. Additionally, people with further expertise had been co-opted onto the Council. He noted that LAANC had managed to get a knowledgeable environmental officer on to HACC (Heathrow Airport Consultative Committee) despite the fact HACC usually did not accommodate technical officers. It was hoped more people would attend LAANC meetings which had historically taken place on Friday afternoons as officers did not have meeting commitments. In 2015 meetings would take place on Friday mornings. Councillor Beer reiterated the fact that the LAANC website was up and running and could be accessed at: www.laanc-heathrow.org.uk.

The Forum received an update from Councillor Beer regarding the recent activity of HACC (Heathrow Airport Consultative Committee). It was noted that HACC was required by legislation for all of the busier airports. HACC was the biggest of the consultative committees and was experiencing changes to membership with a reduction in Local Authority representatives. RBWM had one representative. A number of London Boroughs had more representatives though this was to be reduced. This reduction meant that the Local Authorities ability to represent local communities was being eroded. Local Authorities represented entire communities, including residents, local businesses and users of Heathrow. The industry was also well represented and there were 8 independent representatives though it was unclear who they actually represented. 20-25 people usually attended the HACC meetings. It was also noted that the Chairman was retiring.

Councillor Beer stated that the reduction in the HACC membership should be a separate agenda item at a future meeting.

ITEM 10 – ANY OTHER BUSINESS

Councillor Da Costa questioned how more resource money would be obtained. Mr Miller stated officers needed to submit a bid to Members outlining what they wanted to do and the resources required. Mr Miller stated that he had would report back to the Forum to discuss the success of the bid.

Councillor Beer requested a further meeting to take place immediately after the publication of the Airport Commission’s recommendations. The Chairman stated that this would be for the Technical Group to discuss.

The Forum noted that some attendees believed the Forum was not fit for purpose in addressing problems which were likely to arise in the near future. It was believed that the Forum was behind the ball on every matter including the Cranford Agreement and the 3^rd Runway at Heathrow. It was noted that the Forum did not make enough use of Councillor Beer and did not consult him on all press releases as required by the Forum’s terms of reference. The Chairman disagreed that Councillor Beer had been underused.

RESOLVED: Craig Miller, Community Protection and Enforcement Lead, to report back to the Forum regarding the bid for additional resources.

ITEM 11 – DATES OF FUTURE MEETINGS

The dates of future meetings were noted as follows:

16 February 2015

However it was noted a further meeting may need to be organised before February. The date of this extra meeting, should it be required, would be confirmed to the Forum electronically.

MEETING

The meeting, which began at 7.00pm ended at 8.40pm.