Pilots, aviation lobby groups, GA businesses and flying enthusiasts have given the Government a bloody nose over its latest attempt to sneak through a change to the definition of airfields as ‘brownfield’ sites.

The change, if it had been left unchallenged, could have led to several of Britain’s active aerodromes being developed as housing estates.

A huge response to an internet and email campaign launched in mid-February has forced the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister – John Prescott’s dept – into a humiliating climbdown.

What’s more, and just as important, GA has proven to the Government, planners and developers that we’re on the case – no longer a pushover. The campaign to force the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister into a U-turn happened suddenly in early February.

A draft planning guidance document compiled by the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister (ODPM), which has final responsibility for planning matters, had been put out to consultation last December. The consultation period ended on 27 February. Hidden away in a clause of an Annex document was a bombshell for aviation – sneaked in by the ODPM and only spotted at the last minute.

For that we can thank John Brady of the Popular Flying Association and Anna Bloomfield, planning coordinator at the General Aviation Awareness Council (GAAC), which has a special remit to watch over airfields. In fact, Prescott’s bureaucrats were worse than sneaky – they specifically excluded one sentence from the current guidelines.

“The fact that it has been removed makes the change very hard to spot, unless one compares the existing and proposed documents line by line,” said Ms Bloomfield. The ODPM’s response was a mealy-mouthed admission.

A spokesman told the Daily Telegraph that the policy had not changed and that the ODPM would now “happily consider reinstating” the missing wording in the draft guidance.

“For purely editing reasons, that statement was not in the draft document,” said the spokesman.

No one believes the ‘editing error’ argument, of course, and we have to remain vigilant to make sure the change is made in the final planning guidance.

The GeneralAviation Awareness Council is the body which watches over airfields and responds on behalf of all those organisations and individuals who cannot directly lobby themselves. It has a planning coordinator, Anna Bloomfield, who prepares responses, and GAAC also produces advice for airfields including fact sheets on safeguarding their use. GAAC relies on Voluntary contributions.

Contact them at:
GAAC
c/o RAeS House
4 Hamilton Place
London
W1J 7BQ
W: www.gaac.org.uk