Greg Clark MP is our the Member of Parliament for Tunbridge Wells.
Copy and paste the Bidborough Action Group suggested letter to Greg at either:
[email protected] or
Greg Clark MP
House of Commons
London
SW1A 0AA
[Insert your address]
Dear Mr Greg Clark,
I live in Tunbridge Wells which is under a flightpath for Gatwick
arrivals. I am writing to express concern at the way Gatwick Airport is
currently operating without due regard for the noise and air pollution caused
to residents and local businesses with particular respect
to:
•Ongoing increase of flights both during the day and especially
at night
•Imposed route changes with aeroplane ‘Superhighway’ and arrival
frequency of up to one plane every
minute.
•A Second Runway that could result in a further doubling and
possible tripling of plane flights and additional
Superhighways.
From November, according to Gatwick’s latest‘Consultation’, your
constituency will have all of Gatwick’s arriving planes concentrated over it on
one or more ‘Superhighways.’ My key concern is that Gatwick is almost entirely
self-regulated and under-policed.
Residents under plane arrivals have no rights. Our local and
regional councils, and even the UK Government and the European Union, have no
meaningful policies or regulatory power to deal with the effects of unfettered
airport expansion and the changes continually imposed by aviation companies
without democratic oversight. This is worrying because Gatwick Airport Ltd is a
private company with no ethical remit. Like other aviation companies and
airlines, they operate globally to pursue profits and maximise dividends to
shareholders.
There is a significant Public Health issue posed
by increased flights, which according the World Health Organisation can lead to
a‘considerable burden of disease’. This is both in terms of air quality and also
with regard to noise pollution, particularly from night flights. Gatwick’s
planes come over Tunbridge Wells at unpredictable frequency, different heights,
and different speeds day and night, many flown by pilots who have not been
trained in noise mitigation procedures. There are no minimum heights for
arrivals and noise levels go unreported and largely ignored, as do complaints.
GATCOM, the public liaison committee that Gatwick is obliged to have, is
dominated by people with business interests associated with Gatwick, and it is
funded by Gatwick. Gatwick runs
its‘Public Consultations’ such as the recent second runway event days simply as
PR exercises. For example, the recent events apparently gave the public a choice
between runway options although the wide option runway had already been chosen
and submitted to the Airport’s Commission. What’s more, Gatwick submitted a
larger proposal than that detailed during the runway ‘Consultation’ to the
Airport’s Commission last week, and prior to the end of the consultation
process. Gatwick are acting duplicitously on this
matter.
Gatwick expresses the need to actively mitigate and reduce the
environmental impacts of flights but in reality does as little as possible to
help protect residents. For instance, Gatwick have taken no steps to encourage
Easyjet to retrofit the design fix on their Easyjet Airbus 319/320 aeroplanes to
prevent the high pitched ‘jet whine’ that many residents find extremely
annoying. And they have just signed a flights deal that will significantly
increase the number of Easyjet
flights.
The air pollution and noise from planes are known to have major
impacts on the health of residents both in mental and physical terms. Medical
research, for example the work undertaken by the World Health Organisation,
shows that allowing night flights in particular has too great an impact on
health for them to be economically viable. Presumably, this is why there is a
night flights ban at Heathrow.
However, there is no such ban at Gatwick Airport. Gatwick’s
business plan shows that they intend to increase night flights along with day
flights. Route changes Gatwick made (without public consultation) in 1999 to
reduce night flights over East Grinstead and in turn to enable a higher
frequency of flights to line up in approaching the airport, shifted flights
further east onto Tunbridge Wells and its surrounding environs. Gatwick is now
effectively operating a flight exclusion zone for the town of East Grinstead
whereas there is no exclusion zone for Tunbridge Wells, despite the fact my
area is much more highly populated.
We currently get around ten thousand night
flights per year. Tunbridge Wells now has more night flights concentrated over
it than any other major town in the country. Please find night flight print outs
attached –and these are all ‘off peak’.
In the summer peak time when people often sleep with their windows open,
we are already getting up to 50 planes per night on average, and as shown by
readings at the temporary monitor near Bidborough each one is commonly in excess
of 60dB. I am sure you can appreciate that 60dB is more than enough to disrupt
sleep patterns. A decent night’s sleep is essential for health and wellbeing,
especially for children, and normal sleep has been shown to be disturbed by
plane noise as low as 35dB.
To compound this unfair situation the
responsibility for reporting noise disruption is placed on residents to report
plane ‘incidences’.Lack of complaint is taken as evidence of acceptance. Yet
scientific evidence has shown that while sleep can be severely disrupted by
planes, most people usually do not fully wake up.
Therefore how on earth can people reasonably be expected to complain
about disrupted sleep when they are by definition unaware of it i.e. in a state
of unconsciousness?
I am writing to ask that you take immediate steps to correct this
unbalanced and unreasonable bias in favour of aviation companies. I am grateful
for your work in the past on this issue, for instance, chairing the local Public
Meeting about aviation last year in Langton Green. However, your position on
this issue has not been entirely visible to date, and I want you to better
represent my interests by being more proactive in the aviation debate on behalf
of your constituents from now on. At the very least, I ask that you call for an
immediate ban and moratorium on night flights at Gatwick Airport given the
significant public health costs of such flights, as has been done in many other
countries including Germany.
May I also take this opportunity to point out that allowing the
aviation industry unfettered growth restricts business opportunities for other
industries in your constituency such as Sports, Leisure and also Tourism. The
predicted effect of increased and potentially more concentrated flightpaths on
wildlife and in places like Penshurst and Chiddingstone Castle as well as on the
Ashdown Forest Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty is a case in
point.
Yours sincerely
[Your name]
Dear Mr Greg Clark,
I live in Tunbridge Wells which is under a flightpath for Gatwick
arrivals. I am writing to express concern at the way Gatwick Airport is
currently operating without due regard for the noise and air pollution caused
to residents and local businesses with particular respect
to:
•Ongoing increase of flights both during the day and especially
at night
•Imposed route changes with aeroplane ‘Superhighway’ and arrival
frequency of up to one plane every
minute.
•A Second Runway that could result in a further doubling and
possible tripling of plane flights and additional
Superhighways.
From November, according to Gatwick’s latest‘Consultation’, your
constituency will have all of Gatwick’s arriving planes concentrated over it on
one or more ‘Superhighways.’ My key concern is that Gatwick is almost entirely
self-regulated and under-policed.
Residents under plane arrivals have no rights. Our local and
regional councils, and even the UK Government and the European Union, have no
meaningful policies or regulatory power to deal with the effects of unfettered
airport expansion and the changes continually imposed by aviation companies
without democratic oversight. This is worrying because Gatwick Airport Ltd is a
private company with no ethical remit. Like other aviation companies and
airlines, they operate globally to pursue profits and maximise dividends to
shareholders.
There is a significant Public Health issue posed
by increased flights, which according the World Health Organisation can lead to
a‘considerable burden of disease’. This is both in terms of air quality and also
with regard to noise pollution, particularly from night flights. Gatwick’s
planes come over Tunbridge Wells at unpredictable frequency, different heights,
and different speeds day and night, many flown by pilots who have not been
trained in noise mitigation procedures. There are no minimum heights for
arrivals and noise levels go unreported and largely ignored, as do complaints.
GATCOM, the public liaison committee that Gatwick is obliged to have, is
dominated by people with business interests associated with Gatwick, and it is
funded by Gatwick. Gatwick runs
its‘Public Consultations’ such as the recent second runway event days simply as
PR exercises. For example, the recent events apparently gave the public a choice
between runway options although the wide option runway had already been chosen
and submitted to the Airport’s Commission. What’s more, Gatwick submitted a
larger proposal than that detailed during the runway ‘Consultation’ to the
Airport’s Commission last week, and prior to the end of the consultation
process. Gatwick are acting duplicitously on this
matter.
Gatwick expresses the need to actively mitigate and reduce the
environmental impacts of flights but in reality does as little as possible to
help protect residents. For instance, Gatwick have taken no steps to encourage
Easyjet to retrofit the design fix on their Easyjet Airbus 319/320 aeroplanes to
prevent the high pitched ‘jet whine’ that many residents find extremely
annoying. And they have just signed a flights deal that will significantly
increase the number of Easyjet
flights.
The air pollution and noise from planes are known to have major
impacts on the health of residents both in mental and physical terms. Medical
research, for example the work undertaken by the World Health Organisation,
shows that allowing night flights in particular has too great an impact on
health for them to be economically viable. Presumably, this is why there is a
night flights ban at Heathrow.
However, there is no such ban at Gatwick Airport. Gatwick’s
business plan shows that they intend to increase night flights along with day
flights. Route changes Gatwick made (without public consultation) in 1999 to
reduce night flights over East Grinstead and in turn to enable a higher
frequency of flights to line up in approaching the airport, shifted flights
further east onto Tunbridge Wells and its surrounding environs. Gatwick is now
effectively operating a flight exclusion zone for the town of East Grinstead
whereas there is no exclusion zone for Tunbridge Wells, despite the fact my
area is much more highly populated.
We currently get around ten thousand night
flights per year. Tunbridge Wells now has more night flights concentrated over
it than any other major town in the country. Please find night flight print outs
attached –and these are all ‘off peak’.
In the summer peak time when people often sleep with their windows open,
we are already getting up to 50 planes per night on average, and as shown by
readings at the temporary monitor near Bidborough each one is commonly in excess
of 60dB. I am sure you can appreciate that 60dB is more than enough to disrupt
sleep patterns. A decent night’s sleep is essential for health and wellbeing,
especially for children, and normal sleep has been shown to be disturbed by
plane noise as low as 35dB.
To compound this unfair situation the
responsibility for reporting noise disruption is placed on residents to report
plane ‘incidences’.Lack of complaint is taken as evidence of acceptance. Yet
scientific evidence has shown that while sleep can be severely disrupted by
planes, most people usually do not fully wake up.
Therefore how on earth can people reasonably be expected to complain
about disrupted sleep when they are by definition unaware of it i.e. in a state
of unconsciousness?
I am writing to ask that you take immediate steps to correct this
unbalanced and unreasonable bias in favour of aviation companies. I am grateful
for your work in the past on this issue, for instance, chairing the local Public
Meeting about aviation last year in Langton Green. However, your position on
this issue has not been entirely visible to date, and I want you to better
represent my interests by being more proactive in the aviation debate on behalf
of your constituents from now on. At the very least, I ask that you call for an
immediate ban and moratorium on night flights at Gatwick Airport given the
significant public health costs of such flights, as has been done in many other
countries including Germany.
May I also take this opportunity to point out that allowing the
aviation industry unfettered growth restricts business opportunities for other
industries in your constituency such as Sports, Leisure and also Tourism. The
predicted effect of increased and potentially more concentrated flightpaths on
wildlife and in places like Penshurst and Chiddingstone Castle as well as on the
Ashdown Forest Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty is a case in
point.
Yours sincerely
[Your name]