Luton-10

[LTNman]

My conflicts of interest are limited to where I live and how expansion will affect me and my local community. Remember I don’t live next to an airport but an airport now wants to live closer to me.

I can’t go into my present involvement with the airport, as even I am gagged so I can’t always mention what I know until it appears somewhere else first. In a former life I had a free run of the place both landside and airside so I had more idea of what was happening day-to-day than the people running the place.

So what would I do?

That LRT should truly be accountable but independent with its own board of directors and not councillor directors who work part time in Asda or work as a clerk at a travel agency. They have no recognised skill or ability and do what they are told by Council officials who run the show.

As part of the government requirement for its bailout money to the Council, the Council has to separate more of the airport from the Council with the Council being forced to take on directors who hopefully know what they are doing. I can’t remember if this is to replace the Council directors or supplement them.

I would remove the links between LRT and the Council but leaving the Council as the sole shareholder. Despite the claim that LRT has no staff they do, as the wage bill and email addresses comes from the Town Hall. They are absolutely tied at the hip. Looking at the LRT Facebook page LBC and LRT are one of the same.

I would remove secrecy. The number one priority of LRT is to operate in secret often against the public interest. They publish no minutes and the public are not allowed to attend meetings despite it being part of the Council. They are only accountable to the Council and not the people. When the Council discuses LRT they often shut down the cameras and go into private session, as the public who voted them in must not be allowed to know the truth.

There should be no confidentially agreements between the airport operator and the airport owner (LRT). What do they have to hide if it is all above board?

I would bring back truth and integrity and remove the lies and deception. I great example is the now estimated £150m dual carriageway to Terminal Two. This will be funded by the taxpayer and will be gifted to the new concession holder if the terminal gets planning permission.

So how is this possible? Simple, the Council put in a planning application for a business park that actually sits on the same land required for most of the airport’s expansion plans. The application and approval removes the road from the DCO process so no independent scrutiny there. They have come unstuck, as the Council can’t get grants to help pay for the road, as it is classed as unviable. They dare not mention the true reason for the road, which also just happens to breach the local plan with a link road that is not allowed.

The planning committee are not independent even though they claim to be. They are meant to hear evidence and then make a decision. In reality they have already made their minds up before entering the room, as they all follow party lines with the Labour members and one Conservative member always voting in favour while the Lib Dems normally oppose. It would be hard for Labour members not to vote in favour of airport applications when it is party policy to expand the airport. With that is mind they have their own clear conflict of interest but they don’t declare them.

So what would I do? Airport planning applications should be decided outside the influence of the Council by independent members who are not in any way linked to the Council or its policies. They already have independent members but they don’t get involved in planning. As the Council has lost all credibility and is seen as dodgy this needs to happen.

What is happening now is that a public inquiry is taking place, as the Council has been finally recognised as being incapable of making a fair decision. This was not meant to happen, as the applicant, with advise from the Council, put in an application for just a million extra passengers. The intention, I speculate, was to slip this in under the radar of the government rather than putting in an application to maximise the existing terminal at around 22m passengers. If approved and the DCO was turned down then other one million planning applications would have followed and as night follows day, the planning committee would have approved them all.