Government Responds To Petition On Threat To Airfields

[HAL-26]

A result! Well at least, a reply, from No.10 Downing Street in response to the petition receiving over 11,000 signatures so far!

The petition and the full response is at http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/Airfields/?ref=airfields (http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/Airfields/?ref=airfields)

Actually if you look at the wording below, there isn’t any attempt to reverse the mistake which fell into the revised planning guidelines. What they now seem to be saying is that the original policy statement didn’t mean what it said anyway. Sir Humphrey Appleby would be a proud man!!

Any thoughts on where we go from here??? :bored:

There has been a common misunderstanding about the status of airfields in Planning Policy Guidance 3 (PPG3). Airfields were not exempted from the definition of previously developed land. Previously developed land includes the permanent structures and the curtilage of a site. Planning Policy Statement 3 (PPS3) reaffirms this position.

However, PPG3 stated that where the proportion of open land on previously developed sites (the curtilage) was large, then it would not normally be appropriate to develop these sites to the boundary. It used airfields as an example, but this was never an exemption.

PPS3 continues this approach. It states that there is no presumption that previously-developed land is necessarily suitable for housing development. Nor is there any presumption that the whole of the curtilage should be developed.
This applies to airfields as to all other land uses. It is up to local authorities to decide these issues on a case by case basis.

The extent to which a site is defined as being previously developed land will depend on the particular circumstances of the site. For example, in the case of a large site with few structures, some parts of the site might be classed as previously developed, and others as greenfield.

[Tone]

I see the light now, airfields will not be developed - only the runways.

[eyeinthesky]

More likely will be the edges will be redeveloped and the rest of the airfield left... until the residents of the new houses get a petition up about the noise and the aircraft are forced out.

Nice of Tony / John to write to us all personally though, wasn't it?

[BEagle]

I don't understand the scibbldegook of the lying Government's reply.....

Apart, that is, from deducing that their 'drafting error' excuse was a lie.

When will we be able to vote Bliar and his slimy gang out of office.....

[EvilKitty]

Some time on or before May 5th 2010...

unless the government loses a motion of no confidence in which case things happen a little bit quicker.

[Mike Cross]

Try reading PPG3 and PPS3 and actually understanding them.

Both say that land that has had buildings on it is "previously developed land" and both make clear that this includes the whole of the curtilage (i.e. the land surrounding the buildings). So if you have a big site with a a relatively small number of buildings scattered over it (such as an airfield or hospital) it's lumped into the same classification as a site that was totally bult over, like an urban factory.

PPG3 and PPS3 both make the point that does not result in a presumption that the whole site can be developed right to its boundary.

In PPG3 this was contained in a footnote that mentioned airfields and hospitals as examples. In PPS3 the wording has been incorporated into the main body of text rather than as a footnote and the examples are not included. This makes no difference whatsover to the guidance. The same rules would apply say to a sportsground with a pavilion on it or a house with extensive grounds. The fact that they are not specifically mentioned as examples does not mean that the guidance does not apply to them.

Yvette Cooper the housing minister gave a clear undertaking in a written Parliamentary Answer last month that there had been no change in the status quo regarding airfields.

I'm no apologist for the government of the Dear Leader but on this occaison you're barking up the wrong tree. You would be better advised to direct your energies at a more worthwhile target, like getting HMG to accept that avgas is a "specialist fuel" and therefore does not under EU law have to be taxed at the same rate as road fuel. Some sources suggest that 1.70 per litre would be the result, at which point GA airfield viability becomes somewhat of a foregone conclusion.

[Say again s l o w l y]

Mike, from my understanding, the government is fighting to keep the duty rate the same, it is the EU who wants to increase it.

Nearly every government is trying to fight this, from the French to the Italians, but it seems the Eurocrats are trying to ignore this........

Sorry for the drift, but back to the matter in hand.

[BEagle]

"The fact that they are not specifically mentioned as examples does not mean that the guidance does not apply to them."

I have trouble enough with double negatives - the ANO is riddled with 'shall not, unless' and other weasel-speak.

But triple negatives. What does it mean in simple English?

[Mike Cross]

HoHo... apologies.

The guidance is the same, regardless of whether the examples are there or not.

Mike