Southend Council sold the lease on our loss-making airport to a private sector company (RAL) in 1994 for £1 and also gave them generous rental terms.

The new owners subsequently stated that they accepted responsibility for all future costs removing the financial burden on ratepayers.

In fact, the Council financed an ongoing and considerable program of infrastructure improvements using extremely large sums of local taxpayers money and with little RAL monetary contribution.

Planning permission was quickly sought (and won) by RAL in 1999 for a program of capital projects (a new rail station etc) intended ultimately to satisfy ambitious plans to cater for two million passengers annually with a runway extension.

But plans to extend the runway were frustrated in 2004 by those friendly to St. Laurence Church refusing relocation or demolition and winning the day.

The sale announcement in January 2008 by RAL stating that they could not afford their own capital projects then prompted Southend and Rochford Councils to quietly sponsor a Joint Area Action Plan (JAAP) putting the extension firmly back on the agenda.

This included public consultation, the first phase of which ended in August 2008 (with a pitiful response) and the next expected early in 2009 (to last for only six weeks). You may still be unaware of this chance to have your say.

The Stobart group have now purchased a majority shareholding in the airport company (and therefore the lease as an asset) for a possible and staggering £21 million- all of which goes to RAL.
This means our 24/7 airport with very few operational controls is in the hands of a major freight company which has not owned an airport before!

How did this happen? Because the latest sale is of a shareholding and not the lease Southend Council (despite financing the improvements) were allowed no profit share and no say in the selection of any buyer. There was no foresight in 1994 to create an agreement preventing this situation.

Stobart have made no public withdrawal of those plans to fly two million scheduled passengers aided by a runway extension and which will mean many scheduled flights every waking hour. The potential for night freight flying is obvious.

Our aim is to make local residents aware of the detrimental effect of the all of these developments. Leadership is provided by Kiti Theobald who held a similar position with the campaign group which successfully resisted the earlier issues facing St Laurence Church.