Dear Sir/Madam,

I am enclosing with this letter copies of the representations that I have made to Rochford Council opposing the extension of the main runway of Southend Airport, and also of a letter that accompanied the protest that I made in 2003. The proposals then including the demolition of St Laurence church. They may contain information that will be of use to you. I can supply copies of the inclusions if you require them.

Things have clearly changed since 2003, but the predictions were right. It is interesting that the present proposals made no mention of St Laurence church, despite grabbing about a third of its graveyard.

The airport has in my opinion no long-term future. I have lived with it for over 50 years off and on as airlines have come failed and gone. It never delivers the jobs that it promises. Every few years there comes pressure for one more push, if only we are prepared to sacrifice one more small part of our environment success will come. It never does but the damage is done. To say that it is possible to live with the airport provided it behaves itself has proved to be unrealistic. It will ultimately fail but it can do a lot of damage before then.

Yours truly,

B. J. Free

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Policy LS2

The councils go into a great deal of detail concerning the number of passengers that the airport with its extended runway would attract and makes much of the Airbus A319s that will carry them. However it plays down the freight operations and makes no mention of the tonnage that the airport will attract despite the fact that this is the new owner’s core business. Residents therefore have not been informed about the number of air-movements that this will generate, the number of extra HGVs on the local roads or the type of aircraft that will be used. No mention is made in the proposals of the route that these HGVs will follow to and from the airport or whether the current weight restriction on Eastwoodbury Lane will be removed. As access could be interpreted as access to the airport would this even need to be done? All of this extra traffic both air and road will degrade the environment and infrastructure for local residents and bring them no benefit.

As far as I am aware there is no freighter version of the Airbus A319, FedEx use the Airbus A300-600 and that could not use the proposed runway. Eddie Stobart’s business is a freight operation, so that whereas passenger numbers are hypothetical, freight traffic is certain, despite the soothing words contained in the proposals. The smaller type of aircraft used for carrying freight tend to be conversions of older passenger airliners, bought second hand because they are cheap. They are also dirty and noisy. A runway that can operate an Airbus A319 option A at full payload plus full fuel can also operate a Boeing 737-600B and 730-700A aircraft with the same loading, something that the airport could not do before. The noise footprint of these two types is many times the area of that of an Airbus A319 option A. There is nothing in the council’s document that states that these aircraft types would not be used for freight or for that matter for passengers. Indeed as the runway map shows their noise footprint it implies that they would be.

During the last recession the price of a barrel of oil dropped to $20 but at the beginning of the current one it only dropped to $64 and has already started to rise past $70. Policies that were arrived at when it seemed possible that cheap oil would go on forever must be reconsidered in the light of the new reality. These proposals are now hopelessly out of date, the world has changed forever. It is time to tear them up and start again if the area is to have a future.

Policy LS6

The main runway of Southend Airport should not be extended because its construction makes it unsuitable for this to be done.

As I have repeatedly pointed out in the past, the runway that it is proposed to extend is not constructed from pave quality concrete, the material suitable for modern jet aircraft, but from stabilised soil. This material absorbs water, as was established in 1956 when a section left un-surfaced during the winter was damaged by frost. This means that the minimal steel reinforcement used in its construction will almost certainly by now after over 50 years have turned to rust, leaving it even weaker that when first built.

The aircraft that the runway was intended to cater for were a fraction of the weight of an Airbus A319 and with lower landing speeds. The standard Airbus A319 is 1.4 times the weight of an RJ100, twice the weight of a Viscount 800 and 3.2 times the weight of the Bristol 170 airbridge aircraft, for which the runway was designed. The runway would be too short to operate the heavier A319 option, which has a longer range.

The fact that this proposed extension is being rushed through to be ready for the Olympics in 2012 exposes the proposals for what they are: a cynical attempt to make a fast buck even if it leaves an airport with a crumbling runway. When the runway breaks up, who is going to pay for it to be rebuilt? The council tax payers if the council is sued? If it were not rebuilt, the airport would close. The council cannot say it was unaware of the runway’s shortcomings – they are in black and white in the minutes of its airport committee. Heads have been pushed into the sand and inconvenient facts ignored. If this problem had been addressed earlier, the runway could have been rebuilt with a different alignment and none of the present problems encountered. This is just one of a string of appalling planning decisions made by a council totally unfit for purpose.

That the facts concerning the construction of the present runways have been ignored or deliberately concealed throws doubt on the quality of the investigations that have led to the exaggerated claims of benefit for the proposed developments. An alternative interpretation of events, conspiracy rather than cock-up, is that the proposed developments would be made knowing the runway would fail. Then to justify its rebuilding using the correct materials, it could be further extended. Even if Nestuda Way was closed and replaced by a new route from Kent Elms Corner via an enlarged Snakes Lane, the runway could not be extended to accommodate the heaver option B Airbus A319.

The death warrant for regional airports was signed the day oil hit a price of $200 a barrel. They have no long-term future. Only long haul flights in Airbus A380 super jumbo-sized aircraft will be economic for ordinary people; shorter journeys will use the train. The only people who will be able to afford to fly in small aircraft will be millionaires and corporate executives in their private jets. The owner of Regional Airports Ltd may be many things, but he is not stupid – that appears to be the prerogative of local councillors. Why do you think he sold Southend Airport to concentrate on his airport in Kent, which caters for just this traffic?

I am including with this submission three A4 photocopies of part of the minutes of Southend Council’s Airport Committee, which show the reasons for hardening the runways and the method of construction and problems encountered. Also enclosed are three A4 photocopies of the specification of pave quality concrete Spec 033, showing how it closely controls quality.

Policy T1

I am totally opposed to the proposed extension of the main runway of Southend Airport and the redirection of Eastwoodbury Lane that effectively cuts the parish of St Laurence and its associated community in two.

The last set of changes to the end of the runway with the provision of traffic lights and an extended safety overrun area were claimed by the council to be the solution to all the airport’s problems. Airlines would flock to use the airport. As I predicted in my opposition to these changes, these claims have proved false. It is now clear that the council has consistently acted in bad faith and that the alterations to the runway were just inserting the thin end of a wedge in the expectation that further expansion could take place in the future. Any promises the council or the airport may now make as to future developments have no credibility and are not worth the paper they are written on. The airport will accept any aircraft movement that it can accommodate at any time to pay off its debts incurred by this ill-considered development.

The re-routing of the lane would make it virtually impossible for members of St Laurence’s congregation in the east of the parish to walk to church as many now do. It would also increase the journey time and cost of the number 9 bus service, while at the same time increasing the amount of traffic from the A127 using the eastern portion of the lane.

Furthermore, the re-routed lane would cut the existing St Laurence Park in two and effectively destroy a facility paid for by council taxpayers and used by a large number of the local community. This park contains a football pitch, not a cricket pitch and a play area for children, including swings, slides and climbing frames. Not of low amenity value: ask the children who play there and the people who exercise their dogs.

St Laurence Park as such is not even mentioned in your explanatory documents; the area being referred to as a low-grade amenity area, as well as being incorrectly described. The virtual shutting off of access to St Laurence church as well as the destruction of over one third of the graveyard is not even mentioned. All of which even further undermines any remaining confidence in the honesty of the councils involved.

[insert photos]

Vision 2 Objectives – paragraph 2.3

Only the jobs of around 400 of those currently employed on Southend Airport are dependent on flying activities. The principle employer, employing approximately 800, manufacture passenger aircraft seats. Materials arrive by road and the finished product leaves by road. 400 jobs are not a significant contribution to local employment, especially as a large proportion are not local, but contractors working on short-term contracts. About the same number of local people are employed on the Progress Road estate, which takes up a fraction of the space of the airport.

The current forecasts for passenger numbers and jobs to be created are just the latest in a string of such Pollyanna predictions that have been made over the last 50 years, all of which have failed to materialise even in an era of cheap oil. An extra 50% more energy will be required in 20 years time to grow and transport the food necessary to feed a world population that will have grown to 9 billion, against a background of ever diminishing oil supply. The choice will be between flying and eating, and 20 years may well be an optimistic forecast. Holiday resorts on the Mediterranean can and should be reached by rail, not air. Global warming is a reality and air travel a major contributor. The councils should be promoting local holiday attractions, not the means of moving holidaymakers to spend their time and money elsewhere.

The whole area is steeped in history: the Saxon king, the Boleyns and the Mayflower to name but a few, and yet no attempt is made to exploit their tourist potential. In fact, by almost destroying St Laurence church, they undermine the small but steady stream of American tourists that visit it every year – Americans, it would appear, know more about our local history than our councils.

In a densely populated area where land is at a premium, to waste so much of it on a useless white elephant of an airport is criminal. Even if oil supplies and global warming permitted the continuation of mass air travel, which is extremely doubtful, Stansted airport, which plans to double its passenger numbers, is barely an hour away. The land should be better employed for the benefit of the local population. A full size swimming pool, not the oversized paddling pool currently being constructed with customary penny-wise, pound-foolish policy by Southend Council at Fossetts could be built there. An athletics centre with proper running tracks, an equestrian centre, a vehicle driving training centre to get learners out of our side-streets, a golf driving range in association with the golf course – the list goes on. All these things would improve the quality of life for citizens that our councillors are elected to protect, not degrade with noise, air pollution and runaway climate change.

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29th December 2003

Dear Sir,

Re: – Southend Airport Expansion ref. APP/D1590/E/03/1128002 and APP/D1590/A/03/1128003

I am writing to express my total opposition to the proposal to demolish St Laurence and All Saints church and to the expansion of Southend Airport. The reasons for my opposition are as follows: -

Firstly economics of the proposals. I have lived adjacent to Southend Airport for almost all of the time it has aspired to develop from a flying field. During that time, there has been a succession of undertaking, which claimed that they would make it a commercial success. All these schemes have one thing in common, they were all failures.

Flying operations have lost the Airport money for 46 of the last 48 years and the local taxpayer has picked up the bill. Only for a brief period when the Airbridge was in vogue did flying operations return a small profit. The reasons for this failure are not hard to see and they still apply. In 1982, Burstin Travel operated holiday flights to European destinations from Southend. These flights were unprofitable because the Airport’s runways were too short and within a few years, they ceased. One of its directors, Ivan Burstin, concluded that the runways would need to be between 500 and 1000 feet longer for profitable operation. (1A) The size of aircraft needed to make flights economic could not take off with a full load of fuel and passengers. For example, Air Malta’s flights to Malta using Boeing 737 aircraft required a refuelling stop in France. The additional landing and take off for the refuelling stop increased the quantity of fuel used for the journey and added additional airport fees. They also stressed the passengers; increased maintenance costs and as aircraft and their engines have a finite life, added an increased part of their capital cost to the flight. Other airlines faced the same problem and that undermined the profitability of their operations.

Airlines which have attempted to operate scheduled or holiday flights from this airport have either been forced to relocate, Cosmos to Luton (2A) and Jet Fares to Gatwick (2B) for example, or went into receivership as did Channel Airways. Air UK abandoned its flights by 13 seat Banderante aircraft to Rotterdam, Ostend and Amsterdam because it could not attract sufficient passengers to fill even this small aircraft. (3A) The total list of airlines that have attempted and failed to operate profitably from Southend Airport is too long to include but they are in the public record. (4A,B)

There are no proposals at present to increase the runway length. Even if there were, this would be limited by the presence of the Southend Victoria to Liverpool Street railway line to the east and the B1013 to the west. Therefore, Mr Burstin’s conclusions remain valid. The economics of Southend Airport have been further undermined since then by the massive expansion of Stansted Airport with all the improvements made to its access and the establishment of London City Airport, plus the high speed rail link to Paris and Brussels.

The economics of the proposals must also take account of the construction of the runways themselves. Southend Airport’s runways are not constructed of Pave Quality Concrete, the material required for the operation of modern jet aircraft. They were built on the cheap out of a mixture of clay and cement, containing no crushed stone aggregate, known as stabilised soil. As a young engineering student, I watched with interest the progress of the work. The method of construction chosen was clearly cost driven. This means that the design parameters employed in determining the dimensions and quality of construction would have taken account only of the size and weight of aircraft then proposed to operate there. It is unlikely that any contingency allowance was made which will accommodate the much heavier aircraft with their higher landing speeds that will be essential to the profitable operation of the expanded airport. The original cost estimate of £196,000 for these improvements was pared down to £168,000 by accepting the lowest tender of £113,402-14s-0d by Gough Cooper & Co for the construction of the runways. (5A)

During their construction, a section of the main runway left over winter with no protective bitumen coating suffered major frost damage. For this to have happened, the stabilised soil of which they are constructed must have absorbed water. A top coating of bitumen will protect them from water penetration from above, but they will still absorb it from below. This will result in the corrosion of the steel reinforcement. It is highly likely that after 48 years of use, the runways were completed in 1956, they are now nearing the end of their useful life. (5B)

There is no costing in the proposals under consideration for the reconstruction of these runways. The alternative to reconstruction is heavier and heavier maintenance bills. The assumption being no doubt that the taxpayers, either local or national, will be forced to foot the bill rather than see the project once commenced to founder. It is unacceptable that the residents of Southend be forced to subsidise through their taxes an activity that through air and noise pollution undermines their quality of life. If new runways have to be built, why build them in such a restricted location with such poor access, or with the present alignment?

Having dealt with the economic objections to the proposals, I now move on to those of health and safety. The airspace above Southend is already crowded. All of it is controlled airspace and it is the most congested in the country, if not Europe. Several standard arrival and departure routes pass directly over the Airport, which since 1993 only controls airspace up to 2000 feet for a diameter of five miles. (6,7A,B)

When at an open day at the Airport I queried how the additional flights required to make the expansion proposals economic could be accommodated in such a crowded environment, a representative of the Airport informed me that they would be routed below 3000 feet through uncontrolled airspace.

Jet engines have no catalytic converters and are already the most polluting form of power plant. They are not designed to operate efficiently at such low altitudes and that will make pollution even worse and lower operating efficiency. Furthermore, the approach to the Airport from the east, that most frequently used because of the prevailing wind, is over Foulness and the rivers Crouch and Roach. Large flocks of Brent geese and swans are frequently found in this area and no jet or turboprop engine yet built or proposed can withstand impact with a bird of this size. Even the most recent jet engines are only tested with 4lb chickens and the aircraft likely to use Southend Airport are unlikely to use such engines. Airliners make very bad gliders and the dangers are obvious.

Modern airliners have transponders that indicate their position on radar screens, light aircraft, gliders, balloons and birds do not. These are more likely to be encountered at low level where radar screens have more clutter, further increasing danger. If low level flights are the only way to make this project financially viable, then proceeding with it increases the likelihood of air accidents.

Southend is an area of high population density. Multi-occupancy of domestic premises is high, therefore any increase in air or noise pollution affects a disproportionately larger number of people than elsewhere. It is unlikely that many of the passengers that will be required for the economic operation of the expanded airport will arrive by rail. Most will come y car and the levels of congestion on the roads around the Airport are already high. When the Royal Bank of Scotland’s new offices start operating, it will get higher. An influx of passengers will make things even worse. Not only would the population around the Airport suffer air pollution from the aircraft but also from the passengers’ cars. Furthermore, the proposal to relocate Rochford railway station would add rail commuters to this unholy mess. Rochford commuters who can now walk to the station would have to drive there. More cars, more pollution. Freight operations and the road tankers bringing in aircraft fuel will increase the number of heavy goods vehicles on the area’s inadequate road system.

Southend is served by only two main roads – the A127 and the A13. The traffic levels on them far exceed those for which they were designed. They are breaking up under the load. The routine delays caused by this congestion undermines the quality of life for the local population and places jobs in local industry at risk. If the Airport expansion succeeds then these traffic levels will get worse.

If, however, as I believe, the present levels of road congestion will deter air passengers and their numbers fail to materialise, as has been the experience of airlines in the past, then the expansion will fail.

I come now to the question of the church of St Laurence and All Saints itself. The presence nearby of an iron age burial ground and that of a large stone built into the base of one of the church’s pillars indicate that it occupies a site that has been of religious significance for thousands of years. There is evidence that the church of St Mary at Prittlewell was one of the four established by St Cedd when he came to reconvert the East Saxons to Christianity. St Laurence was established as a chapel by this church and therefore counts amongst the oldest in Essex.

The present structure dates from just after the conquest and is largely of flint and Kentish ragstone with some Tudor brick all set in lime mortar. For a period of time the exterior surfaces of the church were covered with a rendering of Portland cement. It was believed when this was done that it would protect the fabric of the church. The effect was totally the opposite. The acid in the cement attacked the stonework and by preventing the walls from breathing, it encouraged rising damp. Experts sometimes get it wrong.

The planning application made by the Airport requests permission to demolish the church. As far as I am concerned consent to demolish means just that, the total destruction of the structure. A document handed out at an Airport open day showed a scheme to move the church on rollers to a new location. No building of this age or construction has ever been moved in this way before. The walls of the church are composed of an inner and outer skin, the space between being filled with a mixture of rubble and lime mortar. The moving process involves them being undercut in order to cast a reinforced concrete raft to support the structure.

I believe that if the undersides of the walls are exposed to enable this to be done, the rubble in-filling weakened by rising damp will become detached and cause the walls to collapse. Undercutting the church will also disturb the graves beneath the chancel and the north aisle and numerous others close to the walls. Nobody knows exactly what lies under the church. The track on which the church would move to its new location would cut a swath through the grave yard and the movement of heavy machinery and the removal of the spoil would create havoc.

The present site of the church was chosen for good reasons. The land in the proposed direction of movement slopes downward toward a tributary of the river Roach to an area subject to flooding. The maps distributed by the Airport conveniently omit to show this feature, indeed they appear to show that the relocated church would sit directly above it. Because of this, I cannot take the proposals to move the church in this way seriously and believe that they are just a smoke screen to conceal the real intentions. (8A,B,C)

The church of St Laurence and All Saints is of considerable historic importance to the borough of Southend. It was one of the borough’s founding parishes and a representation of the gridiron on which St Laurence was martyred features on the coat of arms. Because of its connection with the Vassell family of Cockethust Farm, and through them with the Pilgrim Fathers, their ship the Mayflower and the American colonies, it is of national and international importance. John Vassell was a churchwarden of St Laurence and a friend of its vicar Samuel Purchas. A number of members of the Vassell family are buried beneath the chancel. These connections lead to a steady stream of visitors to the church from the United States.

John Vassell of Cockethust Farm and an alderman of the City of London also owened a Wharf in Leigh where he with others financed the building of a ship named the Mayflower. This ship was almost certainly the one chartered by the Pilgrim Fathers for their epic journey to the New World. It is on record as having discharged acargo of wine in the port of London shortly before the Pilgrim Fathers commenced their journey from Leigh. Two of John’s sons, William and Samuel are named in the charter of the Massachusetts Company and at one time owned between them 10% of Massachusetts. (9,10A,B,C)

If a fraction of the money wasted on the Airport had been spent promoting the Borough’s connections with such historic events, a thriving tourist industry would bring considerable financial benefits to it. This could yet be done and St Laurence and All Saints church would be an important part of such an undertaking. Tourists stop in the town and spend money; air passengers do not.

Eastwoodbury Lane is a public right of way and one that has existed in its present form for hundreds of years. The planning application under consideration seeks permission to divert it. This is a total misrepresentation of that which is in reality proposed. In order that the extension to the runway can take place, a section of this right of way has to be closed, cutting it into two parts. I assume that these will be renamed Eastwoodbury Lane East and Eastwoodbury Lane West. My understanding is that this cannot be done by a simple planning permission, it requires an Act of Parliament. There is no costing in the proposals to fund this.

An airport is merely a tool of modern living, not a totem of modernity as some egotistical local politicians seem to think. That obsession with retaining its airport has cost Southend’s taxpayers millions of pounds. An accumulated loss of £10,000,000 over the 48 years since the runways were hardened is an estimate that is probably on the low side. (3B 11A,B)

Employing an area larger than all the town’s industrial estates put together, air related activities provide a fraction of the jobs for local people. This is an unacceptable waste of land, a scarce asset in this overcrowded corner of England. Few of the workers employed in the maintenance of aircraft at the Airport live within the Borough. When a large maintenance contract is secured, the personnel employed to carry it out are brought in on short term contracts to do the work. They come from all over the country and from abroad. Should this work cease on the Airport, the loss of jobs to Southend would be minimal. I have sympathy for anyone being made redundant having experienced this on several occasions myself; but I am sure enough of the maintenance work displaced from Southend will finds its way to Stansted, which is now within easy commuting distance, for them to find employment. When making its case, the Airport vastly overestimates the number of jobs dependent on air operations. The largest single employer, IPECO, manufactures aircraft seats which leave the site by road and would be unaffected by rejection of the expansion plans.

Only one third of this country’s population are regular air travellers. Aviation fuel carries no tax or duty and no VAT is charged on tickets. The development of the airliners themselves and their engines is in large part funded by the taxpayer through the defence budget, and the airlines pay no VAT when they buy them. These massive subsidies, the benefits of which only a minority of the population enjoy, distort the travel market and artificially boost air travel.

Fuel prices will rise when China and India with their massive populations start to compete in earnest for a diminishing supply of oil. Estimates of the year that oil production reaches a peak vary from an extravagantly optimistic 2036 by the US Department of Energy to that of geophysicist Kenneth Deffeyes who told the New Scientist that with 99% certainty this would be 2004. Predictions of future demand for air travel based on past growth take insufficient account of the inevitable oil shortage. Politicians accept these forecasts because they are unable or unwilling to contemplate a future without cheap oil. even if the distortions of subsidy are not removed, increasing price of fuel will rein back demand for air travel. An airport at Southend will not be required in the future and if these proposals were allowed to proceed, a priceless asset, the church, would have been destroyed for nothing.

The enclosures with this letter can be criticised for cherry picking reports of the Airport’s failures, but the brutal truth is that in passenger and freight operations there have been no successes. All of the much-trumpeted new dawns and predictions of a golden future have foundered on economic reality. An expert report in 1982 concluded that the Airport could be made to break even within four years (1B) but by 1986 it was still losing money. All this before there was any problem over safety zones. It can be argued that the examples of airlines ending their operations from Southend were all in the distant past, but the obstacles to profitable operation remain the same. A Boeing 737 could not fly from Southend Airport with a full load of passengers and fuel in 1982 and will not be able to do so in the future. Despite the proposed changes, the runway will remain the same length. It was uneconomic to operate these aircraft then, remains so now, and will be even more uneconomic in the future as fuel prices rise. There are few recent examples of airlines abandoning routes from the Airport because for the most part they have learned the lessons of history and not attempted to fly them.

The economics of these proposals are so obviously flawed that one is drawn to the conclusion that there must be a hidden agenda. If permission is granted for these proposals, they will insert the thin end of a wedge. Once the church is demolished and the anticipated passenger flights are not forthcoming, three will be pressure to extend the runway over the B1013. The Council would be forced into paying for this to be done and the Airport’s noise and pollution footprint spread over a much larger area. Confidence in Mr Walter’s integrity has not been enhanced by Mr Justice Hart’s comments in the High Court in 1999; when it ruled against him and prevented the forced sale to him of his partners shares in Regional Airports Ltd. (12)

A meeting of the full council voted unanimously to reject these planning applications. For them to be allowed on appeal against the wishes of the elected representatives of the local community would be an affront to the democratic process. It would reinforce the views of the increasing number of people who consider voting a complete waste of time. The turn out at both local and national elections is already sinking dangerously low. Democracy needs to be supported, not undermined.

Yours faithfully,

 

B. J. Free

 

Enclosures:

(1A) Evening Echo 28^th January 1982 Runways too short.
(1B) Yellow Advertiser 7th May 1982 Airport to break even in four years
(2A) Evening Echo 9^th September 1983 Cosmos switched to Luton saved £20 per seat.
(3A) Evening Echo 4^th November 1983 Thompson save £21 per seat flying from Stansted.
(3B) Evening Echo 25^th January Flying operations lose £600,000.
(4A) Evening Echo 18^th September 1983 Jet Fares move to Gatwick.
(4B) Evening Echo 20^th September 1984 Airport cannot attract sufficient passengers.
(5A) Airport Committee Report back on construction of runways.
(5B) Airport Committee Report back on frost damage to runway.
(6) Standard arrival and departure routes over Southend.
(7A) Evening Echo 12^th May 1999 Air congestion over Essex.
(7B) Evening Echo 12^th May 1999 Air congestion over Essex.
(8A) Ordnance Survey map showing tributary of river Roach.
(8B) Tributary of river Roach shown on Airports map.
(8C) Photograph of tributary behind church.
(9) Essex Countryside Volume 19 number 168 January 1971 Home of the Vassells
(10A) Southend Standard 2^nd May 1966 Mayflower sailed from Leigh.
(10B) Southend Standard 14^th April 1966 Eastwood link with Pilgrim Fathers.
(10C) Southend Standard 13^th August 1970 Mayflower built at Leigh.
(11A) Evening Eho 8^th February 1994 Cost to Southend of Airport, only one offer to buy.
(11B) The News 15^th February 1996 Southend still paying for Airport despite sale of lease.
(12) Evening Echo 10^th November 1999 Malpractice over sale of shares in RAL.