A High Court judge has ruled that campaigners fighting to stop the expansion of Bristol Airport do have a case that should be heard - sending the battle to the courts later this year.
The campaign group Bristol Airport Action Network (BAAN) mounted a legal challenge against a decision by a Government planning inspector that Bristol Airport’s expansion project should go ahead.
And now the High Court judge has ruled that the campaign group has ‘raised arguable grounds which merit consideration by the court’ - sending the fight into extra time.
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Following an inquiry by the Planning Inspectorate, Bristol Airport secured permission to build a new terminal and expand its operations to accommodate a jump from around nine million passengers a year to 12 million passengers. Although North Somerset councillors had rejected the idea and refused planning permission, the airport - which is owned by the Ontario Teachers Pension Fund - appealed to the Government, and a planning inspector overturned that refusal and granted permission in February.
The following month, in March this year, campaigners from BAAN, a coalition of local residents’ groups and mainly Bristol-based environmentalists, challenged the Government’s decision in the High Court, and have now cleared the first hurdle by getting a judge to agree they have a case that should be heard. The campaigners told the court they believed the Government’s planning inspector made ‘errors of law’ by not taking into account the full environmental impact - particularly around CO2 emissions - of an increase in flights and capacity at the airport.
The group also made a case around what would happen about bats that might be displaced by the expansion, and most fundamentally that expanding the airport went against the legal duty of the Government to comply with the Climate Change Act of 2008.
There is now set to be a planning statutory review and if the judges at that rule in the campaigners’ favour, it could quash the planning permission for the airport expansion - sending everyone back to square one, with the planning inspectors tasked with again going through the application and the reasons why North Somerset councillors refused it.
“We are delighted that the judge agrees that we have arguable grounds that the inspector’s decision has errors in law and we look forward to the full hearing,” said one of BAAN’s co-ordinators, Stephen Clarke - a former Green Party city councillor in Bristol. “Many thanks to the thousands of people in the region and beyond who have supported us financially through this three-year battle.”
“The idea that airports can just continue to expand without limit in the middle of a climate and ecological crisis is so obviously wrong. If Bristol Airport plans are allowed, there are more than 20 other regional airports who will use the precedent to also expand; why should aviation be in the privileged position of expanding without limit while every other sector is being constrained? How can this country ever meet its legal obligations under the Climate Change Act?” he added.
After fundraising among supporters across Bristol and North Somerset, BAAN have engaged a law firm, and a planning law specialist, Ricardo Gama.
“The judge’s finding that the claim is arguable shows that there is an important issue to be decided by the court,” he said. “It would be very surprising for national government to be able to overturn a decision of democratically elected councillors which is based on sound planning reasons, including local planning policies which are specifically meant to address climate issues.
“It is difficult to see how climate issues are meant to be addressed in the planning system when local authorities try to make the right decisions for a climate-compatible future only to be rebuffed by national government,” he added.
A spokesperson for Bristol Airport said they will continue to defend their planning permission. "Bristol Airport is aware that permission to proceed to a full hearing has been granted for Bristol Airport Action Network Coordinating Committee's (BAANCC) application for statutory review of the 12mppa permission," she said. "We await the outcome of the forthcoming hearing in which we continue to defend the grant of the permission by the Planning Inspectorate.”
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