UK delays final approval for second runway at Gatwick pending changes to plan

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UK transport secretary Heidi Alexander has signalled she will approve a second runway at Gatwick if the airport makes changes to its plans, but also delayed a final decision despite the government’s pro-growth rhetoric and shift in favour of airport expansion.

Alexander said she was minded to approve the plans later this year if the airport agreed to “a range of controls on the operation of the scheme”. Those include stronger targets for public transport access to the site and to speed up implementation of a noise mitigation scheme, according to officials.

A Planning Inspectorate report on Thursday recommended the refusal of Gatwick’s original application, but — in an unusual move — said that it would approve the application if the changes were made. Alexander has given Gatwick a deadline of April 24 to revamp its plans.

In a written ministerial statement Alexander said she had issued a “minded to approve letter” for the second runway. However, she said she needed “additional time” to seek views from the relevant parties and has extended the deadline for her final decision by nine months to October 27.

Allies of the transport secretary said they hoped she would be able to approve the expansion before then.

The delay came despite the government’s recent promises to push airport expansions and other contentious projects through the planning system to jump-start economic growth.

Gatwick’s chief executive Stewart Wingate said he welcomed the government’s decision and “clear pathway to full approval later in the year”.

But he warned it was “vital” that new planning conditions still “enable us to make a decision to invest £2.2bn in this project and realise the full benefits”.

The project would significantly expand capacity by moving the emergency landing strip at Britain’s second-busiest airport 12 metres to the north. The relocation would put enough space between the strip and the existing runway so that both could operate at the same time.

Gatwick, about 30 miles south of central London, said this second full-time runway would enable it to handle up to 75mn passengers a year by the late 2030s, up from the record 46.5mn travellers who used the airport in 2019.

The project could still involve planes taking off from the second runway by the end of the current parliament in 2029.

One government official said the conditional decision was an “important step forward” that demonstrated how the government would “stop at nothing” to deliver economic growth.

But the complications in approving Gatwick’s plan illustrate the difficulties the government will face as it tries to push through airport expansions across the UK, planning experts said.

Gatwick has presented its expansion plan as a relatively low-risk way to add a new runway to airport capacity in London — compared with the long-delayed and politically contentious proposal to add a third runway at Heathrow — since most of the work would take place within its existing boundaries.

But local campaigners have said they will challenge any decision in favour of a new runway at Gatwick in the courts.

Chancellor Rachel Reeves said last month that flights could be taking off from a third runway at Heathrow “within a decade”. The management of Britain’s only hub airport has pledged to bring forward detailed proposals by this summer. Some Labour MPs remain sceptical about Heathrow expansion, however, with planning permission unlikely to be granted until close to the end of the current parliament in 2029.

The Planning Inspectorate has demanded that Gatwick adopt a legally binding target of at least 55 per cent of passengers annually arriving at the airport by public transport — in line with current patterns at the airport. Gatwick has previously argued it does not want the target to be legally binding.

The Planning Inspectorate has also asked Gatwick to modify its original noise mitigation plan.

Its report found that Gatwick’s expansion proposal would “cause harm in various areas”, notably that its greenhouse gas emissions “would have a material effect on achieving carbon targets”.

The revised plan from the Inspectorate did not recommend changes to lower the overall emissions from the scheme, leaving it “wide open to legal challenge”, said Alex Chapman, senior economist at the New Economics Foundation, which opposes expansion.

Alexander is due to rule on an expansion plan at Luton airport, to the north of London, in the coming weeks.

Whitehall officials have said she is keen to approve Luton’s expansion — which does not include a new runway, but would involve the construction of new infrastructure and terminal capacity and taxiways — so long as concerns about noise over the Chiltern Hills can be addressed.

London’s Stansted and City airports have had their own expansion plans approved.

Reeves last month said airport expansion was compatible with the government’s legally binding net zero 2050 target, pointing to “cleaner and greener flying” through so-called sustainable aviation fuels.

But climate groups have argued such an increase in passenger numbers will be incompatible with the 2050 target, in view of the difficulty in decarbonising aviation.

This story has been updated to clarify that transport secretary Heidi Alexander has given herself until October to make a final decision