Tees Valley Mayor candidate says he'll 'buy back' the airport
A candidate to be the first mayor of the Tees Valley says he will buy backDurham Tees Valley Airport if he is elected in May.
Ben Houchen, the Conservative candidate, said that he will use part of themayor’s £15m-a-year budget to take the airport back into public ownership.
The airport is 89 per cent owned by Peel Airports with the rest owned bythe five councils of the Tees Valley.
Passenger numbers have plummeted from nearly one million in 2006 to just140,000 in 2015.
The new mayor’s prime responsibility will be to boost economic regeneration in the Tees Valley using powers handed down from central government.
Mr Houchen, who is the Conservative leader on Stockton council, said:
"The new devolution deal gives a large annual cash sum to the mayor, which can also be used for additional borrowing.
"There are many calls on these resources, but a rejuvenated airport needsto be one of the top transport priorities."
With Labour dominating the five councils of the Tees Valley – Darlington,Stockton, Middlesbrough, Hartlepool and Redcar and Cleveland – itscandidate, Sue Jeffrey who is the leader of the Redcar council, starts as favourite to win the election on May 4.
However, it is Mr Houchen who is setting the agenda as this is his secondheadline-grabbing announcement of the campaign after he announced he would look to abolish scandal-struck Cleveland Police if he were elected.
The plight of the airport, and its effect on the local economy, has been amajor concern in the area, with a group called Save Teesside Airport set upin 2015.
Peel, though, has a "masterplan" for the airport’s future, which includesexpanding aviation businesses on the site and building hundreds of houses.
Regular flights go to the Schiphol hub in Amsterdam, and to Aberdeen, andlast year it was announced that it is hoped to restart a route to London by2030.
Mr Houchen said: "The current airport owners have their own ideas fordevelopment on the site but our local authorities have lost interest inforcing through a change in the decline of air services."
The airport, next to Middleton St George, started life as a Second WorldWar military base.
In 1963, it was bought by the then Cleveland County Council. That council was abolished in 1996 and the five unitary authorities took on ownership.
In 2002, they transferred the bulk of the ownership to Peel, which ownsairports in Doncaster, Sheffield and Liverpool, in the belief that itsprivate skills and greater resources could run it better. However, in 2010 it controversially introduced a £6 levy on each passenger.
Mr Houchen, who refers to the airport by its pre-2004 name of Teesside,said:
"The airport has been decimated by the local Labour-run authorities andlocal people now have less influence over it.
"The result has been a struggle for flights compounded by policies such asdrop-off fees and passenger fees that actively discourage airport users."
However, the Conservative MP for Stockton South, James Wharton, backed Mr Houchen saying:
"This is a long running issue and it is welcome that atleast one of the candidates is looking to address it.
"I would expect this proposal to be of real interest and it may well be the long term solution we have been looking for."
As well as Ms Jeffrey, the other declared candidates are Chris Foote Woodfor the Liberal Democrats, Hartlepool councillor John Tennant for Ukip and John Tait for the North-East Party.