Cllr David Green, TDC Cabinet Member for Economic Development, said...

Just to set the record straight, neither Thanet District Council or the ruling Labour Group are in favour of a CPO of Manston Airport.

It has been suggested to us by a local MP, and therefore we feel obliged to examine it as a possibility. Until the airport closed, our position was one of support for the airport as a local employer but we were against environmentally damaging night flights. We note that of the three reasons given for closure - loss of BA freight contract, loss of Ryan Air contract and the Government review of south east airports - none of them involved night flights. We suggested extension of the enterprise zone to cover the airport as something Government could do to help stimulate activity. The airport is now closed, and in my opinion unlikely to open again. As the local planning authority we await notification of the owner's plans.

We have already received a suggestion for housing on the northern grass next to the airport. We received this long before talk of closure. This application will be judged along with many other suggestions for potential housing sites and may or may not form part of the next stage of the Local Plan Preferred Options draft that we will be consulting on shortly. That draft will suggest how best to meet our calculation that we will require sites for 11,500 houses over the next 20 years, only half of which can be found within the existing urban boundary.

Three In The Bed, And The Little One Said...

Unholy alliances! It seems that Thanet's two Tory MPs have now jumped into bed with our beloved council's new Labour leader to form a threesome aimed at compulsorily purchasing defunct Manston airport!

Quite how Sir Roger Wind managed to seduce lovely Laura and, er, Labour Iris into taking part in his fantasy, lord knows! Although as you can see from my montage, he was a bit of a charmer back in the day (1943). It's also beyond the wit of any ordinary person to imagine why a Thatchersaurus like Sir Rog is willing to pour oodles and squoodles of public money into what is not much more than a hole in the ground.

And as usual, poor old Windy has got his facts wrong. There is no planning permission for an airport at Manston. Never has been. Unless Iris, who was apparently on the blower to the site's owner last night, has offered to deliver one in the post.

Furthermore, as I understand it, a CPO has to be demonstrably in the public interest. There is no public interest issue at stake here. None of the higher-ups that Windy has been appealing to have shown any desire to keep Manston as an airport in the 'public interest'. Au contraire, they have tried to educate him about the commercial realities of 21st century Britain, rather than the Dambusters dream world that exists between his ears. Ann Gloag's commercial lawyers would make mincemeat of a CPO, and charge us poor council taxpayers a few Bentleys for the pleasure of doing so.

As for the failed bidders having 'every chance of succeeding', well that's just plain laughable. A consortium composed of asset-strippers, people who have failed twice before to make a go of Manston, and some chap the High Court has labelled a dodgy geezer, offering a miniscule percentage of what the place is worth as a development site, does not constitute a viable alternative.

Anyways, here's Windy's statement in full...

North Thanet`s MP, Sir Roger Gale, is supporting  calls for the compulsory purchase, by Thanet District Council, of Manston Airport.

Speaking following a weekend of discussions with local and national political leaders Sir Roger has said:

'Laura Sandys and I are of the view, which I have reason to understand  is shared by the new Labour Leadership of Thanet District Council and by the Conservative Opposition, that with the closure of the airfield the best way to secure a new future for aviation at Manston will be for a Compulsory Purchase Order to be placed upon the site which has, at present, planning consent only as an airport. This is detailed in the very recent draft of the local plan so there should be little difficulty in establishing existing use and thus for the local authority to acquire and then perhaps lease out or sell on the site at a sensible price.

'Clearly the Council will wish to prepare its own study of options based upon legal advice but the opinion that we have been offered is that a bid to place a CPO on the airfield would succeed and that it could be readily funded. If that is so then it ought to be possible to remove the airport from the hands of those who clearly have other objectives and to restore Manston to its rightful place as part of our airport capacity in the South East.

'From the work that has already been done we have good reason to believe that those who wish to re-open the airport and have the capacity to do so have every chance of succeeding where others have seemingly chosen to fail and we hope and expect that TDC`s senior officers, acting on instructions from elected Members, will take a very robust line.

We have to dispel the impression given, arising from discussions that apparently took place with TDC officers earlier in the year, that housing is a “done deal” and that anything other than airport use is on the agenda. As Iris Johnston has made publicly clear, it is not'.

Terminal Decline

Holy airports! With just 24 hours to go until the big 'Save Manston' meeting over on the seedier north side of the island, news that he's a 'confirmed guest' appears to have come as, well, news to Councillor Biggles, the island's self-styled resident expert on all things aviation.

In response to a story in The Gazunder alleging that he'd be attending along with usual suspects Sir Roger Gale MP and Laura Sandys MP, Simes sent this rather sharp tweet back to the hacks: 'I have not confirmed anything other than I am working on Saturday!!'

In all likelihood he'll be up in his teeny-tiny plane, hand on joystick, tugging a banner over Old Trafford. Which seems to be his regular gig these days.

Hey-ho. Support for the 'Save Manston' campaign has hardly set the tarmac on fire. I've seen only one 'Keep Calm and Save Manston' poster displayed on the island (in Westgate, natch!), and the mini-mob in the photo seems to be composed of a few old gippers and some embarrassed children who've been dragged along by their grandparents. Do they really think they're going to fill the Winter Gardens? I expect some of you will tell me tomorrow!

Meanwhile it's been revealed via one of those Freedom of Information thingies that Kent County Council couldn't be arsed to even look at the legals when the current owner, Scottish squillionaire Ann Gloag, bought the place for a quid off Infratil last year. Neither, indeed, did KCC's Tory leader Paul Carter, aka Sir Paul Ruddyfaced-Man. And they're not even bovvered about casting their glass eye over any of Sir Rog's current 'negotiations'. Here's what KCC's FOI response says:

I can confirm that neither Mr Paul Carter, nor any officer of Kent County Council (KCC) holds any information relating to the Heads of Terms or the sale by Infratil of Manston Airport. Also, neither Mr Carter nor any officers of KCC were they shown any Heads of Terms either by the buyer or the seller or any third party. Furthermore, KCC holds no information on how many and which businesses who asked for the closure of the airport were prevented from taking it over and in response to your third question relating to negotiations reported in the media, KCC holds no information that you requested. KCC has not been and is not a party to any of these negotiations.

Which is quite surprising really, given the kerfuffle KCC and Sir PR-M have made about Manston. What with their talk about a new railway station, planes 'flying straight out to sea', 'longest runway in Britain', and the like. Not to mention all the lovely taxpayers' lolly they've lavished on it over the years.

The words 'washing', 'their' and 'hands of it' spring to mind. You do have to wonder whether they were just using the place as a stalking horse to chase off Boris Island, thus keeping their lovely, northwest Kent cottages nice and peaceful at night.

Needless to say, Paul Carter, like Biggles, is not a 'confirmed guest' for tomorrow's meeting. Happy landings!!

Smokin' Future For Manston?

The results of my big poll on the future of Manston are in! And the winner is.... well, it's a dead heat actually.

Asked what you thought RAF London Kent Manston Etc Airport should become now that its days as a runway are rapidly coming to a close, 22% of you went for 'leisure', while another 22% of you opted for a '700 acre cannabis farm'. Hmm. I suppose the two aren't incompatible. And when you add in the 15% who wanted the airport to be returned to agriculture, I think we have a pretty darn good consensus!

That should please Councillor Ian Driver, our appropriately Green local representative who is campaigning for a cannabis caff to open up on Kent's Ramsgate Peninsula. I mean, cripes! With 700 acres of the stuff on his doorstep, he could open up a cannabis superstore!! Here are the results in full:

Question: What future for Manston?

700 acre cannabis farm: 22% (32 votes)
Leisure: 22% (32 votes)
Renewable energy: 16% (23 votes)
Agriculture: 15% (22 votes)
Housing: 12% (17 votes)
Industry: 10% (14 votes)

Personally I would have voted for renewable energy, which came in third. But then, what do I know? Well, what I do know is that it will almost certainly become a mammoth housing estate, which came in second to last.

Meanwhile airport champion Sir Roger Guff has been meeting with airport owner Annie Get Your Gloags today in a bid to save the place. Initial reports are that Sir Rodge has said there is no offer on the table. Believe me, Rodge, there's not only no offer, there's no table, no chairs, not even a room to put them in.

Still, one cloud hanging over the future of the airport as a non-airport, which may in the end prove to be the ace up Roger's hole, is the very well-founded rumour amongst the fly boys that there are unexploded pipe bombs on the site, left over from the war. But then again, if they've been landing planes on them for decades, I can't see it's much of an argument really. Anyone for a housing boom?!?! (Geddit??!!!!!??!?!?!)

Fokker Off

Holy joysticks! With the last KLM flight out of Manston departing this morning, I see the airline has vowed never to return to our septic isle!

In an exclusive interview with Air Transport World, KLM's Cityhopper MD Boet Kreiken said: 'We can’t leave the booking window open if they can’t guarantee operations after April 9. We can’t do business in a shaky environment. That’s not possible, not for the company, or our customers.'

Which will come as a, er, blow to all those Thanetians who were talking about hopping over to Amsterdam to enjoy the city's coffee shops. Actually, thinking about it, none of the ones I came across ever seemed to have the sponds to fund such a trip. Oh well, they'll have to hope that Councillor Motormouth's plan to open a cannabis cafe in Thanet comes to fruitation!

The KLM boss added: 'Now it is game over. We will redeploy the aircraft. We are gone. We can’t flip-flop in and out all the time. That is not the way we work.'

Cargolux have already relocated to Stansted, and Newmarket Holidays are eyeing up Lydd, so it's really looking like there'll be no happy landings for RAFMMTECNDMTSSPI Airport. Which is a bit of a shame, as I'll have to find somewhere else to park my Lear jet now.

Still, per ardua ad astra, as the fly boys say! Which is why I've popped one of my 7 day polls in the column on the right. What do you think the future of Manston should be? Pip pip!

Click here to read KLM comments in Air Transport World.

Click here to read Newmarket Holidays story in Kent Messenger.

Click here to watch video of the last KLM flight on Thanet Gazette website.

Unhappy Landings

In Memoriam 
RAF London Kent Manston
Margate Tracey Emin
Chas 'n' Dave Maggie Thatcher
Schipol Skyport Poundland
International Airport

So farewell
Then, RAF London
Kent Manston
Margate Tracey Emin
Chas 'n' Dave
Maggie Thatcher
Schipol Skyport
Poundland
International Airport.

You had the
Longest runway
In Britain
According to
Roger Gale MP.

And planes flew
'Straight out to sea'
According to
Paul Carter
Leader of
Kent County Council.

None of which
Was true.

You were supposed
To create
'10,000 jobs'.
That wasn't true either.

Now you have gone
To that great
Airport in the sky.

E. C. Richard (29)

Click here to read more about airport consortium pulling out on KM website.

The Unspoken Truth About Manston

I've been holding back on this because it was just a niggle until today, and it could prove rather incendiary.

But at last somebody on the Save Manston Campaign has said what they're really afraid of, should the airport close - 'bleedin immigrants'.

Yes folks, we have a long and proud tradition of xenophobia on our septic isle, with 'Hating Foreigners' somewhere near the top of many people's favourite pastimes. Now a leading pro-Manstoner has posted this on the Broadstairs! Facebook page:

'Who the hell wants 12,000 new homes in thanet.......what you gonna fill them with bleedin immigrants ..........SAVE MANSTON.'

Now don't get me wrong. This person clearly feels very strongly about the airport, and I'm most certainly not accusing her of racism or anything like. But I get a definite feeling that, when people use the argument of last defence about the airport closure, it generally comes out as something along the lines of: 'Well, what you you put there, a sink estate?'  The implication being that such an estate would be full of the brown, black, eastern European or otherwise non-British, non-middle class, non-Tory voting dregs of society, possibly bussed in from London.

As if the white, Tory, British middle class haven't already produced enough of their own dregs. Many of whom are on daily display in Thanet. Kuh!

Update: To their complete credit, the lovely people at the Broadstairs! Facebook page have now removed this woman from their group and deleted all trace of her odious comments. Before she was booted out, I told her I was going to blog about it, and she intimated that as she was 'loud and proud' I should go ahead. In which case I have no compunction about naming and shaming her, so step forward Annette Hearn-Gibson!

Game Over For Manston?

Yikes! Despite Sir Roger's Wind's best efforts to talk the airport up with rumours of a mystery 'consortium', it seems that existing users are voting with their feet and heading swiftly for the emergency exits.

The only scheduled passenger services, operated by KLM, are unavailable on the airline's website as of Wednesday 9th April. And from next Monday, Saudia Cargo will no longer be running its twice weekly round trips between Manston, Kenya and Saudi Arabia, according to the Kent Messenger. Cargolux are also rumoured to be tanking up and taking off for pastures new in the very near future.

Meanwhile, another airport business has been overheard in one of the local pubs discussing its imminent and permanent departure from Manston.

So Sir Rodge had better hurry up and ride to the rescue, otherwise there won't be anything worth saving. Mind you, if he had an ounce of business sense, he would have known he was backing a loser 15 years ago!

Buchanan Skips Town?

One of my lovely readers has sent in this pic and asks:

'Would this be evidence of Charles 'Smiler' Buchanan, the boss of Manston Airport, clearing out his office? I think we should be told.'

Well, er, I'm not sure about that. A quick check of the old telephone number there reveals that it's Scottish. Although, of course, the airport's Scottish owner may well have sent him his P45 in a bloody great orange metal envelope!

Meanwhile Norf Fannit Tory MP Sir Roger Wind appears to be gallumphing to the rescue, saying he has interest from a buyer, backed by a consortium, who wants to take over the airport. That may well be because he's told them Manston has the 4th longest runway in the UK (it hasn't, it's only the 14th longest), and that 'planes fly straight out to sea' (they don't, they go over a town of 40,000 people and 2,500 listed buildings called Ramsgate).

If the only hope for Manston is the guff emanating from Roger Gale's nether regions, then sadly, in all likelihood, it's doomed.

Click here to read more about Roger's 'consortium' in Kent Messenger.

BETRAYED

Yep - that's what the headline in today's Isle of Thanet Gazunder screams, complete with photo of multi-millionaire Manston owner Ann Gloag, who bought the place for a pound last November.

Inside there's lots of Facebook comment from deep thinking local builders, bakers and taxi drivers about how bad the closure of the airport will be for our septic isle. Well, if you want to fly to Thailand to get pissed and turn into a lobster, and aren't prepared to schlep the hour or so to a proper airport, I guess it is a bit of a shame.

But, y'know, I think they've got the wrong person. It's not Ann Gloag who has betrayed us poor, beknighted Thanetians. All she's done is make a tough business decision.

Surely it's the endless procession of local councillors, MPs, hacks and other duffers who have all lined up over the years to pay lip service to the idea of a thriving, international airport on their doorstep, without even stopping to think or find out whether it was ever going to be a goer, who have betrayed us?

Sad to say, it was never going to be a goer. So isn't it about time to finally stop attempting to breath life into this dead dog? It's been dead for 15 years now. It's practically rotted away.

Ramsgate Prices Soar As Airport Plummets

By Isle of Thanet Gazunder Property Editor Sammy Detached

House prices in Ramsgate are surging following the news that Manston Airport is to close.

Estate agents throughout the town have reported a 'tidal wave' of interest in Ramsgate's Georgian and Victorian properties now that the blight of all-night flights, cargo planes carrying rotten bananas and endless training loops by knackered old jumbos has been lifted.

One agent, who didn't want to be named, said: 'Whilst it's obviously bad news for the half a dozen people who worked at Manston, there is an upside. We're getting property inquiries from as far away as Scotland from buyers who have heard the news and are now actively seeking to relocate in our fantastic seaside town.'

One local property expert told the Gazunder that he now expects well-presented homes to double or even triple in value over the next five years. 'It's going to be a new gold rush,' he said, adding: 'I've always maintained that Ramsgate would take off once the take-offs stopped taking off, if you see what I mean.'

Meanwhile redundant airport workers are being urged to 'get on their bikes' and look for work at one of the twelve other airports in the south east. Said one recruitment specialist: 'If you want to work at an airport, stop moaning and move to where there is one.'

That's enough property news - Ed.

Airport Gets New Name (Again)

Holy Gloags! Whiffling through my copy of Global Airport Cities, I spied an article on the new owner of RAF London Kent Manston Margate Tracey Emin Chas 'n' Dave Maggie Thatcher Schipol International Airport!

According to the piece, headlined 'Big Plans For Loss-Making Manston Airport', Scotland's second wealthiest woman hopes to turn her recently acquired acreage of Kentish concrete into 'an environment where new partners are attracted to do business'. Which to my uninitiated ear (that's the left one) sounds like an invitation for everyone to chuck the keys to their knackered old jumbos into a bowl and take pot luck.

She continues: 'I hope that with the co-operation of our neighbours and the wider community of Kent blah blah blah the best chance possible of having a successful and vibrant airport.'

Well, good luck with that Ann! I do hope you mean that, unlike the previous head-in-sand policy adopted by Infratil, you will enter into some kind of meaningful dialogue with the 40,000 people your planes will be flying a few feet over!

Any-old-hoo, to show she means business she's changed the name of her holding company to Manston Skyport Ltd and appointed airport 'turnaround specialist' Alastair Welch to lead her team at Manston. Presumably he'll be the one with the hi-vis vest and ping-pong bats.

Of course, this may leave current RAF London Kent Manston Margate Tracey Emin Chas 'n' Dave Maggie Thatcher Schipol Skyport Poundland International Airport CEO, Smiler Buchanan, feeling as if he's been left with the spare set of keys at an environment where new partners are attracted to do business. Especially as Welch was the MD who presided over the hugely successful take-off of Southend Airport over the last six years.

Happy landings!

Click here to read the full article on the Global Airport Cities website.
Click here for Alastair Welch interview just weeks before he baled out of Sarfend.

Ramsgate Off The Rails?

Cripes! I see there's yet more froth in the local rags this week about a putative 'Manston Parkway' station, and the upgrade of HS1 for the whisking of Londoners thereto.

Quite why Manston needs a 'Parkway', when there's already a perfectly good station just up the road at Ramsgate, lord alone knows. But supporters like Thanet North MP Sir Roger Wind guff on about it deliriously, as if it's the perfect panacea for our lacklustre landing strip.

A bunch of developers are now trumpeting it as 'the key to cutting journey times to and from London - making it (their development) more attractive to investors'. Cogent Land, who are proposing 800 homes on a 112 acre site east of the airport that they've dubbed 'Manston Green', say locating the station within their development would provide an 'important transport link to Westwood Cross, Manston Business Park and Discovery Park'.

This all might be a bit of a surprise to Ruddy-Faced Man and his cohorts at Kent County Council, who have proselytised a Cliffsend location for the 'Parkway'. A recent FOI request brought forth this curt response from the mandarins at Maidstone:

'Kent County Council (KCC) has not had contact with Cogent Land LLP regarding Thanet Parkway Station. The current stage of the development plan for the station is that the business case is being refreshed for the site that KCC originally identified for the station to the west of Cliffs End, while a watching brief is being kept over the Manston Green proposals.

In the event that a new station demonstrates a robust business case then KCC will follow the correct planning procedures in pursuing a planning application. To date, KCC Planning Applications Group has not been involved in this matter.'

Mind you, that's from the people who built you a whole load of traffic calming measures in Cliffsend, then unbuilt them a year later. So I suppose anything is possible.

Meanwhile a reader emails to say that the high speed trains are being discounted to 'all sorts of locations, including Margate and Broadstairs, but not Ramsgate'. She continues: 'Ramsgate has beautiful sandy beaches, a gorgeous Smeaton harbour, fabulous Georgian architecture and is 1hr 15mins from London. It knocks the socks off Whitstable and Deal in terms of beauty. How could anyone screw this up? Well 'they' have. And they continue to do so. We are now 3 places ahead of Margate on the deprivation index. How long before we are top? We need to fight.'

Looks like KCC and the Moonshine Band are already preparing us for the closure of Ramsgate Station, if you ask me!

Finally, talking of letting the train take the strain, reader Mike has emailed me a photo of what must certainly be the winning answer to putting off all those pesky trick-or-treaters on Halloween.

Gale Warning

Cripes! I would sooooo like to turn this into a caption competition, but my wolf pack of highly trained legal beagles have advised against it. Hey-ho.

With the St Jude storm about to hit our septic isle and mash everything to a gelatinous pulp, one of my correspondents has alerted me to another blast of dreadful wind which emanated from Sir Roger Gale, Member of Parliament for Fannit Norf since 1874, in the House of Commons this week.

As usual, Sir Rodge was guffing on about the airport in his customary, swivel-eyed manner (anyone recall his plan to turn Manston into the London Olympics Airport? Nope, nobody does, as it never happened.) Here's the entire text of his latest meanderings from Hansard:

I am delighted to see you in the Chair this afternoon, Madam Deputy Speaker. I am grateful to the hon. Member for Liverpool, Riverside (Mrs Ellman) for generating the opportunity for us to debate something of absolute national importance. Finally, I am pleased to see my hon. Friend the Minister on the Front Bench and welcome him to his new job. I look forward to welcoming him to Kent in the not-too-distant future - he does not know that, but it is going to happen.

I do not want to rerun yesterday's debate either, but during the debate on air passenger duty, the hon. Member for Blackley and Broughton (Graham Stringer) referred to the loss of business to Schiphol and Charles de Gaulle - he might have added Frankfurt - and several other locations in Europe. This is crucial for the economy of the UK. We cannot gainsay the fact that the economic hub of the nation is in London. There is much good business in Manchester, Birmingham and Scotland, but the place that people have got used to interlining through, and therefore also doing business in, is London.

Frequently people just change planes, but equally frequently they stop over. Because they are coming through London, they take the opportunity to take in a show or do business in the City of London. It is not just the thousands of jobs at Heathrow or Gatwick that are at stake and which we could lose to mainland Europe; this is about all the other, ancillary jobs, and the tourism and business that go with them. The cost to the country from the loss of aviation business in the south-east to mainland Europe is almost inestimable.

A long time ago, I upset my right hon. Friend the Member for Saffron Walden (Sir Alan Haselhurst) when I championed the cause of the airport at Stansted. I remember saying then, "It's not Heathrow or Stansted; it's Stansted or Schiphol." That is even truer today than it was then. If I need to underscore that point, KLM Royal Dutch Airlines and Air France are now flying from Manston, in Kent, twice daily to Schiphol, as they are from a number of other regional airports. They are not doing that for fun; they are doing it because they can see there is business to be taken, from the south-east of England in particular, to Schiphol to interline and to go on to all the other places in the world - literally, anywhere that it is possible to fly to from Schiphol. We cannot afford to sacrifice that business.

This debate is about aviation strategy, but my worry is that there is no aviation strategy. There is a commission, and Sir Howard Davies will do his job and report by 2015. Then there will be a debate and more discussion, and there will not be another strip of tarmac or another building, or a Boris island, for 20 years. That is how long it will take. We are losing business today - not tomorrow, in a year's time or in five years' time, but today. As we speak, business is transferring from the United Kingdom to the mainland European airports. We cannot afford to sustain that loss.

On the doorstep of London there is a place called Manston, in Kent. It has the fourth longest runway in the country - it has taken Concorde and wide-body jets - and it is available now. I am not suggesting for one moment that Manston could or should be another London airport, but I believe it could have a major role to play. In, I think, 2005 - I stand to be corrected - the right hon. Member for Edinburgh South West (Mr Darling) published his White Paper on the future of aviation in the south-east, but since then nothing at all has happened in any meaningful or constructive form, apart from perhaps another terminal at Heathrow. I put it to him at the time that Manston was available, and I was told, "No, it's too far from London" - 76 miles.

Let us think about that. Manston is quite a long way - it is further than Gatwick and Heathrow. Actually, it is not, at least not in time. I hope we will eventually finish High Speed 1- my hon. Friend the Minister might have a hand in that. Indeed, I have travelled on the existing line, with old rolling stock, in under an hour from central London to Manston, and if that was possible then, with High Speed 1, it is even more possible today. We can get the journey time down to about 50 minutes. It takes more than 50 minutes to get from central London to Heathrow and almost as long to get to Gatwick. Therefore, in terms of time rather than distance, which is what matters to the traveller, Manston is viable.

So what do we have? We have an airport sitting in Kent, out on the peninsular, relatively out of harm's way in terms of overflying, available today and under new ownership - Manston was sold and bought last week. Its future was in a bit of doubt because it was on the market, but it has now been bought, so it is secure, at least for the foreseeable future. Manston is there and I say to my hon. Friend the Minister and the House that we have to buy time if we are not going to lose more jobs. Manston is never going to be another London airport. What Manston can do is take traffic from Gatwick to release capacity, allow Gatwick to take traffic from Heathrow and free up the capacity there, which is what we need in the short term while the Government take long-term decisions. Manston is a national asset - not a regional or local asset - and we need to use it now. This country cannot afford to waste it.

If you haven't died from a boredom-induced stroke (quite how Our Roger kept the bright young things tuned in during his stint as a pirate DJ in the 60s is beyond me!), you'll have seen that he perpetuates one or two inaccuracies there. Did you spot them? No?

Well how about '(Manston is) relatively out of harm's way in terms of overflying'? Oh well, perhaps geography isn't his strong point. 'Is secure for the foreseeable future'? Business and commerce not a strong point either, clearly. Unless by 'foreseeable future' he means the end of next month.

'Fourth longest runway in the country?' Er, it's the 14th longest, actually.

No wonder the bigwigs in That London don't take Sir Roger seriously. They've twigged he's about as reliable as Michael Fish!

Speaking of which, I'd better tool off and batten down the hatches here at the old cliff top mansion. Let's hope nothing blows off during the night!!

15 Facts You Already Knew About Manston

Only in your super, soaraway Eastcliff Richard! We profile the airport that's just been sold for a whopping £1!!! (Shurely shome mishtake? - Ed.)

1. RAF London Kent Manston Margate Tracey Emin Chas & Dave Maggie Thatcher Schipol Poundland International Airport began life in 1915 as an emergency landing strip for the Royal Flying Corps.

2. Contrary to popular belief, RAFLKMMTEC&DMTSPIA does not have 'the longest runway in the UK'. It is, in fact, the 14th longest runway in the country.

3. Also contrary to urban legend, and contrary to what it says on the airport's Wikipedia page, NASA never had any plans to use the airport as an emergency landing strip for the space shuttle.

4. When the previous owners, Kiwi firm Infratil, took over in 2006 after the airport went bust, they predicted it would be breaking even by 2009.

5. In 2007, the airport was said to require millions of pounds worth of investment to sort out its drainage and fuel tanks.

6. Also in 2007, a poll conducted by Eastcliff Richard revealed that 73% of readers found training flights from RAFLKMMTEC&DMTSPIA a nuisance.

7. In 2008, 1500kgs of rotting food was impounded off a cargo flight, including 'fish that was so badly decayed some of it had become liquid'.

8. Also in 2008, Manston based holiday firm Seguro went bust, leaving 2,500 holidaymakers stranded abroad.

9. In 2009, Thanet North MP Sir Roger Gale pushed for Manston to become 'London's Olympic Airport'. 

10. Also in 2009, Infratil reported the airport was losing £4m a year, and were expected to sell it 'within 12 months'.

11. And again in 2009, British Airways World Cargo pulled out of negotiations to base themselves at Manston, preferring Stansted instead.

12. In 2010, regular Manston cargo visitors Meridian and Egyptair were severely reprimanded by the DfT and CAA for serious technical and safety failures.

13. Cargo flights have often been found to conceal contraband. In 2010, 3kg of cocaine was seized off a knackered old jumbo from Ghana.

14. Also in 2010, the airport changed its name, yet again, this time from 'Kent International Airport' to 'Manston - Kent's International Airport.'

15. During the last general election, Thanet North MP Sir Roger Gale came out firmly against night flights at Manston.

That's enough Manston facts - Ed.

Manston Pickle

You know me, I'm not one of those swivel-eyed rabble-rousers who's prone to posting controversial stuff in the hope of whipping up the lethargic locals into a state of revolutionary frenzy.

But no less an organ than the British Medical Journal has just reported a link between aircraft noise, especially at night, and the risk of heart disease and death from stroke. The report confirms what other studies have found, including one large-scale German analysis that concluded there was a 66% increased risk of heart attacks in men, and a whopping 139% increased risk in women, should knackered old jumbos be whining over your bonce while you're trying to get a bit of the old shut-eye.

I've run those odds past Cyril, my bean counter (he's a whizz with an Excel spreadsheet), and apparently that means there's a statistical chance of everyone in Ramsgate being dead by next Tuesday, should RAF London Kent Manston Margate Tracey Emin Maggie Thatcher Schipol International Airport decide to bust the toothless no night flights ban, which, er, it already does anyway.

Meanwhile Manston's bosses Infratil have been on a shindig to Shanghai, where they've decided to offload their other UK loss-making lump, Glasgow Prestwick Airport, onto the poor old Scottish taxpayer. You'd hope they'd be paying Lexy Salmon and his kilted crew to take it off their hands, but we all know from recent experience here on the Ile de Thanet what dunces public servants are when it comes to doing a commercial deal.

With RAFLKMMTEMTSIA up for sale since March last year, what's the betting Thanet Council's cack-handed Chief Executive Sue McGonigal trumpets a fabulous deal in the next few weeks to buy the £4m-a-year lossmaker for a bargain £3.4m, thus saving the twelve jobs at stake?!?!!!!?!!!

Click here to read about the latest BMJ report on aircraft noise.
Click here to read about Infratil's sale of Prestwick to the Jocks.

Going Dutch

I see Councillor Biggles is getting his joystick in a lather over on Thanet Life about the new KLM flights that began today from the Ile's RAF London Kent Manston Margate Tracey Emin Schipol International Airport.

Bizarrely, I find myself in agreement with our very own teeny-tiny banner-tugger for once!

After all, Thanet is now connected to everywhere in the world, and soon we'll be swamped with gazillions of foreign visitors, all cramming their way onto the island to get a glimpse of our lovely attractions! According to a UKIP pamphlet which flopped through my letterbox this morning, at least 29 million of them will be coming from Bulgaria and Romania! Hurrah!

Of course, I won't be using the service myself as I have my own private Lear jet permanently parked at RAFLKMMTESIA, ready to thrust me off to my other homes in Provence, Bali and the Virgin Islands. But at least this latest development means the radar will work and the runway will be swept. And all with only a £100,000 subsidy from our taxpayers' pockets. Just the ticket!