ERM have a reputation for 'greenwash'. ERM are the company large
corporations go to when they desire a flaky report to make them
look cleaner, greener with a better reputation than they actually
posses or deserve. With the two so-called 'independent' reports
for Rushmoor Borough Council on the TAG risk contours for
Farnborough Airport - main report (October 2002), supplementary
report (December 2002) - ERM demonstrate they have a well
deserved reputation.

In summary: TAG have produced flawed risk contours (which
underestimate the risk), ERM have produced two reports of little
substance. Both have avoided the real issue.

Drawing the 1:100,000 annual individual risk contour (ie the
probability of an individual being killed in any one year)
however well or badly drawn, is not a mechanism for determining
the TAG planning application.

The 1:100,000 risk contour is of use only for drawing the Public
Safety Zone. A PSZ is a future planning tool. It is a sanitised
zone in which no future development should take place, ie no one
should live, work or congregate, ie no houses, playing fields,
car parks, schools, colleges, office blocks etc. At Farnborough
this non-permitted development is already extensive within the
PSZ, ie if it did not actually exist, it could not be built as
not safe.

The PSZ is loosely based on the 1:100,000 risk contour. It is
drawn for the movements and mix of aircraft in 2015, ie not the
current mix and number of movements.

Annual individual risk contours (ie the risk of an individual
being killed in any one year) are determined by the number of
movements, the weight and mix of the aircraft, the crash
consequence area and the crash rate. No account is taken of the
population on the ground. The risk contours for Farnborough would
be the same whether Farnborough were open desert or lower
Manhattan, because no account is taken of the population on the
ground.

What we can say of the risk contours for Farnborough is that more
people are enclosed than at any other airport, ie more people at
risk of being killed. The 1:10,000 risk contour extends outside
the airfield boundary. This is contrary to HSE advice that no
third party should be exposed to such a risk.

To date a ground safety study has not been carried out.

NATS, DfT have both advised Rushmoor that drawing risk contours
is not relevant for determining a specific planning application.
That a ground safety study should take place, that the safety
study should be robust and able to withstand scrutiny, that
serious weight should be given to safety when weighing other
considerations (benefits and disbenefits). To date no such
assessment has taken place, Farnborough reaps all the disbenefits
and receives no benefits.

No account has been taken of the Human Rights of those affected
by these applications.

Before making detailed comments on the planning agenda including
the subsidiary ERM report I would note that the subsidiary ERM
report was not made available until a few days before the
planning meeting (making comment difficult), that isolated
paragraphs and statements have been taken and quoted out of
context from my reports (councillors should have placed before
them the complete reports), these comments should be read in
conjunction with previous detailed comments on TAG and ERM
reports.

All three reports should be placed before councillors. Failure to
do so will be seen as a serious breach of the Human Rights Act.
In the absence of these reports councillors are seeing
information out of context, and being deliberately misled.

The agenda placed before councillors is flawed and extremely
biased. It contain false and misleading comments by officials. It
is extremely one-sided. Reports by and on behalf of TAG and two
reports by ERM (incl one which takes highly selective out of
context quotes from my reports) are included, whereas, the three
reports by myself, and reports by others, are not included. I
will expect these missing reports to be included. As this will be
additional information that councillors need time to absorb and
digest, and have the opportunity to ask questions, the discussion
should be deferred.

The flawed and biased agenda is yet one more example why an
independent investigation of the Rushmoor planning department is
long overdue.

On Saturday morning, councillors had a cosy little tea and
biscuits with TAG in the control tower. Where they were told
that TAG would be making a press announcement on Thursday that
the airfield now had the go-ahead. A little premature one would
think. But then why were councillors, who in a few days time,
meet to consider a planning application from TAG, hob-nobbing
with TAG?

The planning meeting takes place at 7pm Wednesday 18 December
2002 in the Council Offices on Farnborough Road, Farnborough. We
need to have a packed meeting to show the widespread opposition.

The Council is refusing to allow anyone opposed to the proposals to
address the meeting.

The preceding day, the Rushmoor Cabinet will meet (4.30pm Tuesday
17 December 2002 in the Council Offices on Farnborough Road,
Farnborough) to rubber stamp the proposals for an airfield
consultative committee. Out of the 21 seats, only one will be
allocated to the local community (7 seats should be allocated to
the local community).

Keith Parkins

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 http://www.heureka.clara.net/surrey-hants/tag-erm.htm