London Heliport Consultative Group - Wednesday 14 May 2025, 7:00pm - Wandsworth Council Webcasting

London Heliport Consultative Group
Wednesday, 14th May 2025 at 7:00pm 

Agenda

Slides

Transcript

Map

Resources

Forums

Speakers

Votes

 
Share this agenda point

Thank you and the meeting is now live. Thank you very much. Welcome everybody to
the Heliport Consultative Committee. My name is John Evans and I'm the Assistant
Chief Executive of Wands of Council and I'm the advisor to this committee. I'm
opening us up today to take the first item on the agenda before you which is
the nomination of a chair for this meeting and for future meetings of the municipal year.
I've had some discussions with some reps on this meeting and given the nature of the agenda today,
particularly in discussing the future of the heliport, I am, Councillor Colle has asked me
to be put forward as the chair of this meeting. So I'm seeking people's support for
Councillor Colle to take the chair and if people are happy with that then I will step aside and
leave Councillor Colle to it. I'm not seeing any, it seems a nod to that, any objections to that?
I have no idea who this Councillor is, can somebody explain who they are, what their
background is, where they come from please? I will let Councillor Colle who is now chairing
this meeting introduce himself to the meeting thank you
sure hi everyone I'm council Jim Cokley I've been on the committee for the last
two years I was the chair in the year before last extraordinary we didn't get
through the order of business very well previously did we hopefully we're going
make better progress now. I think to say I think Councillor Colle will run through the
agenda now thank you. Okay thank you John. Yeah good evening everyone I'm Councillor
I'll be chairing this meeting. So first I'm going to start by calling names in
order of attendance so if you can switch on your microphone and
just confirm your attendance when I call out your name. So starting with
councillors and myself confirmed attendance as well from Wandsworth
Councilor de la Seusel. Hi good evening everyone, Councilor Caron I'm from St. Mary's
Hall. Thank you Councillor. Then we have Councillor Alexander. Yes I'm here.
Thank you. We have just joined in from Kensington, Chelsea, Councillor Zwetinuk.
Hello, can everyone see me? Yes, we can see you fine. So we're just reading our attendance,
so you got here just in time. Sorry, it should be a few minutes late, I apologise. That's
okay, no worries. So that's all we have today for councillors. Then we have resident representatives.
we have James Eaton. Yes speaking, I'm here. James, we have Jenny Scott -Thompson. I think
you won't be there. Yes, I'm here. I saw your mouth move. And we have Tom Foutend. Yes, I'm here.
And can I please ask the Heliport management and the Heliport users to
introduce themselves. So should we start with Will Crijses? I think you already know who I am.
Okay and Michael Hampton? Yes, I'm managing director of Capital Air Services, we're a
I'm Matthew Rice, I'm the heliport manager. Just for your information, I've
only got an hour today because we've got our emergency exercise starting on -site.
No worries. Are there any other web sensors of any other services or is that
everyone? I believe that's everyone. So can we move on to apologies? I have an
apology for absence from Catherine Vovinco, who's the resident rep for Kingston and TOC.
Are there any other apologies? No, Chair, I can confirm there's no other apologies for
absence. Okay, thank you. And then our next item is the appointment of residents' representatives
for the next year. So I can confirm that nominations for the appointment of
resident references for the next municipal year. We have James Eaton
and Jenny Scott Thompson again for Wandsworth, Tom Farland for Ham, Smith and
Fulham and Catherine Forwinco for Kensington and Chelsea. So are these agreed?
Yes, Michael. Thank you. It's just to confirm that it's for each constituent group to confirm their
appointment, so I think because there doesn't seem to be any objections and I know all candidates
asked to be on the rolls, I think we can take that as approved. Yeah, I think we can take that as
agreed. And then we have declarations of interest. So does anyone have any declarations of pecuniary
or other registrable interests. Okay and then and next we have the minutes so are
the minutes of the previous meeting taken as a correct record? The 22nd of
July minutes they are.
Okay, I will take that as agreed.
So next we're onto our first substantive agenda item, which is the future of the London Heliport
Consultative Group.
This has been added to the agenda at the request of the Heliport.
So I invite Mr. Curtis and Mr. White to introduce the matter.
Okay. We normally airports organize consultant committee meetings and appoint a chair and then select residents groups, etc.
I suppose the trigger for re -looking at this was your decision Jamie to let Tom Farron
A speak as a member of the public at a meeting that wasn't supposed to be open to the public
and B to allow him to be appointed as a residence representative during the course of that meeting
without and totally ignored our objection to that. So that's made us re -look at the situation.
we've decided we're going to take our consultant committee meeting back in
house. We couldn't do that previously in the days before video
calls because we needed a room and I suppose the council were the only people
able to provide that sensibly. However now these meetings are online I think
it's easier for us to chair and host the meeting which we will do. We'll
do two meetings annually, three if we think it's necessary. They will be during
working hours not in the evening because we work during the day we don't work in
the evening as a rule and you will not you can welcome to carry on this meeting
but you cannot call it the Heliport Consulted Committee meeting because
that's a meeting that we should so normally these meetings are organized by
airports not by local authorities and they are open to elected members and
appointed seats. There's normally three seats available to residence groups but
they have to be formally constituted residence groups with properly elected
representatives. So that's our position. I'm afraid we'll be leaving this
meeting in future. This will be the last one that we'll be part of.
Okay and just for the record of the meeting you've provided the terms of
references of the new? We have, yes. We have. Okay. Thank you for introducing me. Just as
a point of order, we are not obliged because of our size to hold a consultant committee
meeting at all. There is no requirement for an airport of this scope to hold a consultant
committee meeting. So we will do so in order to, you know, take feedback from councillors
and residents of course we're always open to that at any time it doesn't have
to wait for a meeting if a local council has something they'd like to share with
us or a concern they're welcome to contact us but you know we need to have
control this meeting the way these meetings are being run I'm afraid it's
just not acceptable to us it doesn't work for us okay thank you for
introducing the item. So first I'm going to start by opening the floor for any questions
or comments from any of our members of the committee. Mr. Eaton.
Hello there. I've read through the proposed constitution from the Heliport, thanks for
that Will, and I've compared it with the previous constitution. There was one particular difference
in section 3 resident reps aren't mentioned it does that there's a letter
F which looks like something may have been deleted but they are mentioned in
section 5b so could you clarify will what what is correct I don't know I
haven't got it in front of me and I'm not intending to look now I'll have a
at it tomorrow. Okay, so well I can tell you at point three it says there are six or there are 12
constitutions or the groups consists of 12 members and then it says a six reps from the heliport and
b six reps from the local authorities and then there's just a letter f hanging but in point five
it talks about 5b it talks about nominations for resident representatives so I think there's
a probably maybe there's just an error but the numbers don't work out if there is an error
in in section three so if you could clarify what do you plan to have i mean you said in your
introduction that you did plan to have resident representatives but they would have to be from
formally um formally appointed from resident associations but actually that isn't mentioned
in your constitution well maybe we took that out i can't remember i'll have to have a look at it
It's a long time ago. I wrote it a long time ago.
So I'll have a look at it.
OK, thanks.
Ultimately, you know, we'll organize the meetings and at the first meeting,
the terms of reference will be agreed anyway.
So we've only produced them for this meeting as a courtesy.
So, you know, the final version will be part of the first consultant committee pack
to be adopted. I'm just seeing if I can find it now to answer your question,
but I'm not sure I can't.
Michael, do you have a copy of the terms of offence that you could refer to?
If you can just give me one moment, I'll see if I can pull it out and share my screen.
Okay, thanks Michael.
In the meantime, we're waiting for that.
Does anyone else, any other counselors or references have any comments?
Jenny.
Yeah, I think just to say thank you for explaining.
I appreciate the group has had ups and downs over the years, but it's disappointing to
have it change like this and I would hope we could find a helpful way forward and it
would be good to understand how you're getting resident feedback in future. I know last meeting
there was some discussion that residents should feed in via councillors. As James has said,
the proposed constitution that many of us only just saw a week ago appears contradictory,
internally contradictory, it would be, yeah, when that comes out it would be good to understand
how the new process is going to work. Right, you say there was a,
because my version doesn't have an F hanging there, I don't know where,
section 5 a B section 3 has the F hanging there section and then section 5
contradicts section 3 it doesn't have the F hanging there in my version so
something's gone wrong in the in the distribution of it I don't yeah it
doesn't have a my version put it that way so I don't I don't know what's
there we'll have to look into that. What does section 5B say? Sorry. Section 5B says
nominations for residents representatives shall be submitted to
the Secretary no later than 10 working days prior to the next meeting in which
their candidacy is to be considered. Any nominations received after this date
shall only be considered at the next meeting subject to unanimous agreement
of all members in attendance of the meeting and that is to prevent
exactly what happened a year or so ago when we were told that the public would
attend the meeting or Mr. Farron would attend the meeting but wouldn't be
saying anything as a member of the public but he wants to attend and we
agreed to that then during the course of the meeting not only did he you know
make representations but also ended up being officially accepted as a residence
group representative which considering that he's in our books of exatious
complainer because he makes countless completely pointless objections we
thought that was a you know not very helpful and that's actually what's led
us to the position we've reached now where we've decided that our best
interests lie in running the consulting committee ourselves so that we don't
have that kind of thing happening. You know this is not my first gig we have a
a consultant committee here at Oxford Airport and I ran one at Biggin Hill Airport and you
know they were all perfectly well run but they were chaired by somebody independent
but that chair was appointed by the airport and then obviously the elected members attended
and you know suggestions were made about residence representatives. So what my version says is
The consulting committee should consider a maximum of 12 members, 4 representatives of the heliport, 4 representatives of the local authorities and 4 representatives of the residence groups. That's what the version I wrote says.
So I don't know if that's what you've got?
That's not what we've been sent to.
So something's gone wrong somewhere and you've been sent the wrong version, whether that's our fault or otherwise, I don't know, but it clearly needs to be corrected.
What we'll do is we'll circulate in the next few days the version that I think we when once we got to the bottom what's happened, we'll circulate the version that we that should be out there.
but obviously we'll be putting that with the pack for the next Heliport Consult
Committee meeting for those that wish to attend. And that'll be, you know, discussed
formally at that meeting and any amendments that everybody agrees are
required will be incorporated and then it'll be recirculated.
Okay, so can you just confirm again, so the four resident representatives on the
committee have to be unanimously agreed by all? Yeah because I don't want to have a
residence representative who phones the airport 30 times in a day to complain
about aircraft. That's not, it's not helpful you know as I've said many many
times before you would not buy a house next to a motorway and then phone the
Department for Transport and ask to have the motorway closed and so it follows
that if you buy a house on the flight route to a heliport don't be surprised
when you see helicopters coming backwards and forwards. They've been doing that since 1959.
You know, it's no secret that there's a heliport there. And we, you know, we can't, every year
helicopters get quieter and frankly we have fewer of them, or certainly it's not a growing number.
So the, you know, the noise nuisance is not changing as such. I mean, it's a city, you know,
we live in London, it's a city and it's going to have to have a heliport somewhere. And that just
absolutely where it is. Okay so I think I think John wanted to, oh wait, I think Tom can go first.
Yeah okay okay I think Tom and then Councillor Paul then had his hand up
afterwards and then and then John has a few concerns that I've been talking about
him previously and wanted to share but first Mr. Fowman do you want to go first?
Yeah thank you I'm sorry that my name has come up so many times in this discussion.
I don't believe I've ever phoned earlyport let alone 30 times. I filled in a form on the website
that didn't have an adequate explanation of what it was for and after Mr. Rice called me to explain
I made, I think, a constructive suggestion about how the website page could be updated
to make it a bit clearer what it was for, and the heliport kindly did that. And I'm
not aware that I've complained in any form ever since then. So I think being categorized
as a vexatious complainant is a little bit unfair. And I don't argue with the question
about exactly how I was appointed into this role,
but I did say right at the beginning
when I was challenged by you, Mr. Curtis,
that I wanted to participate constructively in this group
and I believe I have done ever since.
So I think trying to put the blame on me
is a bit of a stretch.
There is a little bit of a sense here
that the early port doesn't want too much scrutiny,
especially from local residents and the nature of this area has changed radically in the years
since 1959 and it's now a residential area not a light industrial area so things have changed and
things do move on and even your precious Biggin Hill, things changed as well because of noise
and its impact on local residents so things do change and things can change. I don't think
anything is ever set in stone and I would urge whatever the constitution of future groups is
that you do accept feedback, scrutiny, and so on
from local residents, because I think it is important.
I did move in here knowing full well there was a heliport
there.
So I'm not kind of surprised to see helicopters and hear them
as well.
But I do think that constructive engagement and criticism
ought to be encouraged, not avoided.
Anyway.
Matt, could we ask Matt to please to comment on that because as far as I understood it we'd had numerous complaints Matt, is that correct?
Yeah that is correct, I'm just looking at the figures now, it was over 15 different complaints using the form and it was variations of I can't hear my podcast, I can't hear my wife talk and it was across a weekend and there was just ping after ping after ping to our noise complaint form
So that was 15, not 30, and it was forms, not phone calls, just to be clear.
Okay, but it was still, it was 15 consecutive complaints.
And then was that?
And then you come on to be a member of the consultant committee.
That was more than two years ago, and I, like I said, I believe I've been a constructive member of this group since then,
and once I realised what that form was supposed to be for, and once the website was corrected,
I don't believe I've raised a single complaint since. Maybe I'm wrong about that, Mr Rice,
you could correct me. I'm not aware that I have. Other people may have done so, but not myself.
Anyway, perhaps you can move on from that small difference in opinion on exactly what happened.
And not to single you out or anything, Mr Farrand, but I do remember when we were having that
discussion about appointing and we understood that there were concerns in
the heliport because of the record of the complaints has there been any so
well Matthew like has there been any comments or complaints about how Mr.
Fowren has behaved in these meetings because you since this is being used as
a reason for breaking away and forming your own committee has there been any
No, no, no, the complaint is the way you behaved as the chair, which is why I'm astonished
that you've been reappointed as the chair, given that it was such a shambles last time.
You know, you were the person who allowed Mr. Farron without any consultation with us
and against our wishes to be appointed as a residence representative. That's why nothing
to do with Mr. Farron's complaints. That is why we are setting up our own committee, because
that is unacceptable as far as we're concerned completely unacceptable and it
was outside the terms of reference the Heliport Consultant Committee meeting as
constituted by the council so we are going to do a better job ourselves. Okay
so it's more on the point of principle of how he is appointed rather than his
conduct and how he's behaved in the meeting since. Indeed. Okay
Councillor Paul, do you want to come in?
Yes, thank you very much, Chair.
I think it's been very useful being on this committee and I think I have listened to what
the Heliport have said and some of it was quite a revelation which I've taken to my
local authority and we've looked at several of the points raised by the
heliport and this just seems a good point to add in because I think it's
constructive and I hadn't realized that the heliport weren't putting in
any comments to the planning applications that were made within my
Now, that's not their fault, so hopefully Will's not going to jump on this.
They hadn't been informed as a historic fact.
So if I can just give an example of the Riverside Waste Authority, further up the river, and
they've got very, very noisy operations.
And in Hammersmith and Fournier, you're probably aware, I think we've got the most amount of
development along the stretch that would be affected by helicopter noise.
And what happens is with the Waste Authority, when a planning application goes in, they
say, look, we're here, we do this waste transfer, we work around the clock, we'll try and do
this.
But if you build these flats, you know, you can't expect us to deal with the noise complaint.
Accordingly, the Planning Commission has amended or noted that people who are going into these
new developments can't just buy a flat and then complain about the noise that's generated.
Now I'd always assumed that that had been something that was going on with the Heliport,
but it hasn't.
That's a real shame because the effect of this, and I've seen this on quite a recent
development near to Wandsworth Bridge, where as a consequence of those planning conditions
going in, the developers have thought, oh my God, if we build these lights, nobody's
going to buy them if there's a mention of helicopter noise and we're not going to be
allowed to make complaints about the noise.
So consequently, the developers, they put triple glazing in, they put different types
of cladding on the outside of buildings to absorb the noise, which I think that brings
us around to what Will had said, I think the very first meeting I was there about the noise
complaint and said, well, you build these flats, people and then people complain about
the helicopter. So the heliport and that's not fair on us. So in the first instance,
what we've done is we've got our planning department to make sure that they notify the
heliport of every planning application and you can certainly contact me or any
other councillor if you find the form all that troublesome and whatever else
and we'll get the council officers to assist you with that form to make a you
know to make a valid objection that will go before the planning committee so that
hopefully in future the flats are one built in a way that there isn't this
noise problem and secondly that you've got some protection against it so that
you're not dealing with this big volume of complaints.
And I think the volume of complaint one is, again,
something that we've learned from this consultative
committee, and I think you've noticed the number of complaints
that are coming from Hammersmith and Fulham,
and whether it's Tom Farron's Residence Association
or any of the others, have dropped off
because there's a better understanding.
and will explain to us that the big causes of the problems of noise are not the way the
heliport is operating.
It's down to air traffic control, queuing them up, particularly in Fulham.
I suspect that probably is an effect in Kensington and Chelsea as well, where the helicopters
seem to use the railways as a navigation point.
We will have a considerable number of helicopters queued up, particularly after events like
Silverstone.
The noise can be absolutely horrendous.
Some of them will just do small circles while they're waiting to get into land.
In my time as the chair, I've spoken to our admin council officers about talking to the
getting some better links with the with the Civil Aviation Authority because off
my own back I didn't I didn't get anywhere trying to contact the Civil
Aviation Authority about the heliport. They've got plenty of resources if you
want to talk about Heathrow but there's just it goes seems to go down a black
hole so I think we need to get the Minister involved to say we want the CAA
more involved and connected with this committee to deal with noise complaints
where it's being generated by queuing up helicopters and the way the helicopters are being managed
while they're waiting to land.
I hope that's helpful and I hope that Matthew and Will can see that we don't sit on our
hands.
We do listen to what you've got to say and we do want to have a constructive one where
the noise complaints are synthesized down to what needs to be dealt with by the committee,
but we do need your help because without that technical input then our
residents are just going to keep pressing the button or emailing and whether it's Tom or anybody else.
Tom's not going to do that now because he knows what the system is, but other residents will sooner come along.
We've got several developments soon to come online
probably within the next 12 months on there and
And lo and behold, people are going to move in there and they're going to say, what about the
what about the helicopter noise and that? So we do need that. We do need that technical
technical input. And we do need to say to residents, look, this is how we're going to
deal with the problems and where it's the helicopters, the heliport, then let's deal
with the heliport. But where the complaints are coming from, the way air traffic control is
managing things will address the complaints in that one. Another one which is just, sorry
Ciao, I've grabbed a big lump of time, just on a final note, I found in my local authorities
paperwork the heliport is called the Putney Heliport, the Wandsworth Heliport, the Battersea
Heliport, the London Heliport and those are just the permutations I could find. So again I've had
to talk to the planning department at Hammersmith and Fulham to make sure that council officers
are very, very aware of what the correct title is for the heliport, which I do forgive them
a little bit because heliport is not within Hammersmith and Fulham, so they tend to just
see what's on a document, whether it's right or wrong, call it that, which then again confuses
these processes. I hope that's helpful and I'd like to thank everybody for listening
to something that I thought I'd be a lot quicker saying. May I? Sure, go ahead.
Yeah, we absolutely want to cooperate on all technical matters. We fully support you,
Councillor Paul, with that and I think your points are really valid. You know, air traffic control,
we're aware of holding, sometimes it's due to our air traffic control or somebody departing late,
you know, the lack of space we've got.
Other times it's down to other air traffic authorities
who give clearance limits
and won't let people pass certain points.
But we definitely want that interaction
so that we can, as you say,
focus on the things that actually do need correcting
or which we can correct.
If you can get the CAA to take any interest,
that'd be great.
We find that they're very interested
when it's time for us to pay them some money
and they're not much interested any other time.
And so I know that they are particularly keen to avoid dealing with issues of noise.
They feel that's not for them to deal with is my understanding of it.
But sometimes they have to get involved where larger airports are concerned,
but they seem to avoid getting involved with any disputes with smaller airports.
that's been my experience of it to date. But you know to give you our reassurance
we definitely want to you know our consulting committee to carry on doing
all the useful things that the consulting committee has done to date.
Okay John did you want to come in next?
Thank you, Chair, and I just wanted to reflect on a few things, Councillor Copley, you and
I discussed, we're slightly concerned about from a Wandsworth perspective, and I just
wanted to make the point that I don't believe Mr Barron was appointed unconstitutionally
and I think that is something that you as chair were not able to prevent and the constitution
wouldn't allow you but we've also got a difference of opinion there. I recognise that there's a bit of
confusion about the resident reps on the constitution and Mr Curtis has agreed to
go away and have a look at that because as it stands at the moment it seems to suggest there
are no resident representatives and obviously that would be concerning that we would have a
community group input into the heliport, but it sounds like we can get some clarity on that.
And obviously the heliport remained the, effectively the arbiter of who is on and who isn't on that forum, whereas at the moment it's very much led by the community and individual councils to put representatives on the heliports.
Also the meetings are held in private, whereas this one isn't is held in public so members of the public can access this live and the recording of the meeting as well.
And obviously there's discretion of the heliport to to cancel meetings if there's no business and discretion to stop meetings they they wanted to.
I just wanted to pick up a point of clarity that just because the heliport wants to take it on, which is, you know, absolutely their discretion to have their own consultative group.
That doesn't prevent us continuing in some way with a heliport consultative group but clearly the heliport management and operators participation in a group is really the key to its success.
so I think it'd be very tricky for it to continue on in its current uh guy so I just wanted to make
those sort of points of concern uh uh chair and um um I know that there's certainly things that
echoed across uh Wandsworth and Wandsworth council so thank you.
Thank you John and yeah I think you've raised useful points there so firstly
making sure that there is enough membership from recognised residents associations. So
we've discussed that there could be two ways that you want to do this, whichever one is
more preferable, either the regular meetings include the members of the recognised residents
association groups or the heliport, or if it is going to be a sort of closed shop for
more the Heliport staff and councillors, then we have at least one meeting a year as an
open forum. So it gives an opportunity for residents to come and get more direct feedback
instead of just through councillors. Mr. Eason, would you like to come in?
Yes, please. I note from the, this is going back to Councillor Paul's point. Yeah, thanks
for your points, Councillor Paul. It was very interesting, your work in Wandsworth there.
One thing that came up on the last meeting that's in the minutes is about Heathrow Special.
And Will, you mentioned that you were on the steering committee or the steering board for
modernization of London airspace. Is there any way that you and Paul could get together to
work out how to engage better with the CA and as Councillor Paul was saying about the Minister and
how that can work given your knowledge of the Heathrow Special there? Yeah the Heathrow,
The airspace modernization program is primarily about routes in and out of Heathrow, Gatwick,
you know, Biggin Hill, Luton, Stansted, Gatwick.
And the lower airspace at the moment isn't scheduled to change.
The base of controlled airspace might change, which might allow aircraft to fly higher
because the idea is to modernize the departure routes.
but I'm not sure that in the vicinity of the heliport that will make a lot of difference
because the landing gradients will remain unchanged, they'll still be three degrees.
But we can certainly ask, but the Minister doesn't get involved in airspace
modernization at all, the Minister simply rubber stamps it when it's done. It's dealt with by
by individual airport sponsors and by the airspace change organisation ACOG.
And those are the...
But I don't see that it would do any harm to feed into ACOG
that, you know, the heli route should be looked at,
the London heli route should be looked at.
But yeah, I mean broadly speaking, there has been a move by the CA recently to increase
the visibility for flight and cloud base for flight.
And there's been a consultation on that which Matt and I took part in and all the helicopter
operators took part in.
And I think that will, broadly speaking, if they go with the recommendations made by the
operators and by the heliport that'll be a sensible outcome, just a slight
improvement in safety from our point of view. Slightly improved visibility
required but the reason that they're doing that or the CA brought that forward
is because of something called advanced air mobility and there is a thinking as
part of this airspace and organisation that the sky will be full of electric
drones doing things that could usefully be done by people on bicycles but I
don't think it'll ever happen but if it does I guarantee you they'll produce a
considerable degree of nuisance because though the manufacturers suggest they're
quiet they do emit quite a high -pitched buzz like a you know angry bee or
something so I don't think it'll be quite as pleasant as everybody says it
will be I just don't think it's going to work commercially so I haven't sort of
got too panicked about it from the point of view of the heliport. And just as you
know as a follow -on to that if I may, we we have been approached by various of
the electric vertical takeoff and landing manufacturers to be able to use
the heliport, not that they have aircraft that is serviceable yet and we've told
them that they won't be able to do that because there is no known way of putting
out a battery fire. They're just left to burn and they emit lots of toxic fumes
and they contaminate water courses as they burn so you can't put water on them.
And so we think given where we're located unless somebody come up with a sensible answer we would
we would decline on the safety grounds to host electric vertical takeoff and landing aircraft
if and when they actually come to come into service.
Okay.
Does that help in your specific point about the queuing in the
in the heliport area that's caused by air traffic controllers?
Yes, this was something that we, before I was on the committee, and as a lifelong local
residents of Fulham and my neighbors, we tend to automatically in our minds get this picture
of it being all the heliports fault rather than understanding how that queuing system
is worked and who's managing it.
So it's very useful to know that.
And I'm sorry, I've got a bit distracted about the electric aircraft because the idea of
electric aircraft and the fire hazards is incredibly worrying.
And I would like maybe this committee to take a little bit of interest within that because
I think the head reporter writes about the dangers of electric fires and an electric
far there that the toxicity of the fumes that are given off by lithium -type batteries is
absolutely appalling.
It really would constitute a big hazard way beyond anything that's involved with a Jet
A1 fuel.
I think I'm sure Alexander so.
Um if maybe for the.
Thank you for raising your point.
Uh, are there any more questions on the sort of on the structure of the the proposed new
committee. Okay, well, in that case, Will and Matthew, I think our officers will continue
to be in touch with you because as John said, there were these concerns, especially about
the meetings not being public as well as how the resident representatives will be appointed,
how the minutes are going to be circulated. So if you're agreeable to
still discussing this before we finalize the terms of the new
meeting then we can sort of take that outside of this meeting. If I may, I don't
think there's any discussion to be had. We are taking the Consultive Committee
meeting back in -house as it is our meeting effectively and you know there
will be an opportunity to discuss the terms of reference of the Constitution at
that first consultant committee meeting there's no further discussion to be had.
You know there's no requirement for us to hold a meeting at all given the scale
of the airport. So you know I think we would invite all present attendees bar
residents groups at the moment and then decide which residents groups should be
representative and I would like the councillors to decide which residents
groups they think best represent their wards because they know their wards
better than anybody else. But I don't see what purpose we can serve by delaying or elongating
the conversation. It's decision is made, we're going to do it, that's that.
Yeah, we understand that you are going to make that decision, but it's more about just
making sure that the terms of reference are as open and transparent that will be useful
for serving us and for serving the purpose of the committee?
Well as I said at the first meeting there will be a discussion about the terms of reference
so that will be the opportunity to say I don't think this is any good because
I'm sorry but which bit of that were we not understanding because that seems quite simple to me.
I understand what you're saying, I'm just saying that our officers have given a lot of feedback and it's just, it sounds like a delay note of until that first meeting where it being, I'm just saying that we had the opportunity to engage between officers and yourselves before that meeting.
It didn't seem like it was a lot of feedback to me. There was some question about the layout and whether a paragraph was missing or not.
We'll recirculate it, but if anybody wants to contact us, feel free to do so. We've got our email addresses.
But it's work in progress, those terms of reference. They're not final, that's the whole point.
The general way you do it is at the first meeting you discuss them and people bring up their points if they want them changed.
The meeting says, you know, there might be a... I don't want to change without it because somebody else might say I don't agree with that change.
I don't like that change. So that's why we want to do it at a meeting.
We go through it line by line, literally right from the start to finish till everybody's agreed.
I think that's a reasonable approach, isn't it?
Yeah, we're just trying to say that we've already had early feedback on that terms of
reference. That was all the point I was trying to make.
I'm sorry, I don't understand what you're asking from us.
Do you want to come in as well?
Yeah, I think, Miss Curtis, the chair has made some points about our feelings of the lack of transparency in terms of the meeting not being held in public.
That doesn't mean it's a public meeting, but certainly viewable to the public.
And clarifying the point about residence reps, which isn't clear at the moment.
So I think there's some discussion to be had around that but I think certainly whatever the outcome the councils will want to think about how they and their residents views and community group views feed into whatever the new heliport consultative processes and each
Council will need to consider that and how they do that and to make sure
those views are in there. I think it is important that community views are
continued to be represented on the group and I do, as I said before,
the Heliport can obviously create a meeting but it doesn't preclude the
continuation of any other group so it's not really taking it back in. There is no
there's no law around this or no legislation as you know it doesn't apply to um heliports.
No no you you can have as many meetings as you like you just can't call them the heliport
consultant committee meeting that's the only limitation and I think the terms of reference
make it quite clear how residents are to be involved they're four residence groups representatives
allowed so I don't know what else is for one time and that's what that's what we're going to
to do and you know if somebody's got a better idea then by all means table it
but it's up for discussion at the first meeting. Okay I feel like there's not
really much has been added now on this item so we can just draw this item to a
close we can we've had we'll have this noted in the minutes and and we can just
sort of build on there for the next meeting in whatever format that takes.
So now we can move on to agenda item number six which is the information on helicopter movements.
So I believe again that's Mr Curtis and Mr Rice presenting.
Yeah I can take the lead on this one. I'm cautious, I've only got sort of 10 minutes
before I got get involved with this exercise but from the statistics that
are within the minutes itself as you can see January for us was one of the lowest
January's for a long time we had a lot of issues with weather and February
again we had a lot of issues with weather demand was still high but
weather has played a massive effect on our movement numbers but March you look
at March this year compared to March last year we are a good 50 movements up.
So demand is there, we are you know experiencing high demand from from new
customers so you know it's for us it is good. The London's Air Ambulance have
now got their their two new machines and they're using them regularly, they've been
in twice today. Yesterday we had two patient transfers for the Children's Air
ambulance. So you know the the old adage of this is Uber for the rich and famous. Well you can see
it that way but you know we also do patient transfers for coast guard. We had a late at
night one coast guard patient transfer. We have our benefits and without us these these lives may
not have been saved. So there isn't really much to cover. There's no significant changes in our
106 agreement and yeah, we keep to it, we monitor it and I think there was a breakdown
in the sending of the stats with a few staff changes but I understand I've cleared those
all up and sent all the most recent stat updates and I've made sure that the monthly ones get
sent now each month whereas there was a bit of a backlog because we had a replacement
and staff that used to do it. If anyone's got anything on that I can move on to the noise components after that.
All right so firstly does anyone have any questions for Mr Weiss on the helicopter movements?
Mr Feilhard. Sorry I'm really conscious that you probably don't want to hear from me you've got
go so I'm sure you can answer it really quickly. Can you just remind me what the
difference is between category A and category B on that table? That is to do
with the size of the aircraft. So category A are your smaller aircraft so
that could be something like, I don't know if you know your aircraft type as
well, sorry I'm not trying to patronise you, but you know a category A aircraft
would be our regulars are a Leonardo or a Augusta Westland 109 would be a
category A and a category B would be something like a 139 which is a bigger twin engine aircraft.
So it's to do with the weight category.
So it's not to do with noise levels but to do with weight.
I think it is weight, seats and noise as well.
So some of the military ones although slightly smaller because they're the older ones they
may fall into the B category but then obviously we've got the military category which supersedes
that. Thank you. And the exempt ones are things like your air
ambulance and those ones.
Jenny, you have your hand up.
Yeah, just wanted to say I think this is the first time I've
noticed that we've had a user group present. And I know we
don't have a specific section on the agenda. But I think it is
really helpful for residents to have those examples of use. So
maybe I know Mr. Rice has to dash,
but maybe afterwards it would be good
to have a little bit more discussion and understanding there
because as we've said at other points in the meeting,
I think sharing information with residents and the public
can really help perception around all of this.
So thanks for the info.
And Councillor de la Chaux.
Hi, can you just remind me the NA, what is that?
The London's Air Ambulance.
You said the Air Ambulance is the exempt one, what's the NA column? What's the difference between NA and exempt? Let's put it that way.
Please. I'm not too sure that I don't generate this report. This is done by, so I'm not sure about the DNA on that. I'd have to look into July 24. Yeah, I can look into that and find out what the DNA is.
That would be helpful. Thank you. Yeah.
Okay, unless there are any more questions, do you want to quickly move on to the noise complaints?
Yeah, absolutely. So the noise complaints that were in the agenda pack that was sent
out so as you can see the last one was November 2024 and to this day we haven't had a noise
complaint. Now what I would like to say is and apologies for whoever it was that suggested
it the frequently asked questions suggestion put on our noise complaint form seems to have
stopped a lot of our complaints. Like if you look at some of these, the ones where they'll say about the police, something circling over my house, you know, there was one at 2 .30 in the morning where we shut at 11 o 'clock.
So we have we've had nothing. I don't know if that's down to the cold weather recently, the lack in numbers, but or the fact that the reduction is better education on what helicopters are doing, what you know, a bit of some of the regular ones that have that used to put complaints in a more structured emails being sent out to them to explain them.
the situation. We have a diver on our phone now that says, you know, if you want to raise a noise complaint, put it on the form, because previously we found people that were calling in and doing it, didn't want to leave a lot of details. Well, the form, yes, you can leave out details, but it gives us the opportunity to log as much information as possible.
I mean, you know, we do still get the odd ones from, you know, like there in October last year, aircraft nearly crashed into their house.
So that was an aircraft that hadn't been into the heliport in the last two weeks, but it was someone in Northumbria.
you know that people just associate helicopters with the heliport and it's using that form
and that frequently asked questions at the top, which again, thank you for that whoever
suggested it has been really helpful and we've seen a massive reduction in it.
Thank you, Mr Weiss. Councillor Zwietznyuk.
Thank you. I may have raised this actually in a previous meeting, but to clarify these
complaints directly using the form directly to the heliport they're not
complaints that have been received by our respective councils so is there a
sort of I mean I to be honest I guess I get a few complaints forward to me from
residents particularly around Lots Road close to the embankment but I was just
if there is a sort of a more efficient way to make sure all complaints relating to relating to the
Heliport are seen by the Heliport because I suspect that there are residents that email
officers at Wandsworth Council at Kensington and Chelsea and I suppose they're never seen,
they might not be seen by you.
Yeah I suppose if you get them to
yourselves you need to email them to me.
That's the only way I'm going to see
oversight of them because I deal with
every noise complaint that comes in.
Okay, all right understood. That's something I can raise with
officers in Kensington and Chelsea.
There's a broader point.
People complaining about helicopters that aren't actually destined for the airport,
for the heliport, actually, but what would be useful is if there were a forum to deal
with those queries, those noise complaints,
and maybe that's what the existing group should look at
and morph into something that's not to do with the helicopter,
to deal with those helicopters
that aren't landing at the heliport as a suggestion.
It's an unfortunate thing with the heliport, we're next to the heli routes into London,
so anything that transits in and out, sometimes we can have days where we've got only a couple
of movements but you'll see R44s, R22s, single squirrels buzzing up and down the river that
absolutely nothing to do with us but they just get associated with us because
people associate a helicopter, oh it must be going to the heliport, it must
be coming from the heliport. That's the unfortunate base we sometimes have
to deal with. Yes, almost as though there needs to be a tree, I would say well where did
that helicopter go and then it either gets put to the heliport as a
complaint or not, it's all put to somewhere else, put to the
supposed to the CIA or Heathrow Special or whoever, however, some mechanism to deal with
those non -Heliport complaints which at the moment just they don't go anywhere.
Is there something that this group as it currently exists could take away and
work on those complaints and obviously Will's group will deal with Heliport
specific issues and consultation. Is that something that the council, that Wandsworth
could look at?
Do you want to comment on that?
We could have a look at the scope of that and see what that would involve. So I'm not
going to commit to it here, but we need to go away and have a look at that. That's okay.
I mean it's interesting what Matt said about the R -22s and the R -44s because they are a
nuisance and they're single engine and they're more likely to commit effectively an illegal
movement where I live by cutting the corner because they're not allowed to fly over built
up areas so that there is an issue there and it's annoying for the heliport to receive
complaints about those aircraft because they're not relevant to their
the helicopter. So yeah that's great if you could if you could do some
investigation John that would be that would be good. Yeah we'll take that while I have a look.
Thank you. Thanks. Okay are there any more questions for Mr. Weiss?
Okay, so that's everything that we had on the substantive agenda. Did anyone else have any
other business? Or can I put those into a verse? Ms. Scott -Thompson.
Yeah, just wanted to say, if you don't mind, it would be great to hear actually from the
Heliport users. I know we haven't had anything specifically on the agenda, and I'm aware with
the topics, there hasn't been much for the Heliport users to say, but I think Mr. Rice's
examples of Heliport use were good to hear and it would be good to hear a little bit
more about that. Maybe that's a point for a future meeting, but I think it would be
nice maybe if Mr. Hampton has anything to share, that would be lovely.
I can say that 90 % of our passengers are probably on business.
It's not for us to ask them why they're flying where they're going, but Battersea is an expensive
place to go and they don't go there unless they have to and it tends to be for business.
And we also do links with Newton and other airports if they're flying it and they often
businessmen just come in for the day. So hopefully they're bringing in good business for the
United Kingdom, which is what we need at the moment. But no, we don't do jollies or such
at all. It's all business flying. And we are very, very noise aware.
Sorry to jump in now. I'm just going to have to go now. But thank you all, everyone. And
I'll see you all soon.
All right. Thank you, my friend.
Cheers. Bye bye.
Councillor de la Sejal, I think you had your hand up next.
Sure. It's a question on air quality monitors, which if I recall, at the last meeting, Mr
Curtis, you suggested the airport was happy to part fund an air quality monitor. And your
view was understandable was that council should fund the other half so that the actual outcome
the study is seen as unbiased and everyone can get behind it. So I just want to check A that
is still your position, you're not perfect and then the second half of that question is for
you Mr Evans in terms of where are we on those discussions amongst the various councils please?
If Mr Evans... Yeah no discussions will continue obviously we're being focused on some of the more
fundamental or existential questions at the moment around the future of the group and how this group operates. So,
it's something we have discussed in the past with the head of port and looked at options around it. It's not straightforward.
There's a cost attached to it
and the efficacy is
how well it'll work is
a tricky proposition, but we are looking at options. So perhaps that's something I can report to the next meeting.
Did I just say, living in very close to the heliport myself, there's a lot of building
going on around us at the moment, and judging by the filth that comes in through the windows,
I don't think it's a very good time to start trying to test the air quality around the
heliport because the dust, filth, and noise from all the diggers and cranes going on there
would certainly bias your results.
birthday results and they live well quarter mile less but it's less than that probably from the airport.
Sure I think it's something that residents have said they were keen to see happen and I think
we have discussed last time around the limitations but I think it'd be helpful
if we can do it and Mr Evans could we possibly try and accelerate things and not make this
the next meeting because last time we had a meeting was last July so I don't think residents
be particularly happy if we're waiting another year before anything happens.
No, and of course it's not just Wandsworth here. To do that we would be looking at commitments
across the council so that makes it a bit more complex but yeah I understand what you're saying.
Thank you. Thank you. Yeah it'd be useful if we could have an update on that maybe by email and
we can try and progress this outside of the committee meetings considering we don't know
what format is going to take or how often,
when the next meeting will be.
So it'd be good if we can get some action on that
outside of these meetings.
I think Mr. Curtis, you had your hand up next.
Yeah, thank you.
I just wanted to make the committee aware
if they were not already aware
that a planning application was made for Heliport House.
There was a previously consented building
adjacent to the early port um on
building and now with open
balconies. So, it's, you know,
there are two factors that
meanwhile, three factors that
we've identified and are making representations about.
One is the fact it will block the radio signals to the southeast,
and that's been modeled and that's pretty comprehensive blockage.
But then secondly, turbulence from the additional height of the building,
air turbulence and the fact it's now got open balcony,
so it looks a bit like a corn cob.
It's almost designed to generate turbulence.
But the most concerning thing is that items of what we call FOD,
foreign object debris can blow off balconies and actually you know be
ingested by a helicopter engine and cause a really nasty accident so we're
opposed to the building but particularly opposed to open balconies because there
is no way that you can stop people putting out washing then on a windy day
that gets blown off children's toys plastic bags all of those things will
you know and Michael as a helicopter operator I'm sure will confirm that if
one of those, you know, a plastic bag even got ingested into an engine. Even if it doesn't cause
a fatality, the bill is, you know, thick end of one and a half million million pounds to fix the,
you know, take the motor out and overhaul it. So we're objecting and we've got a budget now,
I think about 120 ,000 pounds for lawyers and consultants and goodness knows what,
to object to this building. They didn't consult us at all before they made the application.
they just made the application extraordinary really. Anyway, I just wanted to make the committee aware.
Thank you Mr Curtis. Mr Farland.
Tom, Mr Farland.
Sorry, yes, I was just in a state of confusion about what Mr. Curtis just said.
So who's applied to build that building?
I assumed it was the owners of the people who ultimately own the heliport.
No, no, it's not us.
It's something called Israel Development, Israel Canada Development, something like
that.
I can't remember the exact name, but it's a property development firm.
Yeah, and it's if you look at the renderings online, it's incredible.
Anybody could think it was appropriate to build that next to a heliport, but it's about twice the height of the existing buildings.
Yes, I did see that. I was a bit surprised.
I was just, the only thing I wanted to say was I appreciate what Mr. Hampton said about you.
You don't ask your customers why they're using the helicopter service.
but the idea that it's not jollies, I don't really understand that because the big days,
the days with the biggest number of movements coincide with grand prix's and race meetings
and stuff like that, which are jollies and leisure flights surely. I don't quite get why
you say there are no jollies. I didn't really understand that comment. Well, okay, we do take
people who are going for a nice day out to Silverstone.
We don't get many flights actually from where we are,
but we are also flying people who are part
of the organizing infrastructure of Silverstone.
So our Silverstone weekend probably begins
on Monday or Tuesday before,
and we start working with the various teams
and the people who are involved with it.
So I don't think they'd regard setting up
the Grand Prix weekend as a jolly, it's a business.
Okay. And I just thought you'd be interested. Some of my residents that I represent can
play about dust on their balconies and they blame it on the heli -court. And I say to them,
have you noticed there's a load of building sites all over the place here and on the other side?
I'd rather think the dust comes from there, not from helicopters. As far as I know, helicopters
don't cause dust. From time to time I defend helicopters in the heliport, believe it or not.
But dust and grit does a lot of damage to helicopter engines, so we don't like it either,
I can assure you. Thank you, Mr. Found, and then I think we're wrapping up with Councillor Alexander.
Thank you, Chair. Michael, if you are suffering from dust or any other sort of pollution,
if you think it comes from Hammersmith and Fulham, you're very welcome to use the Council's
website and that goes for you and any of your neighbours. Seeing that you're on this committee,
I would be very happy to receive an email from you if you think there's a
problem and I'll make sure that the council look at that if there's anything
coming from Hammersmith and Fulham to do with construction work because there's a
legal requirement on them to control that dust and there's no excuses for that.
Yeah thank you and I think it is the same for Wandsworth as well we have we
normally have as a planning condition that the construction needs to have air quality
monitoring on site. So if you do think there is a violation, then also report it to us
and we can flag it with our air quality team.
Apologies, I went offline just as you started on that, but I got the gist of what you're
saying. Thank you.
Yeah, okay. So if there's no more any other business then I can conclude the
business of the group today so thank you everyone for your attendance.
Thank you. Thank you, Chair.