Article from BTNews 8 JUNE 2015
COMMENT: Where do you live?
Business Travel News went to see the American comedian Jackie Mason last week.
Somewhat of a Republican (and 83 “did you buy your ticket in advance?”) he has a reputation for saying what he believes in. He is also topical as well. Our visit was the opening night (Monday) and for a true Yank his comments on FIFA were spot on.
The Blatter resignation announcement came at 18:00 the following day.
His show would have started at 19.45. You can be sure he was current, no doubt the news a surprise to many in the audience. He must have brought the house down.
What has all this to do with Business Travel News?
Nothing really.
Except that he says his mind and does not worry if he upsets a few.
BTN is of that ilk.
We are concerned that the anti-airport lobby gains a disproportionate amount of media space. Yes reporting has to be balanced, but is this now being overdone?
Both Gatwick and Heathrow point out that reducing noise is a key priority but as recent polling shows, more local people back a new runway than oppose it.
At Heathrow some 28,577 noise complaints were received from 37 complainers last year. They used computer software to send complaints automatically when aircraft were scheduled to fly over them. When the clocks went back last October, this tiny collective forgot to change the timing on their software with the airport receiving complaints exactly one hour before the plane took off!
BTN believes that whenever a complainant is interviewed the first question should be “where do you live?” and then “when did you move in?”. There is no need to ask if you knew there was an airport nearby. That is fairly obvious. A supplementary might be “when did you last take a flight?”
AND FINALLY is a suggestion of what to do with airport complainers. It might not go well in some quarters and is possibly illegal.
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Chris Pocock, Uxbridge
The media space gained by those opposed to a third runway at LHR pales into insignificance, compared with the daily full-page ads from HAL. The 'recent polling' was conducted by HAL - hardly a scientific or impartial exercise.