Gatwick Airport second runway legal challenge has date set

A legal challenge over plans for a second runway at Gatwick Airport is set to be heard in January, a High Court judge has said.

The privately-funded scheme, costing £2.2bn, will see the airport move its emergency runway 12m (39ft) north, enabling it to be used for about 100,000 more flights a year.

Campaign group Communities against Gatwick Noise Emissions (Cagne) and chairman of the Gatwick Area Conservation Campaign Peter Barclay are taking legal action against the Department for Transport (DfT) over Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander’s decision to approve plans.

The DfT and the airport’s owner, Gatwick Airport Limited (GAL), are opposing the challenge, which will begin on 20 January 2026.

At a hearing on Tuesday, Mr Justice Mould said the case would be heard over four days.

Estelle Dehon KC, for Cagne, had asked the court for the challenge to be heard in February or March due to barristers for the group being unavailable in January, resulting in an “inequality of arms”.

But Mr Justice Mould said that while he was “not oblivious” to the group’s concerns, the date would not change.

He said: “It is in the highest degree desirable that it should be dealt with as expeditiously as possible.

“I am afraid I have to be pretty hard-nosed about this, and I appreciate this will create inconvenience to quite a number of people in the room.”

Announcing its legal challenge in November, Cagne said there was a failure to properly evaluate the significance of inbound flight emissions and to assess the effect of non-carbon dioxide emissions on the climate.

In written submissions for Tuesday’s hearing, Nigel Pleming KC, for the DfT, said some of Mr Barclay’s and Cagne’s arguments were “irrefutably unarguable”.

James Strachan KC, for GAL, said in written submissions: “GAL first applied for development consent in July 2023, almost two-and-a-half years ago, and GAL is keen to begin the development which has been granted consent.

“It is obviously contrary to the public interest that (unmeritorious) litigation such as these claims should unnecessarily delay national infrastructure projects such as the proposed development.”

Additional reporting by PA Media.