Speech delivered to the full Council meeting on 4th December 2003
Thank you Mr Mayor.
I am so pleased to hear the good news on Rochester Airfield. The directors and staff of the airport's operating company will of course be relieved to know that this administration's oft-stated commitment to keeping the airfield green is being maintained and is once again bearing fruit, despite a number of attempts by the unscrupulous to close the airport—either directly or by stealth—and to concrete-over all or part of the airfield site.
We can all now look forward to this interim lease going ahead, followed shortly afterward by the commencement of negotiations for a long-term lease that will attract the investment necessary for advancing this only resource of its kind in the Medway area towards its ultimate, truly twenty-first century destiny, even if there are those here who failed to appreciate its value back in the twentieth.
Thank you, Mr Mayor.
John M Ward (Councillor, Rochester South and Horsted)