BAA win high court battle - or did they?

The Camp for Climate Action is not illegal. Everyone is welcome. So why did some newspaper headlines report on Monday that: “BAA wins Heathrow protest injunction”? With both sides claiming victory in last week’s High Court battle between BAA, the owner of Heathrow airport, and the climate change demonstrators planning to converge on the airport next Tuesday, what is the truth behind the spin?

My verdict – BAA were trounced; their injunction win against the protestors was no such thing.

Mrs Justice Swift awarded BAA an injunction preventing anti-aviation direct action group Plane Stupid and other protestors trespassing on the Heathrow site and disrupting the operation of the airport this August. Martin Bullock, the Managing Director of BAA Heathrow, said after the injunction verdict that BAA got what it wanted: “This injunction has never been about stopping lawful and peaceful protests”. BAA claims that their intention was to stop climate campaigners continuing a campaign, first popularised at Drax power station, in Yorkshire, during the first Climate Camp, to shut down the country’s biggest emitters of greenhouse gases. Numerous groups staged similar actions in the...

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