Conservative MP for Don Valley Nick Fletcher came under fire from mayor Ros Jones last week for claiming that Doncaster Sheffield Airport was closed by the council.
The comments, made in a recent campaign leaflet, follow the news that the airport could reopen as part of a £138 million 10-year plan.
Residents in the Don Valley constituency said last week that they recently received a campaign leaflet from Mr Fletcher which read: “Nick is continuing the campaign to re-open Doncaster Sheffield Airport, challenging the Council’s decision to close it.”
The statement was met with fierce criticism on X, with Mayor of Doncaster, Labour’s Ros Jones, describing the claim as “a complete and utter lie”.
“I have written to Nick Fletcher in relation to misinformation,” Ms Jones wrote on X. “I expect him to retract this statement and apologise to constituents.”
Built on the former RAF base in Finningley, the airport closed in 2022 after owners Peel Group deemed the site “no longer commercially viable”.
The interparty squabbling over the airport’s uncertain future is frustrating businesses in the area.
“We are blessed to have strong supporters in Nick Fletcher and Ros Jones in helping push for the airport’s reopening,” said Craig Dowie, managing director of the Crown Hotel in Bawtry. “But the bickering is overshadowing the objective of getting it open.”
Doncaster Sheffield Airport was opened in April 2005 and was known as Robin Hood Airport until 2016. It served nearly 1.5m passengers in 2019 and housed the last airworthy Vulcan bomber in Great Britain for over 10 years.
The last passenger flights flew from the airport in November 2022, but the Sheffield Wire reported last week that £138m is to be invested by the South Yorkshire Combined Mayoral Authority to help reopen it.
Last week, Mr Fletcher published a series of Facebook posts in order to ‘get to the facts’ of what happened to the defunct airport. He wrote in the posts: “In no way do I ever want to detract from the excellent work that the council officers are doing in their work on the airport.”
However, a spokesperson for City of Doncaster Council told the Doncaster Free Press that Mr Fletcher is yet to apologise publicly for his comments.
