Doncaster Sheffield Airport: South Yorkshire Mayor shares reason behind attempt to divert rail link funding

A Freedom of Information Request revealed that the mayor had asked the government to release £30 million from the City Regional Sustainable Transport Settlement (CRSTS) to go towards airport negotiations.

The funding had been earmarked for a rail link to the airport before it was closed down in 2022.

Letters revealed that his request was denied by Transport Secretary Mark Harper.

The Department for Transport later released a statement, stating that the mayor had not formally submitted his request aside from the revealed communications.

It continued that the request was denied due to the South Yorkshire Mayoral Combined Authority (SYMCA) having access to devolved gainshare funding, suggesting this should be used instead.

The decision also drew criticism from Conservative Don Valley MP Nick Fletcher, who has been critical of the regional authority’s role throughout the process.

Speaking to the Local Democracy Reporting Service, Mayor Coppard revealed the motivation behind the request.

He said: “We want any additional money that we can get in South Yorkshire for our plan. The £30 million for the rail link is for a specific project that the government had already said to us they weren’t prepared to allow us to spend that money on because of the closure of the airport.

“They had what is known as a retain scheme, which essentially meant they had to sign it off before we were allowed to spend the money. Normally that’s not the case but they had specific doubts about that scheme linked to the airport.

“They had already turned us down for a £300 million bid to connect the East Coast Main Line so they clearly weren’t that enthusiastic about airports and rail links, which I think was the wrong approach, but we kept on banging that drum.

“But then when it became clear over the course of the summer that they weren’t going to allow us to spend that money, we then said that we would like to have the additional funds to spend on the airport reopening.

“Frankly, we don’t have endless funds here at SYMCA, I’d love to be able to say we can just spend whatever we want on any of these projects but clearly we’ve got a limited fund that we need to stretch out over the course of 30 years, this is a 30 year gainshare fund for the whole of South Yorkshire.

“I’ll do whatever I need to do in order to reopen DSA within my powers, but it would just help if we had the flexibility on some of the other funds to be able to do that work and the government have said no.”

On Tuesday (13 February) the South Yorkshire Mayoral Combined Authority (SYMCA) agreed to use £138 million from its gainshare fund to progress negotiations.

Doncaster Council continues to work with potential investors to secure a leasehold agreement with site owners Peel Group, with an operator set to be finalised in spring.