IT HAS been three years since the strength of feeling against Heathrow expansion swelled to the point where demonstrations took place on a regular basis.

After the coming of the Coalition Government in 2010 it seemed West London finally had the politicians in place to keep talk of a third runway off the aviation agenda permanently.

However, nothing lasts for ever, and as cracks began to show in the Con/Lib partnership, so too did rumblings of a U-turn start to be heard.

The Government made the first move at the end of 2012 with the setting up of the Davies Commission to examine all cases for airport expansion in the UK

Last Saturday (April 27) their opponents revealed who was on their side; with a mass rally in Barnes, Richmond, where the local council is leading the way by holding a referendum.

The event, compered by Gyles Brandreth, saw over 1,000 people gather to hear speeches by their representitives in Parliament. Also present was a man in a rabbit costume and a lady who turned up in a pair of wings and a jump suit clutching paddles saying no to a third runway and yes to plans for a new airport in the Thames Estuary - a scheme dubbed ‘Boris Island’.

The MP for Richmond Park Zac Goldsmith had organised the rally as a wider publicity exercise to go with the casting of the first vote in the referendum. He welcomed everyone with a simple message, vowing to stop Heathrow expansion ‘no ifs and no buts’.

Justine Greening, is the MP for Putney and was Secretary of State for Transport until last September when she was replaced by Patrick McLoughlin and given the responsibility for International Development.

Saturday’s rally was the first time she had spoken in public on the subject of Heathrow since moving jobs.

She said: "I’ve been consistent in my view that there is no room for any further expansion at Heathrow - it’s time for us now to move on. When Terminal 5 was given the go ahead it was with the express refusal of a third runway. Businesses need a long term strategy for aviation in the UK and Heathrow is not it.

"If London is going to be a successful city it needs to be a liveable city, it needs to keep its families, its children and its life. It can’t blast people day-in and day-out with aircraft noise."

Speaking of unwanted noise, Miss Greening did find herself having to shout to be heard over the clamour caused by the arrival of Boris Johnson .

The presence of the rabbit and the lady with the wings did not appear to faze him as he hit the ground running with a speech full of his customary bombastic spirit.

He said: “On the way here today from my bike I saw squares, parks, the river, and I thought ‘how mad do you have to be as a people to want to profain, desecrate and wreck this city with millions of planes over London, giving rise to great flying fleets of fortissimo flatulence.

“The smell of kerosene, shaking windows, disrupting education, breaking sleep patterns, eradicating the quality of life for thousands of people. Unless we fight now then I’m afraid ‘they’ will go on and build a third runway.

“I know who ‘they’ are, it’s business, BAA, the treasury, the Department for Transport, they will come after the election in 2015 and they will try and build that third runway and it will be a disaster for this city. But it would not be enough for the Moloch of Aviation, they would see what other countries have and they would want the same here, a fourth runway and that would be an environmental catastrophe.

“We won’t succeed as long as ‘they’ continue to be obsessed with the sham, the snare and the delusion that is the third runway. It would be a giant step back for London, if we allow the powers-that-be to make a mistake that will take decades to unpick and recover from.”

John Stewart, chairman of HACAN, kept politics out of his speech and simply spoke from the heart as he left the assembled MPs in no doubt about how he and others would react if they failed to keep their promises.

He said: “Today we have sent an incredibly powerful message to the authorities; if they dare build a third runway then they will have not just a grass roots battle on their hands but a huge international one. Hopefully this means all the parties will realise this is too difficult a box to tick politically.

“Next year we plan to be more and more visible in our oposition to expansion, more marches, more demonstrations and public meetings. In 2003 BAA started from a position of strength and 10 years on they lost the historic battle. We won that, we can win it again.”

The event ended with all the speakers and other VIPs casting large-scale versions of their votes against expansion into an equally oversized ballot box on stage.

Meanwhile the residents who attended got the chance to add their signatures to a giant petition which was hung up from a goalpost on the Barnes Elms playing fields where the rally took place.