Hillingdon Council has for the first time revealed it has spent more than £850,000 backing campaigns to stop a third runway being built at Heathrow.

The council has always publicly opposed the runway but has never before revealed the amount of taxpayer's money it has spent campaigning against it.

It was forced to make the move because campaign group Back Heathrow put in a formal complaint to the Information Commissioner when the council refused to respond to its Freedom of Information Requests, demanding to know the figure.

Stop Heathrow Expansion (SHE) logo

Here's how much the council spent:

- £621,310.97 campaigning against Heathrow expansion since August 2016

- It funded campaign group SHE (Stop Heathrow Expansion) to the tune of £100,800

- The authority gave the No 3rd Runway Group £174,000

Back Heathrow lodged the complaint after it did not receive responses to FoIs lodged with the council on July 27 this year.

Executive Director of Back Heathrow, Parmjit Dhanda, said: "I warned Hillingdon Council some weeks ago that they wouldn’t get away with hiding the truth about expenditure of scarce tax-payers money, but they acted as if they were above the law.

"But now the truth is out. Despite the fact the vast majority of MPs voted for a new runway and the fact that polling shows most residents want a new runway, the Council has spent well over £600,000 on expensive lawyers and anti-expansion groups.

"That’s all money that could have been spent on crucial local services like social care, and children’s services in Hillingdon."

Leader of Hillingdon Council Ray Puddifoot and Heathrow Airport

The council's leader Ray Puddifoot, responded to the comments saying: "Back Heathrow does not represent residents - it represents Heathrow Airport Holdings Ltd - and as the legal challenge against expansion has been listed for hearing in the High Court in March 2019, they are understandably very worried that, as happened in 2010, the court will find in favour of the residents represented by the five local authorities brining this legal challenge.

"I will give an update on the legal challenge, the Civil Aviation Authority’s concerns and deal appropriately with Back Heathrow and their disingenuous statements at the next Council meeting on Thursday 22 November."

What happens next?

On October 4 the High Court granted permission for five legal challenges against expanding the airport to proceed to full hearings.

The consortium includes the local authorities of Hillingdon, Hammersmith & Fulham, Richmond, Wandsworth and Windsor & Maidenhead, Greenpeace, and Mayor of London Sadiq Khan, Heathrow Hub Limited - promoters of a rival scheme to expand Heathrow, Friends of the Earth, Plan B - an environmental campaign group and Neil Spurrier, a Twickenham resident.

The campaigners have wide questions about the legality and environmental impact of the project.

The hearings have been scheduled for ten days in March 2019.