AIRPORT opponents are throwing away jobs and prosperity for their kids, a businessman has claimed.

Colin Mason, a former manager of Medway Enterprise Agency, has emerged as one of the leading supporters of the proposed airport at Cliffe.

He says few people have spoken out in favour of the airport, not because they do not exist but because many are afraid of putting their heads "above the parapet."

"I don't mind going in where it hurts," said Mr Mason, who for the past few years has been fighting bone marrow cancer.

Mr Mason, 54, runs the Engineering Industries Association in London and also its Kent and Medway branch. The father of three boys, James 22, Mark 19, and Bryan, 16, said he was "100 per cent" for the airport. "It's my kids future. It's going to bring employment to Medway. What an opportunity! More people would come to the Dickens centre, and think of all the people who would come to Rochester Cathedral and Leeds Castle."

Mr Mason, who lives in Maidstone, criticised Kent County Council and Medway Council for fighting the airport plan. They had already ruined the areas chance of having a station on the Channel Tunnel Rail Link when they opposed a Mid Kent Parkway International Station near Blue Bell Hill. That proposal was thrown out in favour of International stations at Ashford and Ebbsfleet.

"That was a real turn off for business, and now they are trying to stop the very thing that would bring prosperity to the area and jobs for our kids."

Mr Mason said that prosperity from an airport would flow through Medway and beyond to Maidstone and Swale. It would encourage big name firms to move into the area, especially along the A2 Thames Corridor to London. It would also be "the best driver" the Thames Gateway regeneration scheme would ever have. "It's win, win, win all the way," he said.

"The only thing to suffer would be the birds. But they would move to a different marsh and I understand that it would be their natural instinct to do so. I cannot believe people are objecting unless they are serious bird people."

Mr Mason added that people on the Hoo Peninsula who might lose their homes should be generously compensated.