AIRPORT opponents are throwing away jobs and prosperity for their children, a businessman has claimed. Colin Mason, a former head of Medway Enterprise Agency, has emerged as one of the leading supporters of the proposed airport at Cliffe.

He says that 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 has been fighting bone marrow cancer. His wife suffers from multiple sclerosis. Mr Mason, 54, runs the Engineering Industries Association in London and also its Kent and Medway branch.

Mr Mason, a 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. 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. He said that they had already ruined the area's 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. The only sufferers would be the birds and they would move to another marsh.