Last-minute councillor and officer meeting on Doncaster Sheffield Airport loan falls flat, sources suggest

A last-minute meeting between senior officials and city councillors on a critical vote for the reopening of Doncaster Sheffield Airport has fallen flat, sources suggest.

The Local Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS) understands that Damian Allen, the chief executive of the City of Doncaster Council, requested councillors attend an in-person meeting at the Civic Office at 4pm on May 6, 2026.

It is said the meeting, which was led by executive director for corporate resources Debbie Hogg as Mr Allen was not in attendance, was an attempt by council staff to explain the importance of the £57m loan to the airport’s reopening.

The loan was approved in November 2025. However, following the leak of the council’s lease with the landowners the Peel Group in January 2026, Reform UK announced its intention to rescind its approval. The vote will take place in an extraordinary meeting of council on May 11.

Councillor Jason Charity, deputy leader of Reform UK, said on April 2 that his party was not given the appropriate information to make the original approval on the loan.

One senior opposition councillor said their main takeaway from the May 6 meeting was that Doncaster Council “still has no lease” that is workable for the airport, as talks with Peel are on hold.

A Labour Party councillor, who did not want to be named, said they did not believe the meeting would change opposition councillors’ plans.

They said: “I think Reform will still continue with their proposal on Monday though anything can change between now and then.”

Council papers for next week’s meeting say the renegotiation of the lease, which is required for the South Yorkshire Mayoral Combined Authority (SYMCA) to release £160m in funding for the reopening, had stalled amid the uncertainty over the loan and on a controversial “turnover rent” clause.

The same papers revealed a significant risk to the airport reopening and council if the loan was rescinded.

It stated that without alternative funding the site “would have no future as an airport”. It also revealed that it would not be possible to secure alternative funding quick enough to continue the reopening on the current timescales, when passenger flights are projected for Easter 2028.

Additionally, if the airport reopening does not go ahead, the council would also need alternative funding to pay the £50m cost of closing the project. That does not include redundancies for the dozens of high-paid staff already employed for the project.

One opposition councillor, who asked for anonymity, said that officers made a “very forceful case as to why they believe the airport needs to reopen” but provided “no new information beyond assurances and promises”.

They added: “Personally, I do not believe Doncaster needs an airport. However, I am supporting its reopening because that is what many local people want, even though I believe the money could be better invested elsewhere in the city.”

Sources said that Ms Hogg was asked by a councillor if she believed the original lease with Peel was “a good deal”. She responded: “It’s all we had.”

One member said they felt Ms Hogg had admitted the council had a “rubbish lease” because “it was the only one on offer”.

Despite the meeting seemingly not proving much comfort for opposition councillors, it didn’t convince many that ending the project was the right route either.

Not all Reform UK councillors are sold on rescinding the loan. One, who asked not to be named, said: “My concern with rescinding the vote is the potential damage it could cause to investment confidence and jobs in Doncaster, for which Reform may ultimately be held accountable.”

The LDRS understands that the number of Reform UK councillors uncertain about the loan vote is not insignificant, but a rebellion is not expected if leadership push ahead.

It is believed neither of Reform Doncaster’s leaders Cllr Craig Ward and Cllr Jason Charity, whose names are on the motion to stop the loan, did not attend.

Ros Jones, Mayor of Doncaster, was elected on promises to reopen the airport.

The council was already going down the publicly-funded route to reopening before the election and the original lease with Peel was signed in March 2024, but issued with a “rule 16” which expedited the decision to sign it. That meant it didn’t go before the council’s scrutiny committees.