40 leading historians battle to block plans to turn Dambusters’ RAF base into migrant camp

40 of Britain’s leading historians have joined a battle to block plans to turn the Dambusters’ former base into a migrant camp.

The 40 - including Sir Antony Beevor, Sir Max Hastings and Dan Snow - have written an open letter to Suella Braverman, the Home Secretary, urging her to abandon her plan to use RAF Scampton in Lincolnshire for 1,500 migrants moved out of hotels. It was also the base for the Red Arrows until last year.

Campaigners led by local MP Sir Edward Leigh also met Robert Jenrick, the Immigration Minister, on Monday to warn that the migrant scheme would scupper £300 million plans to preserve the base’s historic runway as an operational aviation and aerospace hub and a new national heritage site.

On Monday Nigel Farage wrote in an article for The Telegraph: “I believe this is wrong on every level and I’ve joined the campaign to stop it being turned into one of these centres."

“To turn a place like this into a detention centre would be an act of cultural desecration. Neither would it bring any benefits to the residents of the village of Scampton, who number fewer than 1,000.”

RAF Scampton is one of a series of sites being considered by the Home Office to reduce the £6 million a day cost of housing 51,000 asylum seekers in nearly 400 hotels. Rishi Sunak said in November that they aimed to move at least 10,000 out in the near future but have run into local opposition campaigns at proposed sites.

In their letter, the historians - who also include Dr Tracy Borman, Jonathan Dimbleby and comedian Al Murray who broadcasts about the Second World War - said keeping the site as an operational airfield would “not only preserve the past, but secure our future” through the regeneration scheme for the former base.

They said that with the death of Johnny Johnson, the last of the Dambusters, it was “now left to the buildings of Scampton to provide that all important tangible link to the past.”

“To erase Scampton’s heritage, rather than preserve, protect and enhance it further, would be a scandalous desecration of immeasurable recklessness.”

The 617 squadron - the Dambusters - was formed at the airfield from where 19 Lancaster bombers departed for the famous raid in 1943 to destroy three dams in the Ruhr valley in Germany’s industrial heartlands with “bouncing bombs” designed by the renowned engineer Barnes Wallis.

The historians said it was one of a series of RAF stations built in the 1930s, which helped save Britain in 1940s and, in the form of Scampton, provided “what surely remains the most famous air raid of all time and certainly by the RAF.” It also has the unique distinction of having three airmen who all won VCs.

West Lindsey district council has negotiated a £300 million deal with development partner Scampton Holdings Ltd to turn the site into a centre of aerospace technology and create 1,000 jobs while preserving its rich heritage.

In the Commons, Sir Edward urged Mrs Braverman to take note of the concerns raised with her immigration minister at Monday’s meeting.

“If she goes ahead with her plan for 1500 migrants being placed there, this will scupper the long term retention of the runway and the 300 million pound’s worth of investment by Scampton holdings,” he said.

Mr Jenrick insisted “no decision has been made.” “We’ll consider all of the things that were said in that meeting extremely carefully as we come to a final decision,” Mr Jenrick told MPs.