Government under attack over failure to give clearance for second terminal

RYANAIR has continued its attack on the Government over its failure to give approval to the building of an independent terminal at Dublin Airport.

The airline’s chief executive Michael O’Leary said yesterday he was “dismayed at the continuing inactivity of the Government in implementing its own election programme to bring forward competition and low-cost efficient facilities at the Irish airports”.

He said the charges at Dublin Shannon and Cork Airport will rise next year and that this was a disincentive for any airline to open up new routes.

“Access costs and fares to Ireland will rise in line with these totally unnecessary price increases, at a time when Irish tourism is crying out for new routes and lower access fares,” he said.

“It is now over 12 months since the Government received 13 expressions of interest from a wide range of aviation companies to finance and build multiple competing terminals at Dublin Airport and we still have seen no action whatsoever to introduce this desperately-needed competitions,” Mr O’Leary said.

He said it was time the Government “got real.”

Last week, Mr O’Leary protested outside Government Buildings and launched another personal attack on Taoiseach Bertie Ahern, accusing him of “dithering” and “fudging” the second terminal issue.

A spokesperson for Transport Minister Seamus Brennan said the proposal to build a second terminal would go to the Cabinet before Christmas.

Announcing the company’s first-half results in Dublin yesterday, Ryanair’s commercial director Michael Cawley accused Aer Rianta of charging “six or seven times” the average Ryanair pays at other European airports.

However, a spokesman for Aer Rianta said Ryanair was misleading the public, that its charges were among the most competitive in Europe and that successive reports had shown this.