Planned 500% hike in airport parking fees slammed

AER RIANTA was last night accused of being discriminatory and unfair after it revealed plans to increase parking fees by 500% for some airport staff.

A Ryanair spokesman last night said the planned hikes were evidence of a semi-State monopoly which had completely lost the run of itself and called for the company to be broken up.

New charges are also to be imposed on media organisations, which will be asked to pay 100 per hour for taking photographs and making sound recordings.

Meanwhile, a charge of 250 per hour will be imposed for commercial photography and filming.

A Ryanair spokesman said: "It is scandalous that the Aer Rianta monopoly is attempting to impose 500% price increases for the staff of customer airlines to use existing staff car parking facilities, whilst the Aer Rianta staff and friends of Aer Rianta pay nothing.

"This is both discriminatory and unfair. This ludicrous attempt to invent a whole new range of charges, which will force media organisations to pay a photography fee of 100 per hour or a commercial photo/filming fee of 250 per hour to photograph facilities that were built by and are owned by the people of this country, is a sign of a monopoly gone mad."

A letter sent to airport staff contains the new rates which mean general staff parking is to be increased from 253 per annum to 1,537 an increase of 507%. There is no charge for Aer Rianta staff or Aer Rianta VIP guests. Public parking is available at a rate of 20 per day.

Ryanair accused Aer Rianta of "using the last days of its monopoly to impose additional monopoly charges on its customers, while continuing to exempt its own staff, its VIP friends and itself from these charges".

Ryanair and other airlines were last night said to be referring the increased charges to the Department of Transport, the Monopolies Commission, and the Competition Authority. The Ryanair spokesman said: "The Aer Rianta monopoly has clearly lost the run of itself.

"It is time this monopoly was ended, and we call upon the Government to move now to permit the development of multiple competing terminals at Dublin Airport and end the damage being inflicted on Irish tourism Aer Rianta could not be contacted for comment last night and failed to responded to messages regarding the price hikes.