TD urges U-turn and warns airline ‘the game is up’

A PROMINENT Fianna Fáil backbench TD last night called on Aer Lingus management to realise that “the game is up” and reverse the decision to axe the Shannon-Heathrow route.

Speaking before entering a meeting of Fianna Fáil TDs, senators and councillors from the west of Ireland in Shannon, Limerick East TD Peter Power described the Aer Lingus decision to end the Shannon-Heathrow route as “flawed”.

Defence Minister Willie O’Dea, Minister of State Tony Killeen and TDs, John Cregan and Timmy Dooley attended the meeting at the Oakwood Arms Hotel.

Outside the hotel, Deputy Power told reporters that he hoped that the consensus from the meeting would be “that Aer Lingus even before the extraordinary general meeting (EGM) will come to a conclusion now that the game is up”.

Deputy Power said that he also hoped that the major shareholders “have now come to the conclusion that the decision of Aer Lingus management rather than the board is wrong”, adding that “management manage any company at the behest of the shareholders”.

Mr Power said Aer Lingus “miscalculated quite seriously the efforts and the lengths to which not just public representatives, but the business community would in the mid-west area go to have the decision reversed.”

* A protest march is planned for the main airport road at 7pm tomorrow.