Ahern’s €400k media unit missed Shannon article

THE TAOISEACH’s media monitoring unit, which costs almost €400,000 a year to run, missed an Irish Examiner story in June which had serious implications for Shannon Airport.

The unit’s failure to bring the story to the Government’s attention was the source of a row in the Dáil yesterday. The unit disseminates a summary of news headlines to government ministers and their departments.

On June 13, this paper ran a story signalling Aer Lingus was to introduce routes from Belfast. It cited the possibility of a route between Belfast and Heathrow. The obvious implication was Aer Lingus would have to transfer Heathrow landing slots from one of the three airports in the Republic, with Shannon the main candidate.