The airline’s CEO Lynne Embleton said that even with the support received Aer Lingus had still been losing €1 million per day, and that its balance sheet is still severely damaged by the fallout from Covid. There’s something wrong in that.”Īer Lingus Chief Corporate Affairs Officer Donal Moriarty said that employing the logic used by Deputy Crowe, every business who receive the Temporary Wage Subsidy Scheme or the Emergency Wage Subsidy Scheme should also repay it. “It might have come under a different accountancy column but it was money from the Irish taxpayer to shore up things in Ireland and in that same period you set up a brand new base in Manchester. Has it occurred to your airline at any point that the net figure should be refunded to the Irish State? He said it was “devastating” for staff with up to 30 years’ service at Shannon to lose their jobs, while a new base was established in England.ĭeputy Crowe asked if the airline would consider paying back the support it got from the State. There was a different tenor to Deputy Crowe’s subsequent remarks however as he queried the propriety of Aer Lingus opening a base in Manchester, while receiving substantial pandemic payments from the Irish State.ĭeputy Crowe began by inquiring how much support the airline had received from the State during the pandemic.Īfter hearing it was in the region of €60 million, he queried how appropriate it was to have opened a new Manchester base, while receiving such significant support from the Irish State. Responding, Mr Moody said, “It’s something we’re really interested in, our comms team and marketing team, both internally and in conjunction with the tourism bodies across the country, are really keen on exploiting all the opportunities that the opening stages of the Tour de France bring and the Ryder Cup.” “The Ryder Cup is coming to the Mid-West, there’s the prospect of the Tour de France being staged here, there are some pretty big events coming to the shores of Ireland and we want ye to position yourselves to the fore as others will, to receive people into Ireland and fly them globally.” “We have a really good relationship with the Shannon team and we’ll continue to work closely with them.”Īt Wednesday’s sitting, Clare TD Cathal Crowe urged the airline to prioritise serving major sporting events in the region over the coming years. We see Shannon being up by 21% next summer with the overall additional seats and we’ll continue to work with the Shannon team. “Shannon as a whole is doing really, really well overall. Mr Moody was very positive about the performance of Shannon. He said that there had been four weekly New York services pre pandemic, but it will be daily next year, while Aer Lingus will also maintain its three daily Heathrow services. “There’ll be exactly the same frequency on Boston, but more capacity because there are more seats on the new aircraft.” While it still has not as yet decided to resume the summer leisure routes that it had pre pandemic, the airline’s Chief Strategy & Planning Officer Reid Moody told the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Transport that there will be stronger US-Shannon links. The good news for Shannon Airport came with the airline saying it will significantly increase its transatlantic capacity there next summer. AER Lingus relayed some good news for Shannon this week at an Oireachtas Joint Committee on Transport hearing where it was also taken to task for opening a base in Manchester.
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