Mr. Ronan Gallagher:

It is specifically in regard to the regulatory decision that the CAR makes. There are general powers of direction the Minister can give around other issues and we are retaining that. What we are specifically doing is removing the ability of the Minister to engage in or cut across what the CAR might be deciding based on its analysis and the regulatory process. That is a point of policy principle around what independent economic regulation looks like. As long as one has the fall-back of a Minister being able potentially - not that it has ever been done - to instruct the regulator what the outcome needs to be, that does not lend itself to being described as independent regulation. Part of this is to strengthen that. To be clear, as we take that away, we require that the CAR has full regard to national aviation policy and other relevant Government policies, including climate change. That puts the onus on the Minister and the Department to be very clear what their aviation policy is and to make sure it is up to date so that the CAR can reflect on that. We certainly are not weakening the Minister’s authority. It is just one area where the Minister has agreed it is not really appropriate that he retains that.