Ms Rose Hynes:

I thank the committee for inviting me to appear before it today. I have submitted my statement and will take it as read. As members will see from my statement, I am a native of County Clare and I have worked for most of my career in the Guinness Peat Aviation Group, GPA, in Shannon so I have Shannon in my heart. When the airports were separated in 2012, I was appointed chairman of the Shannon Airport Authority in 2013 pending the establishment of the Shannon Group in 2014. Shannon Group put together the independent Shannon Airport and combined it with the restructured Shannon Development, which meant we got a property portfolio primarily composed of the Shannon free zone and a heritage portfolio added.

I set out the position at the time of the separation of the airports in my statement. At the time, passenger numbers had been dwindling and had been negative from 2006 to 2012. Addressing that was, therefore, an immediate priority. The infrastructure at the airport required significant work and expenditure as there had been a history of underinvestment. Likewise, there had been material underinvestment in the property portfolio in the Shannon free zone. The occupancy rate was 43% and many of the buildings were not fit for purpose. The Shannon Heritage portfolio also required significant investment.

I have set out the current position in my statement. We have increased passenger numbers by 34% and invested €100 million in the group since 2014 to bring things to where they should be and drive the group forward. We have stabilised and grown the financial position of the group and it is now in a much stronger position. We have invested a great deal of time and effort in that.

I will focus on the fact that this year is very challenging primarily because of the worldwide grounding of the Boeing 737 MAX jet aircraft on health and safety grounds. This has impacted us. We have lost 13 weekly flights, equating to 120,000 passengers, this year, which is a significant number for a company like the Shannon Group. It means our passenger numbers will be down this year. We have stated there is nothing we can do about this. We also lost Air Canada, which equates to about 25,000 passengers. We face a very challenging situation, including as a result of Brexit, and I would like to discuss how we will deal with those challenges. We are doing everything we can, working with all the Departments to be Brexit fit and Brexit ready, but who knows what Brexit is at this stage?