Michael McNamara (Clare, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I congratulate Mr. Ó Céidigh on his appointment which will be beneficial not just for the mid-west but for the entire west and the Shannon region. I have six questions and I hope Mr. Ó Céidigh will answer them all, if possible. He mentioned promoting Shannon's environmentally-friendly credentials. He will be aware that Shannon Airport has the longest runway in Ireland which enables planes to take off with a higher load than they can from shorter runways, thereby delivering greater fuel efficiency per passenger than is possible from any other Irish airport or, indeed, many other airports across Europe. This brings me to a question about fifth freedom flights, that is, flights which start outside of the EU and whose destination is also outside of the EU, with Ireland as a transit point where passengers can board or disembark. Shannon Airport was very much the fifth freedom hub in Ireland for a long time but was undercut by Dublin. Shannon Airport went after Ethiopian business and was on the verge of signing a deal with Ethiopia when it was undercut, possibly with the help of an Irish Minister of State with responsibility for overseas aid at the time. What now for fifth freedom flights? The fifth freedom flights arriving into Dublin provide relatively little added value to the Dublin region but would be very beneficial to Shannon in driving economies of scale. Is that something that can be pursued?

Mr. Ó Céidigh has repeatedly said that he is a non-executive chairman.

Will he explain the difference between an executive chair and a non-executive chair? I have a related question. Mr. Ó Céidigh said that his role is to determine the strategic direction of the airport,. Whose role is it to drive matters and achieve that strategic direction if he remains a non-executive chair?

Antigen testing was very topical at this committee for a while. As a State, and unlike almost all other EU member states, we do not seem to have moved very much on this. How important is antigen testing as an alternative to PCR testing in attracting people, and especially Europeans, to come back to Shannon Airport and to Ireland more generally?

Reference was made to Dublin Airport buses. Mr. Ó Céidigh will be aware that the buses that serve Dublin Airport and the city of Dublin are blue. They stopped throughout the pandemic and were not running. There was no bus from Ballsbridge or from Leopardstown, take your pick, to Dublin Airport yet there was a bus from Shannon Airport to Dublin Airport throughout. Can we get to the bottom of that? Who is funding that? It is clear that someone is doing so. If it was not commercially viable to run a bus from Ballsbridge or Clontarf to Dublin Airport and it was viable to run a bus from the door of Shannon Airport to Dublin Airport, it begs some serious questions about fairness and a level playing field. Will Mr. Ó Céidigh be raising this with the Government to get to the bottom of it? I suggest that it is indicative of something bigger.

There has been a great deal of talk about Heathrow slots. At the moment, however, the only slots that are being utilised are those relating to Cork. How real is the risk of losing the Heathrow slots when the guarantee runs out next year?

My final question is more of a statement, although I try not to make statements.