Kieran O'Donnell (Limerick City, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I am trying to make my point in a different way. The regional airports programme is clearly the lever to encourage further balanced regional development. The Minister spoke about the regional airports being used for safety. It allows them to use other funds for various other purposes, such as encouraging airlines to fly into their airports. The committee will take this into account. It may be a route in terms of balanced regional development whereby at least the regional airports can have further funds available to them. Shannon Airport received €4.347 million on the operational side. That is very positive. It is €1.3 million up from last year and that is very significant.

Ryanair appeared before the committee last week. It posed a number of questions in respect of aviation policy. They made the point that it all centres around the fact that we are an island nation on the periphery of Europe. The committee visited Schiphol Airport. Holland is very different from here. It has borders with all its European neighbours; Ireland does not. Michael O'Leary made the point that EU statistics show that aviation accounts for 2.8% of EU emissions, almost half that of shipping. In the context of aviation policy, connectivity and competitive air access are vital. If one of the biggest airlines in Europe is being heavily caught by the emissions trading system, ETS, but the long-haul flight airlines are not, is the current ETS model fair?