Joanne Collins (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

The officials are welcome. We really appreciate them giving of their time.

I know the officials do not deal with the regional balance for airports, but I am going to twist the question in a way and frame it in the context of the environmental impact of aviation. It may not be the fuel for the aircraft, but many people flying here to visit the west coast land in Dublin because 80% or so of the flights come to Dublin Airport. People are getting off flights and getting on buses or into cars, so it has an environmental impact in one sense. Shannon Airport has a capacity of 5 million but it only caters for 2 million at present. The authorities at the airport refers to it taking 15 minutes from getting out of the car to getting on the plane. Dublin Airport is at capacity. It is sometimes crazy when you go in there. I do not like having to be the airport two hours before a flight. I live in Limerick, so I am used to Shannon. I had an hour and a half before a flight to Liverpool last week, and I ran through Dublin Airport. I could not get over how busy it was going through security. There are airports in Cork, Shannon and Knock and they are nearly empty. You fly through them. At the same time, I would not like to see Shannon Airport become like Dublin Airport, because that would take the novelty of the 15 minutes from getting out of the car and onto the flight away. Surely, however, there should be a bit of rebalancing there, particularly in the context of the environmental impact. The officials are going to tell me they do not deal with regional balance.