Mark Duffy (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I compliment Joe Gilmore and his team out in Knock airport. They run a good, tight ship. It is great to see the investment from Government in the airport because it is going from strength to strength. I believe they had growth of 6% in the first quarter of this year. It is continually expanding. We need to support regional airports like Knock, Kerry Airport and Shannon Airport. There has been so much talk of Dublin and the barriers to growth there. The regional airports play a key role in taking some of the pressure off Dublin, especially when we are investing in motorways and roads and making the island smaller from a connectivity point of view by reducing travel distances. Regional airports have an increased role to play because of that.