Mr. Declan Fitzpatrick:

That would come back to whether we would have a public service obligation route. The only one we have in Ireland today is between Dublin and Donegal. There previously were such routes from Dublin to Kerry etc. The Government has stopped supporting those routes. If we look across Europe, we see a trend over the years where the shorter routes are dropping off. There are fewer and fewer flights of one hour or less because ground infrastructure - trains and roads etc. - has improved As a trend, across Europe there are fewer routes like the Cork to Belfast and Cork to Dublin routes. Ultimately, if someone wants to put on a flight from Cork to Dublin next week for the all-Ireland final, or any other match, it comes down to a commercial decision by the airline. If they believed they would make money on it, I suspect they would put it on. What the Deputy is experiencing with the airlines is probably related to a lack of aircraft. At this time of year the airlines do not have spare aircraft sitting around waiting for an opportunity. For a lot of the commercial operators it would not be worth their while, to be frank. That is a question for the airlines.