Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Thursday, 9 October 2014

Public Accounts Committee

2013 Annual Accounts of Shannon Free Airport Development Company

12:05 pm

Mr. Neil Pakey:

I will endeavour to answer each question in turn and see if I am able to answer them all sufficiently. In terms of what are the new challenges facing the business, there are challenges and, in fact, the challenges are driven out of what brought us together in the first place. It is fair to say that the companies were brought together under the Shannon Group out of need and this need was driven partly by performance. For example, in terms of Shannon Airport's performance, it had experienced five years of successive decline in passenger numbers, which has an economic impact and an impact on prosperity. Similarly, Shannon Development was in need of regeneration and transformation.