Cathal Crowe (Clare, Fianna Fail)
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The Minister for Transport, Deputy Eamon Ryan, was sitting in the same seat now occupied by Mr. Ó Céidigh just last week. I asked him about Mr. Ó Céidigh taking on an executive role. The suggestion was first made to me by some of the hoteliers in Clare. They see the appointment of Mr. Ó Céidigh as an enabler for the region. They asked me to put this question to the Minister for Transport. The transcript of the meeting is not live yet. The committee transcripts take about two weeks sometimes to come on stream. However, the Minister's response was negative. We have heard a doubling down on this proposal today and I again support it. We should go back to the Minister again with it.

I made this proposal last week. The Chair heard the Minister's response then. He came up with several reasons why this proposal should not be accepted. He stated that Ms Considine runs the airport from day to day as the chief executive and that Mr. Ó Céidigh would have a chairing role. That is fine. A bedding-in period is required, however, where Ms Considine and Mr. Ó Céidigh need to work in tandem to get us on a recovery trajectory. I double down on this proposal in that context. Others have also made the same proposal today, so let us go with that.

There are opportunities here. We have an infatuation with Ryanair, Aer Lingus and North American carriers and rightly so. Those are the carriers that bring large volumes of people into Ireland. Mr. Ó Céidigh could push other opportunities in addition, however, during his tenure. I refer to companies such as GainJet and other small private jet companies that fly into Shannon, some of which are based there as well. We must explore the opportunities presented by those flights. Some of those departures from Shannon originate in the Middle East and they go on to land in Washington D.C by night and important traffic is included in those flights. Enabling works are being undertaken by the Department to expand on those activities as well.

Recent months have seen much talk of the Air Corps. I do not want to go near the separate debate about search and rescue, SAR. What has been mentioned is the Air Corps moving away from the Pilatus propeller-driven aircraft it uses for pilot training and finally catching up with the rest of the world in using fixed-wing trainer jets. There are capacity limitations in Baldonnel, and if those trainer jets are adopted, we should pitch in for them. Lest anyone say that we are trying to unravel search and rescue, this is about the training of Air Corps pilots, which is a separate and distinct area. We should be pitching Shannon Airport as the location for such fixed-wing trainer jet capacity.

Locating a cargo hub at the airport has not been mentioned widely yet. I have mentioned it several times at this committee. Cargolux is a fantastic model where there is buy-in from the state. It is a cargo carrier with a majority of shares owned by the state. It goes all over the world. Luxembourg is tiny, just slightly larger than County Clare, and yet it has a dominant global position in international air capacity. Shannon Airport is well positioned in that regard. We have heard many things mentioned in the last week, including motorways to Cork, talks in the Government about a rail cargo facility at Limerick Junction, rail spurs to Shannon, motorways to Foynes and estuary capacity. All that lends itself to Mr. Ó Céidigh and the Shannon Group pitching the airport to the Government for something big to happen there. There was much talk between the Government and Amazon about having a facility in Shannon and the mid-west. With its long runway, Shannon can strongly position itself as a potential location for an air cargo facility.

We have talked about American Airlines, Delta Air Lines, United Airlines and other carriers. JetBlue has now begun transatlantic flights. The airline is flying in the UK twice a day. I would love Mr. Ó Céidigh to pitch to that airline. It is flying into Gatwick Airport and conscious of its budget regarding landing. Let us pitch to the company to touch down in Shannon, take on so many passengers and then go back. In time, then, perhaps we could lock the airline into a full Shannon service. For the moment, a quick touchdown in Shannon would enhance the airport's connectivity into America. Anyone who has been in an American airport will have seen that United Airlines and American Airlines dominate, but JetBlue also operates an immense network. I would love to see that pitch made. I ask Mr. Ó Céidigh to wrap up on some of those points.