Timmy Dooley (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister of State to the House. As she knows, aviation and tourism throughout the State have been devastated due to the Covid pandemic. Shannon Airport is no different to any other airport in the world, in that it has suffered very considerable losses in passenger numbers and a reduction in activity. I recognise the support the Government has provided to date, which is well respected and well regarded at the airport and in the wider region. I am very pleased to see that the supports the Government put in place have today received the support of the European Union, which is most welcome.

As the Minister of State knows, however, 2022 is seen as the year from which the recovery of the aviation and tourism sectors will begin. I will put on public record that, prior to Covid, Shannon was not keeping pace with growth at other airports. We saw very significant growth in tourism numbers in the five years prior to 2020 and, quite frankly, Shannon was not holding pace with that growth. Only 1.7 million passengers went through Shannon Airport in 2019. In 2007, there were close to 3 million passengers, or more, going through the airport. Cork Airport is at 2.5 million and Dublin Airport, the behemoth, has 35 million passengers going through it and is growing all the time.

The effort now in rebuilding activity at all airports gives an opportunity to rebalance, to some extent, the lopsided growth that has taken place between east and west. There is now an opportunity to see more balanced growth. Dublin was bursting at the seams, putting pressure on the infrastructure at the airport, in addition to the infrastructure of the roads and public transport network around it. Shannon Airport will need ongoing support to ensure that it is in a position to rebuild and be ultimately self-sustaining into the future.

In the long term, we have to look at putting in place a national aviation policy and establishing a national aviation authority, which will have responsibility for the three State airports in order that they work together rather than in competition with one another and do so in a way in which Government policy dictates a regional development approach.It is not to take from Dublin, but it is to take the unnecessary traffic from Dublin, and supporting Shannon, Cork and the wider region in the way we do it. I do not think the structure as it is currently constituted, or the current policy, are appropriate to do that. However, I am also mindful that it will take some time to change the policy and put those kinds of processes in place. In the meantime, we must do everything we possibly can to rebuild the foundation in Shannon in order that it is able to compete and start to rebuild from this year on.

I have a couple of asks. The first thing we need to do from the perspective of the Department of Transport is ensure that there is an hourly direct bus service between Galway and Shannon and Limerick and Shannon. There are good Bus Éireann services at the moment but they are not direct. We need the buses to make the journey in the quickest possible time. It is possible to drive by car from Shannon to Galway in less than an hour and it is important that we have a direct bus service to replicate that.

The chambers of commerce in Clare and Limerick have done a very good piece of work on the need to establish a link between Shannon Airport and one of the big hubs in Europe, either Schiphol or Frankfurt. Schiphol is probably the best, with Frankfurt at number two and Paris and number three. To get an airline to do that in the short term will require significant Government support. Under the public service obligation, PSO, rules it should be possible to put in place that kind of funding. I accept it will need intervention from the European Commission, but I hope the officials in the Department will be open-minded to such a proposal and will be prepared to put together an application for PSO status for a route from Shannon into Schiphol or Frankfurt at the earliest opportunity and to give Shannon and the wider mid-west region – the Minister of State's city, my county and neighbouring counties - a real opportunity to start the rebuilding process as early as possible.