Clare Daly (Dublin North, United Left)
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381. To ask the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport the reason the Irish Aviation Authority does not fall under the Freedom of Information Act. [39244/14]

Paschal Donohoe (Dublin Central, Fine Gael)
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The principal reason is related to important regulatory functions undertaken by the IAA under which it operates an extensive confidential, non-punitive and mandatory safety incident and occurrence reporting system. The guarantee of confidentiality is an essential prerequisite for this system, which is mandated under EU law, to operate effectively and it is considered that the application of FOI provisions would be inconsistent with this prerequisite.

There are also certain relevant commercial factors to be considered in this context. The Single European Sky Initiative aims to integrate European airspace management through, inter alia, a reduction in the number of Air Navigation Services Providers across Member States.  This process will increasingly involve international competition between operators and the IAA, as a service provider, could clearly be placed at a serious competitive disadvantage if it had to operate disclosure requirements which would not be applicable to competitor providers in other Member States.