Response to EU Investigation
Ryanair Holdings PLC
10 July 2007
RYANAIR RESPONDS TO EU COMMISSION INVESTIGATION
INTO BERLIN, DORTMUND, LUBECK AND TAMPERE AIRPORTS
Ryanair, Europe's largest low fares airline today (Tuesday, 10th July 2007)
condemned the European Commission ,which announced investigations into Easyjet's
cost base at Berlin and Dortmund airports, and Ryanair's costs base at Lubeck
and Tampere airports, while at the same time continuing to ignore the blatant
State Aid being doled out to Europe's largest flag carriers including Air
France, Alitalia, Lufthansa and Olympic.
Ryanair pointed to the European Commission's repeated failure to investigate
massive State Aid as follows:
1. •Air France enjoys a 50% discount on airport charges for domestic routes at
French airports which amounts to unlawful State Aid of over €1bn over the
last 7 years.
2. •Lufthansa's exclusive use of the second terminal at Munich Airport which
caused the State owned Munich Airport to lose over €50m last year. These
enormous losses being made by the State owned airport for the sole and
exclusive benefit of Lufthansa prove conclusively that Lufthansa is not
paying the full charges associated with the second terminal at Munich.
3. •The European Commission has repeatedly ignored the billions of euro of State
aid which are handed annually to Alitalia in the form of rescue and recovery
plans.
4. •The European Commission continues to ignore the annual bail out of the loss
making Olympic Airlines by the Greek Government.
Commenting today Ryanair's Spokesman, Peter Sherrard said:
'Today's announcement proves that the European Commission has a biased
approach to State Aid investigations. It continues to ignore €billions of
State Aid to flag carrier airlines in the form of discounted domestic
charges, exclusive use of terminal facilities and annual bail outs to
Alitalia and Olympic Airlines, yet at the same time the Commission is
wasting time and resources investigating the cost base of small secondary
airports such as Lubeck and Tampere, which without Ryanair would have no
traffic at all, or the main airports of secondary cities such as Berlin and
Dortmund, which would have far smaller traffic numbers were it not for the
services provided by Easyjet.
'This latest development is further proof that this European Commission has
given up on deregulating the European Air Travel market, and is intent on
re-regulating that market at every hands turn. At a time when many of
Europe's flag carrier airlines are raising fares and levying fuel
surcharges, Ryanair calls on the Commission to launch investigations of
these massive State Aid subventions to Air France, Lufthansa, Alitalia and
Olympic Airlines, instead of wasting time investigating the affairs of
smaller secondary regional airports who are and should be free to continue
to discount their charges in order to win new business from low fare
airlines.
'What's next from this European Commission? Perhaps they will investigate
McDonalds for negotiating discounts with beef and cheese suppliers? Perhaps
they will investigate Ikea for negotiating volume discounts with furniture
suppliers? Who knows perhaps they will investigate Tesco for using its
purchasing power to negotiate supplier discounts on behalf of its customers.
'Low fares airlines negotiate substantial discounts over the high published
charges at many airports in secondary cities and secondary airports,
precisely because those airports wish to develop new routes, traffic and
business. This development has created competition to the high fare flag
carrier airlines who are using their political power and influence to send
the European Commission off on wild goose chases, whilst ignoring the real
State Aid scandals which are the massive subventions which continue to be
given annually to flag carrier airlines like Air France, Lufthansa, Alitalia
and Olympic.
'This Commission is not interested in competition, it simply wants to
protect the flag carrier airlines and penalise the low fares airlines who
are negotiating discounts at secondary airports and passing on those
discounts to the travelling public in the form of lower fares.
'It is noteworthy that this latest investigation comes just two weeks after
the EU Commission blocked Ryanair's takeover of Aer Lingus, when it had
previously rubber stamped the much larger Air France takeover of KLM and the
Lufthansa takeover of Swiss and Austrian. Clearly this Commission applies
one rule to the flag carrier airlines and an entirely different rule to the
low fares airlines. Sadly this Commission cannot be trusted to advance the
cause of consumers, it is more interested in protecting the narrow self
interest of flag carrier airlines'.
Ends. Tuesday, 10th July 2007
For further information
please contact:
Peter Sherrard Pauline McAlester
Ryanair Ltd Murray Consultants
Tel. 353-1-8121222 Tel. 353-1-4980300
This information is provided by RNS
The company news service from the London Stock Exchange
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