MONDAY 29 NOVEMBER 2004

MR ALAN WALKER AND MR EDDIE LYNCH

  Q120  Chairman: It is still called the M1, I think.

  Mr Walker: There was a major significant improvement last year south of the border and there is a further improvement which is due for completion early next year and it will reduce journey times to Dublin Airport. Obviously in terms of railway access, there is no direct railway access to Dublin Airport as we speak but it is an option for the future, so you are not getting a lot of people travelling that way. The road improvements do make Dublin an attractive proposition but, equally, they make it easier the other way, for people to get to Belfast and make Belfast a more attractive proposition.

  Mr Pound: I have to say that our Prime Minister would love to hear you say that competition is never a bad thing. Thank you very much indeed.

  Q121  Chairman: You have just prompted me to ask a supplementary question. We talked earlier on about a flight from Belfast International putting under threat some of those passengers who currently use Heathrow as a fly-through. Surely as the road improvements to Dublin happen and Dublin Airport itself grows and offers more routes and becomes more attractive—I think they want to be the fourth largest airport in Europe somewhere around Schipol, Amsterdam size—there is a threat that people will just use Dublin as an alternative to Heathrow and, again, would be a threat to some of that traffic from Belfast to Heathrow?

  Mr Walker: There are around five million people on the complete island of Ireland and there is a limit to how many routes can be sustained out of the island of Ireland. It will never be on the scale of having 91 destinations but if there are destinations that are complementary, particularly to North America which is where the main long haul routes are out of Dublin, then of course people from here should consider it and they should go to the one that offers them the best deal, the best price and, indeed, the correct interlining facilities because as we have moved more to point-to-point travel in Northern Ireland we have lost the guaranteed link-ups between services which are normally provided by full service airlines.

  Q122  Mark Tami: I note that you state that "The Council believes that the Department for Regional Development needs to consider any other issues on the island of Ireland that could potentially impact upon Northern Ireland air services as part of its consultation to devise a strategy on the future of aviation in Northern Ireland over the next 25-30 years". What does that mean? It is very catch-all, is it not? What do you mean by "other issues"?

  Mr Walker: In layman's terms it means we need clear definition of what the White Paper means for Northern Ireland, we need more discussion on that so that we all know in a clear and concise way how we are going to take this forward in relation to Northern Ireland, and that should include any issues such as the impact that Dublin may have, the impact that road improvements may have, or, indeed, the development of a second large airport in the Republic of Ireland if Shannon was to develop further, for example. I am not aware of plans to do that at this point in time but we need to consider all of the options so that we can then move forward to ensure that we have a sustainable aviation industry for the future and we do not lose many of these new services that have come to bear in the last few years.

  Q123  Chairman: One of those complexities in terms of who is doing what and who is suggesting what, I suppose, is that you are right in your evidence to us to say that the DRD needs to take seriously its responsibility for airport policy but, of course, with the suspension it is this Committee that is currently having to conduct the inquiries. We are very serious about ensuring that should we be successful this week in getting the Assembly back on track they can take the evidence from Westminster and that they have not wasted time in terms of taking on the task that will be set them. Your written evidence to us was very clear and certainly it assisted the Committee to the extent that probably it limited the questions that we were able to ask you verbally. As we often do, could I ask you if there are questions that we have not asked you that you expected, and therefore give you the chance to answer them even though we have not asked them?

  Mr Walker: I am not aware of any others and you can guess that it was deliberately written in that way to limit the questions you could ask us. Certainly I believe that the Committee's intervention is timely in terms of the representations that we have been making this year and in terms of the recent consultation with the Department for Transport and, indeed, the developments at European level as we currently speak. I look forward to seeing what results in terms of the report of the Committee. Unless my colleague has anything that he feels has been missed out, there is nothing.

  Chairman: Do feel free to supplement and complement the evidence you have given us, should you feel you wish to. Can I thank you on behalf of the Committee. We are looking to publish around February time, which is our target, maybe slightly earlier, but that will depend on a number of factors. We are very grateful for your input, thank you.