Ryanair rejects DAA’s €60 million incentive offer to deliver new passengers

Negotiations between the two companies ended today after Ryanair's insistence that it be paid more than €100 million in discounts, with no guarantee of any additional traffic. Ryanair also wanted to be paid more than €10 million in discounts for existing passengers at Dublin Airport.

The Ryanair proposal would have seen the airline potentially being financially rewarded for reducing traffic at Cork and Shannon airports and transferring it to Dublin Airport.

DAA initially tabled a series of incentives that would have given Ryanair more than €50 million in discounted airport charges if Ryanair delivered incremental growth of four million passengers at Dublin Airport over the next five years. DAA subsequently indicated its willingness to improve its offer and to provide Ryanair with more than €60 million in incentives if it delivered incremental passenger growth.

Regrettably, Ryanair has refused to accept this proposal and instead continues to demand €100 million in subsidies with no guarantee of any extra traffic for the airport or for the country.

The DAA is keen to stimulate sustainable growth at its three Irish airports and has been in a process of engagement with Ryanair in relation to this issue during recent weeks. Under the DAA proposal, growth at Dublin Airport would only be supported if it was incremental growth.

"We have offered Ryanair generous discounts worth more than €60 million if the airline delivers the new passengers that it claims it can," said DAA Chief Executive Declan Collier. "Our aim is to encourage additional passenger traffic for Dublin Airport and for the country as a whole, but Ryanair was unable to provide any guarantee that the traffic it would deliver under its proposal would be additional," Mr Collier added.

"Agreeing to the Ryanair proposal would mean that DAA could potentially pay Ryanair €100 million in incentives for no overall passenger growth and no extra inbound tourists," according to Mr Collier. "DAA was therefore unable to accede to Ryanair's unrealistic and unsustainable proposal," he added.

"Our incentives are structured to ensure that airlines cannot qualify for tens of millions of euro in discounts unless they deliver new passengers. But Ryanair gave no commitment in relation to how many of its projected four million passengers would be additional traffic or what percentage of the traffic would be inbound tourists."

Ryanair also wanted to be paid more than €10 million in subsidies for existing passengers, despite the fact that DAA's incentive schemes are designed to stimulate traffic growth.

DAA has a range of generous incentive schemes to stimulate growth at its three Irish airports, which gives discounts of up to 100% on the company's competitive airport charges for incremental growth and new routes. The company will continue to consider proposals from any airline that offers incremental growth on a sustainable basis.

DAA strongly rejects Ryanair's spurious claims that it has not properly responded to the company's proposal. DAA sought clarification from Ryanair in relation to several issues surrounding its proposal on a number of occasions in recent weeks, but Ryanair has declined to provide answers to these requests.