Aer Lingus CEO Lynne Embleton expressed hope that a new government will address the controversial 32m annual passenger cap at Dublin Airport, saying it harms the Irish economy.
The High Court recently granted Aer Lingus and other airlines a stay against the Irish Aviation Authority’s decision to limit passenger numbers next summer, which will prevent reductions in Aer Lingus’s capacity.
Despite a decline in Aer Lingus’s operating margin to 18.6pc in the third quarter, Embleton noted this was an improvement over previous plans to reduce capacity due to increased competition in the North Atlantic market.
The airline reported a revenue of €746m for the third quarter, a 3pc drop from the previous year, with operating profit falling by 30pc to €139m, affected by a €55m impact from pilot strikes earlier in the year.
Lynne Embleton shared: “The impact of this 20pc increase in north Atlantic capacity certainly played a very major part in our summer results. It was a difficult environment. That amount of capacity coming into a market in one go was always going to cause a bit of disruption to the normal commercial set up, and that’s what we saw in the summer. I’m expecting that to moderate, and that the supply-demand balance will become more normal. Hopefully a new government will look seriously at the passenger cap. It does damage the Irish economy and it does need to be resolved. It conflicts with European slot regulations and Aer Lingus’s historical slot rights. We hope the planning process can catch up and we’ll get a permanent and positive resolution to this issue, hopefully next year.”
