Apart from the three State airports at Dublin, Shannon and Cork, there are six smaller regional airports at which airlines operate scheduled passenger services. These are the regional airports in Kerry, Sligo, Galway, Mayo, Donegal and Waterford. My Department supports the regional airports with capital grants for essential upgrade of airport infrastructure and facilities and grants for marketing, safety and security measures by the airports. The details of the grants paid to the regional airports by my Department over the period 1997 to 2002 under both of these schemes are set out in the following tabular statement:
Airport
|
Marketing/Safety/Security Grants
|
Capital Grants
|
|
€
|
€
|
Donegal
|
896,610
|
831,780
|
Galway
|
795,034
|
2,382,570
|
Knock
|
1,806,238
|
1,475,871
|
Kerry
|
2,558,550
|
838,809
|
Sligo
|
877,560
|
835,933
|
Waterford
|
1,155,971
|
531,290
|
Under the relevant EU legislation, there also exists a framework for supporting the provision of air services based on defined public service obligations, PSO. Our PSO regime currently facilitates the operation of air links between Dublin and the regional airports in Kerry, Galway, Sligo, Knock, Donegal and Derry. However, as the Deputy is aware, Exchequer support for the PSO air services is paid to the air carriers concerned and not to the airports.
I do not believe that the restructuring of the State airports, decided upon by the Government in July last, will have devastating consequences for the regional airports. The new arrangements for the State airports will facilitate greater competition for new business among all Irish airports to the extent permitted by market dynamics. It will, of course, be important to ensure that, as far as possible, a fair competitive environment exists having regard to the scale of operations at the smaller regional airports and to the level of Exchequer support for such airports in the future.