The key finding of the IBEC Ireland/US Open Skies Report was the necessity for effective pre-emptive action by the Government to offset the threat posed by the probable reduction in transatlantic services through Shannon Airport.
This was the view expressed by Independent MEP Marian Harkin when she called on the Government to accept its responsibility to compensate the Shannon and Mid West region for a decision it made to remove the core underpin of the area’s economy.
“The keys to the economy of the Mid West are it’s tourism and foreign owned manufacturing activities, both of which will be seriously affected by any reduction in transatlantic services into and out of Shannon”, she said.
The report’s estimate, that a significant reduction in air traffic through Shannon would cost the Tourism sector €75 million per year, was a tangible deficit that demanded an immediate response by way of Government investment to incentivise transatlantic services through major targeted marketing activity, the Independent MEP said. In addition the necessary roads infrastructure including the dual carriageway from Ennis to Galway and the fourth Shannon crossing had to be prioritised by front-loading in the National Development Plan 2007-2014, she said.
The proposal in the IBEC report that this vital roads programme should be completed by 2012 was a far too long time scale, she stressed. “The proposed fast track infrastructure legislation must be used in the Mid-West and the necessary roads completed by 2010 if the Mid West is to be given a fair chance of maintaining the necessary competitive edge in the future”, she said.
Foreign investment which was so important to the Mid-West was becoming increasingly mobile with low corporation tax regimes now existing in the central European countries which had most recently joined the EU, Marian Harkin said. “Direct and regular transport of people and goods may well be the determinants of where foreign investment will be committed and the Irish government must recognise it’s responsibility to the Mid West by off-setting it’s open skies decision with appropriate and rapid support programmes”, she said.
The Mid West and West regions should also be given a lead position in an increased national spend on Research and Development in their third level education institutions, Marian Harkin said. A re-invigorated Shannon Development agency with a specific mandate to counter any adverse fall out from the open skies decision coupled with a debt-free Shannon Airport authority would also provide the region with a fair opportunity to thrive into the future, she said.
The current National Development Plan had failed to deliver on its core promise of balanced regional development and next plan for the next seven years had to perform very much better if Shannon and its hinterland was to have a fair chance of withstanding the challenge created by the Open Skies policy, MEP Marian Harkin said.
On her recent visit to Washington to lobby on behalf of undocumented Irish emigrants she had sought through US Senator Tom Harkin to have the proposal of Congressman Christopher Smith for a study of the economic effects of an open skies policy on American owned industry in the region approved by the Senate. “As a senior member of the Appropriations Committee I am hopeful that Senator Harkin, who knows Shannon Airport very well, will be able to have Congressman Smith’s proposal advanced and that it will contribute to the case for special measures for the region from the Irish Government”, Independent MEP Marian Harkin said.
The proposed privatisation of Aer Lingus was a further serious threat to the future of Shannon Airport and the Mid West Region when the Open Skies regime came into existence, she said. Marian Harkin warned that the Aer Lingus privatisation was likely to add considerably to the pressure on Shannon Airport and this raised another question about the desirability of changing the status of the State owned airline.
