The intervention seems entirely logical to me. Gist seems to be that FlyBe will still be liable to repay the APD owed following a grace period. So no free gift. And this move allows time for the airline to be reorganised and (hopefully) saved from collapse.
And if all goes to plan, the potential payback for the state includes:
- Around 2400 FlyBe staff still in gainful employment, paying their taxes and not claiming benefits (although some redundancies may be inevitable).
- Exeter, Southampton and Belfast City Airports not pushed to the brink with all the job losses that would bring. FlyBe ops dominate these three airports in particular.
- Jobs preserved amongst airport and handling agency staff across FlyBe's other UK airports.
- Lifeline routes to IOM and Channel Islands preserved.
- Regional connectivity (essential to general business competitiveness) maintained across several more remote counties of the UK.
- Franchise partners not dragged down with the ship.
Seems to me that the UK taxpayer would be on the hook for a whole lot more if the operation was allowed to fail?
Rescue initiative sounds like good value to me. Taxpayer exposure is very low compared with the costs which would certainly be incurred in the aftermath of collapse.