Anyone able to point me to the "CBI figures suggesting that 430 jobs will be created"?
I can understand what the job-creation reasoning could be. Route Development Funds (I'll take the one in Scotland, run by Scottish Enterprise, as an example) pay out based on the expected economic benefit (including jobs) of new air routes. Typically that means either inbound leisure routes (tourists coming to Scotland and spending their euros etc) or business routes (2-way business flows, more contracts for Scottish business, etc.) Routes which are almost all outbound leisure (e.g. Malaga, Alicante) don't qualify for route-development funding because they have no economic benefit for Scotland.
Ditto for BHX. How exactly does a Birmingham-Malaga (not even a new route, but one in competition with MyTravelLite for as long as they keep it up, and then with bmibaby) create new jobs in the Midlands (other than the 25 new direct jobs in flyBE to crew the aircraft)?
I can't believe that the CBI has done a specific analysis of the economic impact of these particular flyBE routes, so is flyBE telling porkies?
This is the kind of voodoo economics I expect from a Ryanair press statement!
