Ryanairs Christmas message
Their way of saying thankyou for all the fuel efficient reroutes and climbs they get compared to the flight plan!!
On their website and in the national press.
UK ATC deliver £50 million Christmas present to owners and promptly take the weekend off
Ryanair, Europe’s largest airline, today (9 Dec) called on the Transport Secretary to ensure that the UK monopoly Air Traffic Control provider (NATS) turns up for work in the run up to Christmas.
Last week the NATS monopoly completed a payment of £50m to its owners, including the Government, Easyjet, BA and Virgin, who seem more interested in keeping UK Air Traffic Control charges the highest in the EU rather than improving the service to passengers.
Just two days after this Christmas bonus, NATS advised its airline customers that weekend flights are at risk of “short notice sickness”. On Saturday 3rd December, NATS announced “staffing” as a reason for UK ATC delays that morning.
It is no wonder that the ATC Performance Review Body* (PRB) has condemned NATS as a failure, having failed to pass the ”delay level” and “unit rate” check (i.e. poor service and high prices). Despite this damning report, the CAA regulator “did not adequately address” the PRB findings.
Ryanair calls on the Transport Secretary to:
• Require that NATS turns up for work at Christmas so that passengers are not disrupted by ATC “short notice sickness”.
• Require the CAA to act on the PRB finding that NATS charges are too high.
• Ensure that UK airspace is opened to competition rather than wrapped up as a cast iron monopoly for sale to the highest private monopoly bidder.
• Ensure that the Government shareholding is used to improve NATS service and reduce charges rather than inflating NATS for sale to a private monopoly (with the same disastrous results as the BAA’s London airports).