I see the usual uninformed prejudices are alive and well.
The Airport Package contains three elements – a revision of the Slots Regulation, a strengthening of the Groundhandling Directive and a new set of noise rules.
From the airline point of view:
The Slots Regulation didn’t need to be revised. The Commission’s proposal contained some good points, mostly bad. The bits the airlines didn’t like were mostly there at the behest of the airports and the slot coordinators. The Council (= national governments) and the Parliament Transport Committee pretty much kept the good bits, threw out the bad bits.
Thye Groundhandling Directive changes were an honest attempt to get rid of anticompetitive practice at many major airports by giving airlines greater choice of handler. It has been scuppered by the unions and a number of key airports (think: Germany). The Parliament will throw our the proposed changes.
The noise proposal is pretty much balanced and sensible.
Kallas and his people are seriously pissed off at the way things have gone through Council and Parliament (on slots and handling) and have threatened to pull the entire package rather than be humiliated by the vote.
By the way, Kallas is spouting rubbish – none of the proposals has anything to do with delay, nor the passenger experience at airports. As far as groundhandling is concerned, the dismantling of monopolies/duopolies means lower costs (which is why the unions hate it) leading to savings which can be passed on to the customer.
As for slots, the Commission’s angle is that tinkering with the rules can squeeze more flights into existing capacity – how is that supposed to help delay?