5milesbaby - According to management (so it must be true
), 'giving away' a chunk of Oceanic airspace to the Irish will make no difference to Shanwick revenues as charges are made on a 'per flight' basis. They also added that oceanic airspace isn't really ours to give away.
055166k - I think you are probably correct on most counts. It was admited that it is a very political decision - the IAA's input into Shanwick is deminishing as more aircraft communicate via datalink and HF becomes less of an issue. Jobs in the west of Ireland are being lost and the IAA are understandably desperate to hang on to something. They could, apparently, rip up the Shanwick agreement with just two years notice so this is a compromise that suposedly benefits us both.
We could have stuck a radar in Northern Ireland that would have done the trick but the fact is that we haven't. The Irish have so they have the upper hand. And as I said, from a ScACC point of view Southwest sector becomes a lot less hassle. Of course, having done that they will probably give us sector 7 to make up for it...