Why do the Gov not want Ryanair to take over Aer Lingus?

Dannyboy83

bonkey wrote: »

Whereas Ryanair don't actually need their pilots to be qualified or in good health, right?

That's irrelevant.
It was a bonus for the company if I had the cert, otherwise, I would have paid myself.
I assume if Ryanair had a shortage of pilots, they would offer these terms.
I need to be in good health for my job, its still my own responsibility.
I assume its the same for you.
That's just how business works, unfortunate or otherwise.

Edit: And more to the point, it looks like, shortly, Aer Lingus will not need their pilots - healthy or otherwise.

P. Breathnach

Dannyboy83 wrote: »

He said on that show, that if he did acquire Aer Lingus, there would be no merger. ...

He also said in the past that he had no interest in Ryanair taking over Aer Lingus -- then he launched a bid.

Dannyboy83

P. Breathnach wrote: »

He also said in the past that he had no interest in Ryanair taking over Aer Lingus -- then he launched a bid.

Indeed, but we can debate on who said what, until eternity, and then some.
I know you are a clever & pragmatic man, so I know you'll see my point of view -> It doesn't matter in the least to me, wheter its privately owned or publicly owned, or somewhere in the middle.The thing that makes my blood itchy, is this demented pursuit of ideology over basic common sense.

Judging by that article, the current sideshow are capable of running the airline, only in the form of running it into the ground.
And they appear to have unrelenting Spartan determination in doing so.

How is the current strategy viable, when the Airline is on the verge of collapsing and laying off "North of 1000 staff"?
Does the time for consideration of alternatives come only with hindsight?
Do we need to wait until its bankrupt before a new direction emerges?

As far as I understand, Aer Lingus are trying to change their business model, to compete with RyanAir, in a manner which they are not capable of doing and I seriously doubt will be able to do so, in a way thats financially viable. The eventual outcome will be the collapse of Aer Lingus.

http://www.centreforaviation.com/news/2009/11/05/contrasting-fortunes-full-service-carrier-restructuring-by-aer-lingus-and-air-new-zealand/page1
Substantial productivity gains are still required. In 2008 the average staff cost for Aer Lingus was reported as EUR82,000 compared with Ryanair’s EUR50,000. Aer Lingus last year handled 2,600 passengers per staff member, compared with Ryanair’s 9,700. Even allowing for different commercial practices, the substantial productivity differential highlights the difficulties faced by legacy airlines in emulating the low cost model.

The above article contrasts Aer Lingus and Air New Zealand.
As shown, Air New Zealand are praised for their resilience in the face of the competition. They have the advantages of geography and isolation. And not having to compete with the biggest international low cost airline -- in their domestic market.

Why not pursue a new strategy while its still sustainable?
e.g. a new transatlantic service, merged or otherwise
Not just for the benefit of the airline and its staff, but for the country too.




http://www.independent.ie/business/irish/aer-lingus-loss-almost-quadruples-as-passenger-numbers-fall-1870933.html
http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/breaking/2009/0827/breaking11.htm

ceret

seclachi wrote: »

I`m guessing because Aer lingus is the national carrier and that if ryanair was in charge it would cut any non profitable routes, which may not serve the country's interests.

Aer Lingus is no longer the national carrier. It was privitized and is just as motived by profit as Ryanair.

Remember Aer Lingus wanted to drop the Shannon-London route, and only on threat of a large shareholder (the Irish Government) did they change their minds.

Diarmuid

Daragh101 wrote: »

The fact is if Ryanair take over aer lingus, their is no real competition left in the business, therefore creating a monopoly(fact).

Here are a list of airlines that are flying in and out of Dublin today:

Aer Arann
Aer Lingus
Air Baltic
Air France
American Airlines
Bmi
Continental
Delta Air Lines
Etihad
Flybe
Lotus Air
Lufthansa
Luxair
Norwegiian
Primera Airlines
Ryanair
Sas
Swiss
Turkish Airlines
Us Airways

You need to study this page and this

97i9y3941

he do a good job thats why,all the heads of board would know he would fire them and replace them with cheaper workers,along with getting rid of the unions..

Dannyboy83

This just says it all, HAHAHAHAHA

http://www.rte.ie/news/2009/1203/tourism.html
Strategy to boost tourism
Thursday, 3 December 2009 10:52
Tourism Ireland is to spend millions of euro next year to encourage visitors to come to Ireland.

The agency is launching its strategy for 2010 today, with the hope of increasing the number of tourists visiting this country next year by 3%.

In 2009, there was a 12% drop in visitors.

Advertisement
The strategy will focus on the British and German markets as places to source new business.

Tourism Ireland Chief Executive Niall Gibbons says thousands of jobs are dependent on the success of the strategy.

In October Central Statistics Office figures showed the number of trips made to Ireland was down by almost 600,000 compared with the same period last year.

The CSO said there were just under 4.9 million trips to Ireland by overseas visitors in the first eight months of 2009, down 10.9% or more than 596,000 from August last year.

There was a drop of 25% in visitors coming from Britain.

gnxx

I hate flying with Ryanair and personally would be disappointed if Ryanair bought Aer Lingus. I do remember the dark days pre-Ryanair when Aer Lingus and others extracted £300 ( in old money ) to fly to London.


Regardless of the customer experience of Ryanair, it is a great company. This is now the biggest airline in the world. We have few companies that stand on a world stage. O Leary has a proven track record as a business person. I found the recent BBC Panorama expose on Ryanair amusing, particularly the insinuation that he was somehow unethical in squeezing Boeing for the best deal possible after September 11th.

From a commercial viewpoint though, why is the government holding onto Aer Lingus? It doesn't seem to make any sense. Ireland has a poorly performing national airline. We also have the one of the top Airline bosses in the world living in Mullingar. It is hugely questionable that government hasn't negotiated acceptable terms so that O'Leary can buy Aer Lingus.

To me, it appears that O'Leary hasn't played the game within the Irish government rules and this is the reason that Aer Lingus continues in state ownership.

Sadly, I believe that Aer Lingus will be eventually sold in a fire-sale to another airline that wants the Dublin connections. Aer Lingus will soon after stop flying loss making routes and will probably cease to exist as a standalone brand. This would be a fate much worse than a negotiated sale to Ryanair.

Daragh101

Diarmuid wrote: »

Here are a list of airlines that are flying in and out of Dublin today:

Aer Arann
Aer Lingus
Air Baltic
Air France
American Airlines
Bmi
Continental
Delta Air Lines
Etihad
Flybe
Lotus Air
Lufthansa
Luxair
Norwegiian
Primera Airlines
Ryanair
Sas
Swiss
Turkish Airlines
Us Airways

You need to study this page and this

They are not competing for a share in the irish market!!!

oscarBravo

Daragh101 wrote: »

They are not competing for a share in the irish market!!!

They're flying in and out of Dublin, but not competing for the Irish market?

How does that work?

Diarmuid

Daragh101 wrote: »

They are not competing for a share in the irish market!!!

So they are just flying in for fun? Of course they are competing for the Irish market.

Daragh101

oscarBravo wrote: »

They're flying in and out of Dublin, but not competing for the Irish market?

How does that work?

just say people from france are coming to ireland..
when the plane arrives they will bring irish passengers to france.
This is very small business...
At the end of the day people in ireland book there flights with either air aran, aer lingus or ryanair, they dont even consider anyone else!

Diarmuid

Daragh101 wrote: »

just say people from france are coming to ireland..
when the plane arrives they will bring irish passengers to france.
This is very small business...
At the end of the day people in ireland book there flights with either air aran, aer lingus or ryanair, they dont even consider anyone else!

:pac::pac::pac::pac::pac:

Can't argue with your logic there...

schween

oscarBravo wrote: »

They're flying in and out of Dublin, but not competing for the Irish market?

I agree. Take the Iberia Airlines Madrid - Dublin route.

In Ireland the route isn't advertised and it is mostly Spanish people on the flight.
So in a way Iberia are competing at Madrid Airport, but aren't too bothered about Dublin.
The only reason the flight back to Madrid is so full is mostly because of visitors on a return flight.
Most Irish would book either Ryanair or Aer Lingus on that route, and wouldn't even know about Iberia.

oscarBravo

Daragh101 wrote: »

At the end of the day people in ireland book there flights with either air aran, aer lingus or ryanair, they dont even consider anyone else!

I'll consider anyone who's flying where I'm going. My flight to London in a couple of weeks will be with BMI.

oscarBravo

schween wrote: »

I agree. Take the Iberia Airlines Madrid - Dublin route.

In Ireland the route isn't advertised and it is mostly Spanish people on the flight.
So in a way Iberia are competing at Madrid Airport, but aren't too bothered about Dublin.
The only reason the flight back to Madrid is so full is mostly because of visitors on a return flight.
Most Irish would book either Ryanair or Aer Lingus on that route, and wouldn't even know about Iberia.

Again, I'm aware of that route. As it turns out, it was cheaper for me to fly Dublin-London-Madrid, so I'm flying BMI and Iberia - but not because I didn't know about the direct flight.

Dannyboy83

Anyway, so much for that idea:

http://www.rte.ie/business/2009/1203/aerlingus.html
Aer Lingus is starting cuts process

Thursday, 3 December 2009 16:35
Aer Lingus says it has set up a taskforce to start planning reductions in its fleet and compulsory redundancies.
In a statement, the airline said that despite 'exhaustive' negotiations with all union groups, it was no closer to an acceptable deal.
Aer Lingus said that it believed it was still too far from bridging the gap with the demands of pilots and cabin crew.
Advertisement

On Tuesday night, the Aer Lingus board said it had decided to go ahead unilaterally with its plans to cut €97m worth of costs from the airline.
Aer Lingus chief executive Christoph Mueller said at the time that the decision would most likely lead to further redundancies, possibly compulsory, over and above the 676 voluntary lay-offs being sought under the draft plan

irish_bob

seamus brennan tried to deregulate transport in the capital , the unions were angered and this in turn angered bertie so brennan was moved , the unions are still a force at aer lingus and cowen like bertie seeks union approoval above most things , hence no sale to mick o leary

on a seperete note , ryanair are singapore airlines in comparison to iberia in my experience when it comes to the things that are most important to me

P. Breathnach

irish_bob wrote: »

seamus brennan tried to deregulate transport in the capital , the unions were angered and this in turn angered bertie so brennan was moved , the unions are still a force at aer lingus and cowen like bertie seeks union approoval above most things , hence no sale to mick o leary...

So said O'Leary. Do you have a disinterested source for that interpretation?

Diarmuid

P. Breathnach wrote: »

So said O'Leary. Do you have a disinterested source for that interpretation?

Why don't you ask Bertie? I'm sure you'll get the straight , honest answer you are looking for.

Failing that you could hit google. There is no denying that he was demoted in 2004 from Transport. Also no denying that he pushed through lots of de-regulation in the transport industry against union issues. I'm sure people closer to those issues would be in a more able position to say if those two facts were linked or not, but it would be in character for Bertie to have dealt with his competence by demotion

onedmc

Rb wrote: »

hate ......These days, Aer Lingus is the slightly more expensive .

I travel to the UK once or twice a week and Aer Lingus is often cheaper than Ryanair to Manchester and Birmingham.

Where there is no competition between these Airlines then the prices of both of them go up. Last week I spent €1,500 on Ryanair flights they can be really expensive when there is no choice.

O'Leary is the first to admit that he will charge the customer as much as he can if he knows the customer has no choice. He even brags about doubling the price of batteries on Christmas Day in his old Spar shop.

Hopefully Aer Lingus will be taken over by another airline but not ryanair.

Diarmuid

onedmc wrote: »

O'Leary is the first to admit that he will charge the customer as much as he can if he knows the customer has no choice. He even brags about doubling the price of batteries on Christmas Day in his old Spar shop.

Typical Irish attitude. As he said himself, he could have stayed in bed and the guy looking to buy the batteries would not have got them for his kids. Instead he worked Christmas day and sold the batteries at twice the price. His customers still had a choice you know, they could have not bought them.

onedmc wrote: »

Hopefully Aer Lingus will be taken over by another airline but not ryanair.

Yea one of the other major carriers who run their business for charity. Mother Theresa Airlines or something like that :rolleyes:

irish_bob

P. Breathnach wrote: »

So said O'Leary. Do you have a disinterested source for that interpretation?

heard the one about brennan on marc colemans newstalk radio prgramme some weeks back , didnt even hear o learys interview last week

AllecEiffel

Ryanair are a money-making machine of the most ruthless variety.

If they take over AerLingus they will implement a flight schedule facilitating maximum profit for minimum cost (i.e. minimum amount of scheduled flights).

This will result in a scenario resembling the AerLingus monopoly of the eighties; fewer flights and higher costs for the consumer.

If any airline attempts to come into the Irish market and compete, Ryanair will simply reduce fares on that route for as long as it takes to kill-off the competition.

Wake up and smell the coffee. We need two strong independent viable airlines. The ongoing round of cost-cutting at AerLingus has been effective and will guarantee their viability. Lets hope that will be the case for the sake of the consumers.

Dr Galen

I have a simple rule for choosing air travel. If I'm only going to the UK or a short hop type flight I'm happy to fly Ryanair. If I'm going anywhere further away with a decent flight time, I'm happy to pay more (Aer Lingus et al) for the added comfort etc. There are exceptions, especially if I'm travelling in a group and people want costs to be kept lower but thats how I work it.

O'Leary isn't stupid. He knows there are lots of people like me. He knows that the chances of getting me on a four hour Ryanair flight are small most of the time. He knows that there is a market for a well run and cost effective Aer Lingus type operator in the Irish market, so the fear that he would turn AL into the twin sister of Ryanair are being overhyped imho. If anything, we'll see prices remain pretty much the same for Ryanair and for AL, I would suggest that prices for AL might edge up slightly over time, and with that have a better standard of service, making a clear differential to Ryanair. This would give consumers choice on how they want to fly. There would be cuts made where overlaps occurred. Most likely to the AL schedule, as the Ryanair model would be more profitable when compared, unless the AL route was doing well all on its own.

The real jewel in the AL crown for O'Leary, as has been mentioned, would be the transatlantic capacity. I think O'Leary would take a serious look at how he could cut costs here and get bums on seats. I wouldn't be surprised if he reduced First Class/Business Class type seats substantially on AL transatlantic routes to allow for extra low cost capacity. In fairness, if I had the cash to be flying in those sections, I'd be hopping onto a Virgin plane not AL. Low cost transatlantic flight (circa €200 return), would and could be the saviour of AL, if other costs could be kept low and managed properly. If it worked, we could see an era of other airlines following a similar model and offering cheaper seats, creating more competition and more importantly availibility on transatlantic routes

zootroid

AllecEiffel wrote: »

Ryanair are a money-making machine of the most ruthless variety.

If they take over AerLingus they will implement a flight schedule facilitating maximum profit for minimum cost (i.e. minimum amount of scheduled flights).

This will result in a scenario resembling the AerLingus monopoly of the eighties; fewer flights and higher costs for the consumer.

If any airline attempts to come into the Irish market and compete, Ryanair will simply reduce fares on that route for as long as it takes to kill-off the competition.

Wake up and smell the coffee. We need two strong independent viable airlines. The ongoing round of cost-cutting at AerLingus has been effective and will guarantee their viability. Lets hope that will be the case for the sake of the consumers.

You make it sound like Ryanair and Aer Lingus are currently the only two airlines operating out of this country. There are alternatives, BMI for example. As well as that, not every airline competes on price alone.

Personally, I would like to see Aer Lingus survive as an independent airline. I don't think the state should hold any stake in it at all. But when there is talk of how Ryanair must be stopped from taking over Aer Lingus, I take it with a pinch of salt as I'm not sure the scenarios people envisage will happen. In fact I often think people just say it as they have a problem with Ryanair.

old boy

aer lingus cannot survive, take jfk, how many people staff one check in point, the last time i went through it was 4, i had a pre booked wheelchair, no sign of it, i asked at the desk, i may as well ask bertie for handout info, i litherly had to crawl through security, which felt sorry for me, and left me through the short aisle, but then terminal 4 is busy they could do no more for me, a nice jog from there to the plane, in flight entertainment, a drop down moniter between a few seats, the indo at oleary prices, i am off there in 2010, not al definitely, the new security check in shannon, why cant they use it, i have used ryan air, they are not the worst, it does what it says on the tin, which aer lingus does not, happy ? new year folks.

View

Personally, I think Aer Lingus should have been flogged off in a trade sale using a (multiple round) sealed bid system. I don't see them surviving independently on a long term basis.

nice_guy80

maybe its because the government could no longer appoint their cronies to the board of Aer Lingus. its always been a nice earner for supporters of the party

Eliot Rosewater

This claim that the acquisition of AL by Ryanair would create a monopoly is a silly economic analysis, to be honest.

Firstly another poster has already pointed out the roughly 20 other airlines that operate out of Dublin. And this is still limiting the discussion to air travel. If one wants to consider international travel (which one really should) one should also include ferry services out of Ireland in ones analysis.

Fundamentally air travel is not one single market. There are different classes: standard, business etc. Within standard class you have different markets: low fairs, comfort. In effect Ryanair has a monopoly already on the low fairs airline market.

The silly assumption is this: that should Ryanair overtake AL O'Leary would merge them. Why would he do this? Wouldnt the cheaper alternative be just to buy additional aircraft to bulk up the existing Ryanair fleet?

I think the O'Leary would target the different market should he get his hands on AL. The low fairs travelers are already using his services; turning AL into the Ryanair model would be futile. Instead he would play towards the comfort traveler, who is willing to pay a little bit extra for more comfort.