Aer Lingus signals Belfast could act as a model for future

AER LINGUS has stressed its commitment to its new hub at Belfast International Airport despite the airline’s current review of operations and costs.

Corporate affairs director Enda Corneille said the Belfast base, which has taken its 500,000th booking three months earlier than projected, “should be seen as a model, not as a target” for the review, details of which are expected before the end of the month.

The new short-haul services from Belfast to Heathrow and to seven other destinations across continental Europe and the Canary Islands were performing well, he said.

Three other destinations are to be added next winter.

“We’ve more or less held our load factor,” Mr Corneille told The Irish Times.

“Belfast isn’t dragging down the load factor in short-haul, it’s actually keeping up. In July and August, we’ve seen load factors from all of our routes out of Belfast in the mid 70s, with Heathrow performing particularly strongly.”

He claimed business was being taken from rival BMI on the route.

The operation was cost-effective with an average passenger-per-seat-cost of close to €60. This figure was in line with that achieved by easyJet, Belfast International’s largest customer.

The Belfast base was delivering volumes, he said, and the business model operated at the airport was one which he would like to see replicated elsewhere, particularly in the Republic.

“Aer Lingus has been around for a number of years and we have a number of legacy issues that other carriers don’t have.

“Belfast, for us, was an opportunity – a green field – to put in place the right organisation of the right size with the right terms and conditions that were appropriate to the market and the current environment. Not only is it a model that we could export, we could also import it as well.”

That model was still appropriate, he said, despite the significant changes in trading conditions since the Belfast base was established.

“We have 100 staff, productivity levels are very good. The market is still growing.

“We are stimulating it by price and by advertising – maybe a bit more than we expected. But the important point is that we are delivering the volumes and that’s not our numbers, that’s the Civil Aviation Authority’s statistics.”

Asked if there was any suggestion of cold feet following the move to Belfast and the controversial transfer of the Heathrow service from Shannon, Mr Corneille said, “Absolutely not. Month on month, we get even more encouraged that it was right thing to do.”