Government plans to scrap the contentious 32 million annual passenger cap at Dublin Airport moved forward on Tuesday with Cabinet approval for draft laws to amend or revoke the planning restriction.
The measures advanced by Minister for Transport Darragh O’Brien come four months after the Cabinet first gave the go-ahead for the move and more than a year after such measures were promised in the programme for Government.
State airports operator DAA has breached the cap in each of the last two years after strong passenger growth, triggering Fingal County Council enforcement action and litigation that is now before the European courts.
The new legislation will take planning responsibility for DAA away from Fingal and put it under the control An Coimisiún Pleanála. It will also prevent any new cap being imposed in the future.
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On his way into the Cabinet meeting O’Brien said Dublin Airport was critical strategically for the State “and we can’t have a situation whereby there is a false inhibitor to growth in place anymore”.
DAA welcomed the move, saying the cap was “outdated” and was “artificially restricting growth” in the airport. “Standing still as our population grows and other cities and countries compete to draw flights and destinations away from Dublin would be an own goal,” DAA said.
However, Ryanair said progress was too slow and claimed the timetable set out by the Government suggested the measure would not take force for another year.
“Micheál Martin’s programme for Government, published in January 2025, promised to abolish the cap ‘as soon as possible’. A two-year delay is not ‘as soon as possible’,” Ryanair said.
The airline said Martin should scrap the cap before he visits Washington for St Patrick’s Day next month. “Micheál Martin has a 20-seat majority, he has wasted 14 months doing nothing,” said Ryanair chief executive Michael O’Leary.
