Ryanair filed a formal appeal against the projectAena, manager of Spanish airportsto increase the airport charges of 4.1% in 2024despite the Madrid government’s promise to freeze them for five years following the Covid pandemic.
“Ryanair is calling on Spain’s Council of Ministers and the Spanish regulator (CNMC) to protect passenger growth by ensuring Aena continues to respect the decision taken by the Spanish government in 2021 to freeze airport charges until 2027 This is a brazen attempt to ignore the law, which aims to increase Spain’s competitiveness through a charge freeze“said the Irish low cost in a press release.
And to recall in passing that the resumption of air transport in Spain – and that of Ryanair – would be threatened: “the Spanish growth of Ryanair was in direct response to the freezing of airport charges at Aena, bringing growth of 12% in Spain this summer alone, operating 40 million seats on 740 routes. Aena’s attempts to increase charges put this capacity at risk, harming direct and indirect jobs in the Spanish tourism sector, on which the Spanish economy depends heavily.
Spain is one of the main countries to have benefited from the resumption of post-Covid travel and now has more air capacity than in 2019. Traffic which largely benefits Aena, manager of 46 airports in Spain: the semi- Spanish public made 607 million euros in net profits in the first six months of 2023.
