Aviation industry demands end to air passenger duty - Greenpeace response

Responding to demands by figures in the aviation industry to scrap air passenger duty, Graham Thompson of Greenpeace said:

"It's a bit rich for Mr O'Leary, the man who wants you to spend a pound every time you spend a penny (1), to complain about extra charges on top of the ticket price that ensure we all pay for our pollution. The real story here is that many passengers are switching to more convenient, comfortable and climate-friendly rail routes, leading to trains increasing their market share of intercity travel by over a third in the last five years (2). That, in combination with the UK aviation market being massively over-supplied (3), is the real reason for this drop in demand."

(1) www.dailymail.co.uk/travel/article-1263905/Ryanair-toilet-charges-phased-in.html

(2) According to the Civil Aviation Authority, UK airports handled 48.7 million passengers in 2007, but that number fell to 38 million last year - a fall of 22%. Rail appears to have been a major beneficiary and competitor. The Association of Train Operating Companies said intercity rail journeys had risen by 19% since 2007, while on the top 10 domestic air routes, including London to Manchester, Edinburgh and Glasgow, rail's market share versus airlines has risen from 32% to 44% since 2007. "In what is a highly competitive market, better services and more cheap tickets are encouraging more and more people to choose rail to travel between the UK's main cities," said ATOC.

(3) Jim French, chairman and chief executive of Flybe added that, according to the Civil Aviation Authority, domestic air travel had fallen 20% over the past four years, as an over-supplied market bottomed out. "It is a combination of the economic and business cutbacks over the period, but I truthfully think that the market was over-supplied five to 10 years ago," said French, pointing to a subsequent scaling down of domestic routes by Ryanair and easyJet, as well as the sale of British Airways' domestic operations to Flybe in 2006.