Dublin Airport's T2 second terminal under construction

Ryanair said last week it confirmed that that it would invest over £8m to build a new (second) hangar facility at Glasgow Prestwick Airport, which will see over 200 new engineering and support jobs created at Prestwick, which will now undertake a larger amount of the maintenance of Ryanair’s fleet of 220 Boeing aircraft. The airline on Sunday released copies of its letter to/from Tánaiste Mary Coughlan confirming that Ryanair had offered to create up to 500 maintenance jobs in the former SRT hangar at Dublin Airport, if the Government would agree to procure that the  Dublin Airport Authority (DAA) sell or lease the SRT hangar for the same (arms length) price that the DAA had purchased it from SR Technics, the Swiss company which closed its maintenance operation there last year. However, the DAA  said on Sunday that two companies will employ 250 people in aircraft maintenance at Dublin Airport.

Apparently, Ryanair refused to deal with the DAA and it said on Sunday that the correspondence with Coughlan makes clear, "neither the Tánaiste nor the Government were willing to upset the DAA monopoly, even if it would mean a multi-million euro investment by the world’s largest international airline in Dublin Airport and the creation of up to 500 well paid maintenance jobs to replace the 800 jobs lost recently through the closure of SR Technics. Instead the DAA has recently leased the SRT hangar to Aer Lingus for its line maintenance operation, which has created no new jobs whatsoever (in fact Aer Lingus are presently cutting jobs at Dublin)."

Ryanair’s Michael O’Leary said:“It’s sad that neither the Tánaiste nor the Transport Minister are willing to stand up to the DAA monopoly, even if this results in the loss of 500 well paid engineering jobs at Dublin Airport. Last week the first 200 of these jobs were won by Scotland and Glasgow Prestwick Airport and Ryanair expects to announce a 2nd maintenance facility at another EU airport later this year, which will account for the remainder of these jobs.

“The former engineering workers in SR Technics must wonder why it is that the Tánaiste and the Minister for Transport would prefer to see the DAA monopoly lease the SRT hangar for line maintenance to Aer Lingus, who have created no new jobs at the facility, rather than sell it to Ryanair – at an arms-length price – which would have seen up to 500 well paid engineering jobs created in Dublin.

“This correspondence shows that while the Government was inviting the ‘Diaspora’ to a three day photo-shoot (i.e. “economic forum”) in Farmleigh House last September to discuss ideas for creating jobs and economic growth, the Tánaiste and Minister for Transport were doing nothing to win an offer for 500 jobs here in Dublin from the world’s largest international airline. Sadly protecting the DAA monopoly is more important to this Government than creating or securing 500 jobs”.

Mary Coughlan commented on Sunday: "Over a protracted period last year every effort was made by me in consultation with IDA Ireland, to advance the outline proposal for securing the Ryanair investment for Dublin Airport, including direct engagement by IDA Ireland, at my request.

Despite the best efforts of IDA, as acknowledged by Mr. O' Leary of Ryanair, it was not possible to overcome obstacles in relation to access to specific hangar space at the airport.

I, my Department and enterprise agencies remain available to assist in whatever way we can to maximise investment by Ryanair at Dublin Airport and would ask Mr O' Leary to continue his dialogue with us."