20 November 2008

Ryanair threatens to shut Canary islandÃ¢â¬â¢s routes

Nine Ryanair routes to Fuerteventura have been threatened with closure in a dispute over funding.

The budget airline warned that it will close all of its routes from the Canary island from January 31 unless local tourism group AIE honours a "commercial agreement" to promote Fuerteventura as a tourist destination.

The airline blamed a breach of the agreement for the cancellation of a flight from Dublin earlier this month.

Ryanair now says it will withdraw services to Fuerteventura from Birmingham, Bremen, Dublin, Dusseldorf (Weeze), East Midlands, Frankfurt, Liverpool, London and Shannon if agreement is not reached on the alleged contract breaches before December 6.

The airline has started legal action against AIE and its individual members for breach of agreement.

It claims that annual passenger numbers to the island have risen from 2,000 in 2006 when it started flying to Fuerteventura to more than 250,000.

The carrierÃ¢â¬â¢s deputy chief executive Michael Cawley said: Ã¢â¬ÅâœAt a time when Spanish tourism numbers are falling, RyanairÃ¢â¬â¢s numbers continue to grow.

Ã¢â¬ÅâœHowever, the AIE continues to threaten the livelihoods of the local tourism industry by blatantly reneging on its contractual commitments.

Ã¢â¬ÅâœRyanair has served 30 daysÃ¢â¬â¢ notice to the AIE to comply with its contractual agreements.

Ã¢â¬ÅâœIf it refuses to do so then we will have no choice sadly but to end all Ryanair flights to Fuerteventura from 31 January.Ã¢â¬~

by Phil Davies