US-Europe air service plans “fall short” – BA boss
US plans to lift long-term restrictions on transatlantic air services make “no progress” towards full open skies with Europe, according to British Airways boss Rod Eddington. The UK carrier’s chief executive warned that two recent rounds of negotiations with the Euroepan Commission had led to a US proposal which “falls far short of Europe’s objective of achieving a truly liberal open aviation area”. He accused US negotiators of coming up with an “essentially unbalanced” plan which would allow US carriers unlimited rights to pick up passengers in one country in Europe and fly them to another while providing no access to the US domestic market for European airlines. Mr Eddington, speaking at the Aviation Club in Brussels, called for European airlines to be allowed fly internally within the US and for the removal of restrictions preventing foreign ownership of US carriers. And he stressed that it would be “naïve” to sign up to a staged agreement that met US objectives but with only a promise to return to Europe’s needs at a later date. He urged the European Commission to keep pressing its case with US authorities but conceded that there may be little movement during an election year in America. Mr Eddington said more headway may be possible in the early term of a new administration in Washington when the US economic recovery was more firmly established. Efforts to liberalise transatlantic air services have foundered for years. The last accord called Bermuda II was a UK-US bilateral agreement signed in 1977 restricting BA and Virgin Altantic and two US carriers – American Airlines and United – to fly non-stop transatlantic routes from Heathrow. Report by Phil Davies
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