Ryanair has described Government plans to introduce regulations on the availability and advertising of air tickets as "nonsensical" and said attention should be paid instead to the high prices charged for daily parking at Dublin Airport.
The airline said Aer Rianta was "fleecing the consumer" by increasing the daily car-parking rate from £7 to £12, a rise of over 70 per cent. It said the Minister of State for Consumer Affairs, Mr Kitt, should focus his attention on that instead.
In addition the airline said Aer Rianta was currently trying to eliminate competition from Gannon Homes which was trying to build a competing private car-park at the airport. He said it was trying to do this by seeking a judicial review of planning permission obtained by Gannon Homes.
A spokesman for Aer Rianta last night dismissed the claims and said daily car-parking charges had increased by 15 per cent, not 70 per cent and were cheaper than most car-parks in the city centre.
He said Aer Rianta was against the Gannon Homes plan because it infringed the "red zone" around the airport runway, and consequently there was a safety issue. He said the company was in favour of more car-parks.
The chief executive of Ryanair, Mr Michael O'Leary, said: "Perhaps the consumer minister might now focus his attention on the one area where consumers of air travel are truly being fleeced and then talk to Minister O'Rourke about introducing some competition at the Dublin Airport monopoly".
A spokesman for Mr Kitt said Mr O'Leary was confusing two issues, one about car-parking and another about transparency when consumers were buying tickets. He said an example which had come to Mr Kitt's attention was a ticket advertised for £4; when other charges were added it came to £33.60. "The consumer has a right to know what he or she is going to have to pay for a ticket and this is what these regulations will be about," he said.
Mr Kitt announced on Wednesday that in conjunction with the Director of Consumer Affairs, Ms Carmel Foley, he would be introducing regulations to ensure pricing of tickets was transparent. He said the availability of certain low-cost tickets would also have to be made clear by all airlines.
Mr O'Leary responded: "Perhaps Minister Kitt has forgotten that most consumers can and do ask their travel agent to compare the prices on two different airlines, or many can now check them on the Internet". Mr Kitt's spokesman said, however, that even on the Internet the real price was not always clear.