RYR at BRU (press conference)

[airazurxtror]

The purpose of an airline is to carry passengers; providing jobs or profiting to the country are only conséquences, of no direct interest to the passengers.

[sean1982]

Maybe it's indeed a stange choice of words by me, but what I mean is:
where they come from
where they go to
why the travel
how much then expect to spend during their time away
Nothing to do with what you make it sound like....

Anyway, if you really care, I invite you to continue discussing in the Dutch/French part of this forum: since you are working for Belgium's biggest airline at once of their Belgian bases, I suppose you are at least as fluent in 2 of our 3 national languages as I am in yours and we can avoid any misunderstandings then, okay?

I am completely belgian thank you very much. I speak flemish, french and a good bit of german too. Nice try to ridicule me

Wat zal het zijn? Nederlands? Francais? Oder Deutsch?

[teddybAIR]

Can I kindly ask all forum members to refrain from insulting other forum members? Half he posts contain some sort of insult or insinuation.

Have a great weekend!

[Inquirer]

I don't think transiting pax flying 'classic' airlines bring much more value to the belgian economy than FR pax... (except if that 'classic' airline pays a lot of profit taxes in Belgium)

Don't forget about all the social contributions as well as personal income taxes Belgium gets from both the employer as well as the employee, even if the end result of the company itself can not be taxed!
If an airline's core business is tranfer passengers, it's pretty much the same as a factory exporting goods abroad you know?

Since I love to check numbers (I know, it's a professional habit of mine, sorry), allow me to make a small illustration based on the most recent balance sheets of some Belgian airlines to show you how much money 'we' make from Belgian airlines offering employment here.

Brussels Airlines paid:
€37M in social contributions
€188M on salaries (of which in Belgium more than 45% is taxed away through income taxes alone)
so roughly €120M per annum is paid to the Belgian government, on DIRECT employment alone.

TUI Airlines paid:
€8M in social contributions
€43M on salaries (of which again some 45% is taxed away)
so another €27M of income for our government anually, regardless the company's year's end result.

Thomas cook paid:
€4M in social contributions
€23M on salaries (of which 45% is income tax)
so another €14M straight out.

In all, our government ends up getting more than €150M per annum on DIRECT employment alone at the 3 Belgian airlines. Definitely not peanuts, is it?
I fully agree the purpose of an airline is not to pay taxes, but a government should run it's budget like a private business does and take care of its most lucrative 'clients' first.

[sean1982]

and this whole discussion has what to do with the press conference?

[FlightMate]

Well, my point was that now, FR has to pay social security in Belgium, for their employees in Belgium. So that part is the same as belgian airlines. Except of course that they have less office staff in Belgium than belgian airlines.

But having aircraft based in Belgium, their participation to the Belgium economy by having employees in Belgium will weight more than other european airlines flying to BRU.

Now I still say the economic footprint of FR in Belgium is limited. And indeed, if they receive some sort of state aid, the only benefit apart from creating 1000-6500 jobs as some claim, is helping belgian citizen to fly abroad cheaply.
But now, belgian airline will benefit from a disguised state aid as well. So they will bring less return to the belgian economy than previously.
150 million - 100 million= 50 million. Still a nice profit for the government. Would be curious to see the actual numbers for FR. any possibily to see the report from the national bank?

[DannyVDB]

Hi all,

A totally different question: these flights seem to focus on bringing Belgians to holiday destinations in the south. Is FR doing efforts to bring more foreigners to Belgium as well? I think not many inhabitants from Ibiza will come to Belgium, but people from big cities like Lisbon, Rome, Valencia, ... is another story.

Any numbers on that, also for Charleroi?

Cheers
Danny

[SN1203]

All the off airport jobs which they like to refer to based on passenger numbers are very questionable to start with, as they depend far more on the kind of passengers, than on their numbers really.

The Belgian National Bank did an analysis of the wider economic impact of Ryanair on the Belgian economy and found it to be disappointly low and definitely much lower than what they estimate it to be themselves, exactly due to the nature of their passengers.

I'd take an independently conducted economic impact study by the National Bank over just a general rule taken from a report by an industry lobbying agency, but to each his own beliefs of course.

Very well said, tolipanebas.

@sean1982: get off your high horse please. When tolipanebas refers to the 'kind of passengers', he doesn't imply a negative connotation but refers to the passenger profile. As usual you don't get to the content but you feel offended like a little kid... I've already told you once you should develop some critical sense. It is clear that the wider economic impact of 4 Ryanair aircraft based at BRU will be lower compared to 4 Brussels Airlines aircraft at BRU. It really doesn't require a master degree in Economics to figure this out... So yes, that part of the press conference should be taken by a (big) grain of salt.

For me, the past two Ryanair conferences can easily be summarized in a) a cry for media attention (which is their full right) and b) a cry for money/subsidies to finance their future growth in Belgium (which is their full right as well, as it is simply what their business model is built upon).

[crew1990]

And yes indeed an SN aircarft will need more people than a Ryanair one.

Catering, every morning the catering will put some trolleys in the Ryanair Aircraft, and thant this catering load will stay the all day in the aircraft, this is a clever way to save the cost.

On a Brussels Airlines aircraft the catering will have to come on each rotation to put some new trolleys. The catering will be more complex as well as on one aircraft there is 3 different type of service, B.Light, B.Flex and B.Business.

For the cleaning of the aircraft, SN clean the aircraft after each flight while Ryanair do it once a day after the last landing, and the crew do a light cleaning between each strech.

For the crew, Ryanair crew doesnt have layover on normal operation while SN does.

Finally SN operate flight 24 hour a day because of the long haul flight, Tel Aviv and the charter flight.

So for one aircraft, SN will employ much more people than Ryanair, wich is normal as this is to model completly different.

[Flanker2]

Hi all,

A totally different question: these flights seem to focus on bringing Belgians to holiday destinations in the south. Is FR doing efforts to bring more foreigners to Belgium as well? I think not many inhabitants from Ibiza will come to Belgium, but people from big cities like Lisbon, Rome, Valencia, ... is another story.

Any numbers on that, also for Charleroi?

Cheers
Danny

If you go to CRL, you see as many people from outside Belgium as from within.
I often talk to co-passengers, among them businessmen from all around Europe coming to BRU for events/conventions, students who study in Belgium, etc... You also often see school groups, sports groups, etc...
Tourism isn't Belgium's strength, there is nothing to visit... so you can't blame anyone if people don't come for that nor can you blame that Belgians will go abroad to spend their money. Belgium attracts people through events, business.

To say that Ryanair exports more wealth than it imports is really something that only god can quantify.


I also doubt that as many jobs as FR claims are created.

[sdbelgium]

When those aircraft are coming to BRU? And when are them starting their operation?

They will be flown in from STN on the 25th, should all arrive in BRU between 11.00 and noon local time.