BRU reacts on the subsidising of regional airports

[Squelsh]

(..) Brussels Airport in een reactie op uitspraken van Waals minister André Antoine (CDH) afgelopen weekend in de krant L'Echo.

BRU in the attack?

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How about BRU in defence?
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First of all, the article posted mentions regional policies and political figures. Don't be surprised if -just maybe- somebody will mention politics in their reply trying to answer the question you shoot. Don't complain that suddenly political stuff is being discussed.
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Talking about politics is talking about BIG money nowadays. billions here, billions there.. Moneyflows here, moneyflows there..
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Regions need money for their policies. I guess we're in luck that there is one region that can present it's numbers in thick black ink.. (positive political news!) Guess what.. Now pay up for the red numbers of the others and their policies (the same policy in casu leeching traffic away by waving coupons paid by the same victim region, the best pupil of the class)
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This whole situation is so Belgian that it makes you.. not want to read it anymore....?
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Go back to sleep here I guess

[Acid-drop]

you are unbelievable
We should put you in a museum.

[sn26567]

Last Warning !

Stop politics in this thread, else I start deleting posts !!!

Back to the topic please !

Moderator, with all respect : it's hard to discuss about a political interference in aviation without talking about politics. A distinction indeed has to be made between politics and party politics.

I agree that this thread is about politics, but it should be possible to talk politics without hurting the feelings of a large group of citizens. The main word here should be respect and understanding.

I hope everybody will agree.

[Acid-drop]

next to the non-county of belgium, you'll find the non-region of Flanders and Wallonia, a nice mix a people without a common history and probably without a common future

[Squelsh]

Okay okay, guess you got a point that what divides us will make us stronger. We share alot of stuff -literally- and really at the end of the day a real Belgian -whether it be Flemmish or Walloon- only has the best in mind for all involved.
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My POV, on this public forum -> it is not smart of this minister to throw this offer out in the open in these politically, financially difficult days where cut-costs are in the loop. It is, as mentioned by some LZ-user in the original thread, a purely political game from his end. The debates/discussions were already there, the fire is now being heated with xtra oxidizer, hence the press release from BATC.

[jan_olieslagers]

you are unbelievable
We should put you in a museum.

A nice addition of verified relevant data...?

[Flanker]

I suggest you guys just go to the AF website, and book a flight to CDG with a connecting flight from ORY. I am just curious if you find this a good idea, and if it works well. Would it draw a lot of customers you think? I think I know the answer to that. So the only way for SN to profit from the subsadies of CRL is to move all business there over night. Very realistic right? And then the airport will be promoted from regional to national, and all subsidies will be gone anyway... So where is the win-win?

It's indeed impossible to split the SN hub in 2. It's more realistic to move everything to CRL but in the current context, it's impossible.

I've heard this regional/national airport speech more than once in the last few weeks.
Both CRL and BRU have a vast majority of non-federal share ownership. Can one really claim that BRU is a national airport or is it just a title that is used as an excuse to milk money from airlines like SN?
ATC fees? If they are anywhere close to make a difference on operational costs, then they are paying too much. I don't think so, it's probably another excuse.

Now the attack on CRL:
CRL love to claim that they are heroes by creating jobs in a less favored region. In reality, the people who work there are receiving a miserable salary for hard work with responsibilities (imagine what it is like working for Ryanair), you can hardly call it a positive contribution to the social environment.
Ryanair is like the McDonald's of airlines and though CRL like to be proud of their new terminal, it has much in common with building a McDonald's the size of the Empire State Building.

Pilots and cabin crew? If you consider that Ryanair is taking away pax from SN, then they aren't creating any pilot jobs, they are stealing them. CRL also receives many flights from Ryanair aircraft that aren't based in CRL.

If really Wallonia wants to create valuable jobs, they need to consider other, more lucrative and better ways to invest money.
For instance, create a world class hospital complex (the biggest in Europe, to the image of the Texas Medical Center in Houston) where you assemble the cutting edge of the medical technology in all disciplines, with doctors from everywhere. It creates many many high paid jobs and stimulates young people to head into an industry with a real future.
It stimulates tax revenue, allows to tap into social security revenue from other EU countries and can even attract non-EU patients with fat wallets and a health problem.

That's better than to stimulate young people to go for "flipping burgers" for Ryanair at CRL.

Ryanair is a big win for the Belgian consumer. I understand the unwillingness of the politicians to do anything about it and frankly, Ireland can use the tax revenue too.
If we want to be angry at someone about the money, it should be towards the Belgian politicians who are collecting criminal amounts of taxes from us, without offering much in return.

Is it the Belgian airlines' fault that a big part of the salary goes to the Belgian fiscal system? No.
Do employees understand this? Yes and they tend to be reasonable on the demands.
Do airlines appreciate this understanding? It doesn't seem so.

[regi]

Hold on, Flanker. Despite my dislike of Ryanair, I won't call them the McDonnald's of aviation. I do have numbers about salaries and working conditions at hamburger outlets. I do not have them about Ryanair staff. Sean has informed us already that salary at Ryanair is above average in European aviation ( Sean: please correct me if I misunderstood )

But this is is not about Ryanair. I would not call their staff McDonnald's clones. But what concerns all the people in and around CRL, this is another matter. Let us take legislation. The FOREM cannot force an unemployed person to accept a job at Ryanair. But they can oblige somebody to go work at the airport working in a 7/7 days schedule, low wage. Staying at an airport hotel, I was surprised about the working conditions of hotel staff.
Speaking to people at Courcelles, I could give their 2 teenage kids a summer job ( at the Flemish coast ) where they earn 300 € more than their parents !

Through my weekly contacts with inhabitants of Courcelles , I can say that they consider working at CRL as a last resort, to stay out of trouble with FOREM. Or for youngsters as their first job.
I had a quick scan on the website of FOREM. And guess what: Caterpillar, the largest employer, uses in its first words for a position : Société de droit belge ( company according Belgian legislation !)
Sorry guys, but this sounds so strange to me that an employer states immediately that the contract will be according Belgian law. This is a undisputable proof that there is a large workforce out there that does not want to work under foreign legislation.

[Acid-drop]

there is just one flaw is your nice design : people are not educated. they dont have qualifications. so "bad" jobs is what is actually needed.
wallonia has plenty high tech busineses, that's not the prob. you need more low class jobs. there is no harbours or car factories.
also,dont forget there are more ground jobs than ryanair jobs

[airazurxtror]

Ryanair is like the McDonald's of airlines and though CRL like to be proud of their new terminal, it has much in common with building a McDonald's the size of the Empire State Building.

If you consider that Ryanair is taking away pax from SN, then they aren't creating any pilot jobs, they are stealing them. CRL also receives many flights from Ryanair aircraft that aren't based in CRL.

You are not serious, I presume ?
Just a few remarks :
- what is wrong with McDonald ? It's better for Ryanair and CRL to make profits like McDo rather than like SN, me thinks.
- a good part of Ryanair passengers would rather stay home than buying a ticket at SN prices. Thus, Ryanair does not take so many pax away from SN (and even if it did, what with it ? SN has no sacred right to take all the belgian traffic).
- CRL get a lot of flights by aircraft based elsewhere, yes - a lot of flights to BRU are also flown by foreign aircraft based far away, no ?

[regi]

there is just one flaw is your nice design : people are not educated. they dont have qualifications. so "bad" jobs is what is actually needed.
wallonia has plenty high tech busineses, that's not the prob. you need more low class jobs.

I do recall some remarks about the quality of young people in Brussels - to see how far they comply to the job requirements at Brussels airport. And the results were staggering poor.
There is however quite some difference with young people in Wallonie where the figures of education are better. Except 1 item: knowledge of Dutch. The reason is that French is obligatory second language in Flemish primary schools. But in Wallonie they promote English. So an entire generation grows up with rather good English skills , but unable to converse with a Dutch speaking customer at Brussels airport - and certainly not at CRL.
By experience, I am very happy with the level of engineering skills of Walloon employees. The métallurgical division of Liège university has a good reputation. It has been the breeding school for many Cockerill Sambre managers. ( which is now in turmoil by closing down the hot section of Arcelor Mittal )
Guess who studied métallurgy in Wallonie - as a Flemish, in French language

[Flanker]

there is just one flaw is your nice design : people are not educated. they dont have qualifications. so "bad" jobs is what is actually needed.
wallonia has plenty high tech busineses, that's not the prob. you need more low class jobs.
also,dont forget there are more ground jobs than ryanair jobs

With that mentality you won't get far.

How much has Wallonia invested in CRL and Ryanair already? A few hundred millions? A billion?
How many local jobs does the airport in CRL support? 2000?
Hundreds of millions if not billions for 2000 jobs is a bit expensive for "bad jobs" don't you think?

You have to look towards the future.
Are they going to invest 300 million for a station under the airport or should they be smarter with the money and build something that creates new good jobs.

In my example, a mega-hospital. So you can breed a new generation of cutting-edge medical staff who will have good salaries and pay good taxes and be proud to save lives or make lives better.
Not another half billion to hire luggage loading "slaves" who survive from paycheck to paycheck.

The youth see what's happening around them. They are inspired by what they see and try to adapt to the possibilities available to them.
If the best thing they see is an airport, they won't go to university, they'll try to become luggage loaders, check-in staff or cabin crew.
If the best thing they see is a mega-hospital, they want to go to medical university and become a surgeon.

- CRL get a lot of flights by aircraft based elsewhere, yes - a lot of flights to BRU are also flown by foreign aircraft based far away, no ?

No. The argument is whether Ryanair creates many new Belgian jobs, not where aircraft flying to/from Belgium are based. Totally off-context and frankly you lose credibility with this kind of posts.

- what is wrong with McDonald ? It's better for Ryanair and CRL to make profits like McDo rather than like SN, me thinks.

By your reasoning, Wallonia should become a gigantic McDonald's and nothing else. I think that Wallonia deserves much better than that and should invest accordingly.

- a good part of Ryanair passengers would rather stay home than buying a ticket at SN prices. Thus, Ryanair does not take so many pax away from SN (and even if it did, what with it ? SN has no sacred right to take all the belgian traffic).

You are right, and I always say that it's very good to have Ryanair for the consumers.
I personally choose FR over SN for my personal travel, I admit it.
I think that the competition is not fair and I don't say that it's only CRL/Wallonia's fault, I also think that BRU is too expensive.
But I don't care if competition is unfair because by subsidising my tickets, Wallonia is giving me part of my hard earned taxes back, which I find excellent.

But I think that Wallonia is making the wrong investments for its own future.

What future is there with Ryanair? There are only so many destinations you can serve profitably from CRL/Belgium and Ryanair is closing on saturation. Is Wallonia going to invest another half a billion euro to create only a few more bad hamburger jobs? Is that the intelligent choice to make?

Hold on, Flanker. Despite my dislike of Ryanair, I won't call them the McDonnald's of aviation. I do have numbers about salaries and working conditions at hamburger outlets. I do not have them about Ryanair staff. Sean has informed us already that salary at Ryanair is above average in European aviation ( Sean: please correct me if I misunderstood )

Only a few people at CRL are directly employed by Ryanair and those are crews. The East European cabin crews are paid peanuts, the West European cabin crews and flight deck of whom a considerable portion are by the way non-Belgian residents/nationals are paid ok to good salaries.
What I mean by hamburger jobs is all the other jobs at and around the airport, mainly handling jobs or jobs in horeca and logistics and you give perfect examples of what I mean.
What I mean is that CRL and Wallonia brag that they create many jobs but in reality they create
-1% good jobs, of which half of that is stolen from BRU with regional money and they pay taxes in Ireland,
-99% low wage, hard working bad jobs who pay taxes in Belgium.



I guess that the main point I want to make is that Wallonian politicians are making the wrong decisions for their people. They want to show off to the Flemish by showing how well they can run an airport but in reality it's a stupid idea to invest so much money for so few and low quality jobs. The investments that have been made are already past us, but for the future I think that Wallonian politicians have to stop showing off and start thinking in the interest of their people and most importantly they need to inspire the youth.
Offering low quality jobs isn't the way to do it!

For the record, in case you should doubt my objectivity, I think that I've made it clear that I'm not a big fan of how SN is being run and that its managers only have themselves to blame for its big losses.

[Squelsh]

ATC fees? If they are anywhere close to make a difference on operational costs, then they are paying too much.

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But still not enough.. Minus 20 million euros for this year alone in the books of Belgocontrol. The CEO, Mister Tintin, apointed to himself a royal bonus of 50000 EU this year -on top his fees- because of his succesful management. Someone has to cough up the green in these kind of things.

[Acid-drop]

Flanker, I think you completely miss the point and it's gonna be very difficult for me to explain you why. It's a problem of life experience. You are probably a healthy person, with a healthy job and you are probably surounded by other healthy people like you (nothing negative about that, i'm in the same situation). But You don't even imagine how life is in some poor place in Charleroi. Go have a walk there, you will understand.

How much has Wallonia invested in CRL and Ryanair already? A few hundred millions? A billion?
How many local jobs does the airport in CRL support? 2000?
Hundreds of millions if not billions for 2000 jobs is a bit expensive for "bad jobs" don't you think?

Yes and no. This is long term.
And putting someone out of the vicious circle of unemployement and depression has no price.
old pdf (2006) but still interesting : http://www.sowaer.be/pdf/download/01000 ... sowaer.pdf
or a 2009 : http://www.sowaer.be/img/imagemanager/d ... sowaer.pdf

Are they going to invest 300 million for a station under the airport or should they be smarter with the money and build something that creates new good jobs.

You know that this train station could increase a lot the attractivity of the airport, so it will create jobs.

In my example, a mega-hospital. So you can breed a new generation of cutting-edge medical staff who will have good salaries and pay good taxes and be proud to save lives or make lives better.
Not another half billion to hire luggage loading "slaves" who survive from paycheck to paycheck.

The youth see what's happening around them. They are inspired by what they see and try to adapt to the possibilities available to them.
If the best thing they see is an airport, they won't go to university, they'll try to become luggage loaders, check-in staff or cabin crew.
If the best thing they see is a mega-hospital, they want to go to medical university and become a surgeon.

This is the part you don't understand. Some of these people have issues. They are uneducated, they have barely no qualifitations, maybe they left school when they were 16. What do you want to do with those ? Trying to convince them to become a surgeon ?
Anybody who has a job will have my respect, even a mcdonald kind of job. At least he's living on his own and not on the system money. If only we were able to give a job to all, even low class jobs like turning screws all day at ford genk, this would be a much better country !

But I think that Wallonia is making the wrong investments for its own future.

That is probably the most sensible phrase : wallonia is indeed not investing properly : they should invest in education. But the situation is at it is, you need to feed those people and givin them unemployement money is not the solution. Waking up in the morning and working for something will make those people better.

And please, once and for all, stop talking about ryanair jobs, this represent a very small % of all the jobs created in CRL. You can fly a plane with 4 staff on board, but how many do you need on the ground ?

in reality it's a stupid idea to invest so much money for so few and low quality jobs.

so few ? 10.000 in Liège only ... That's 20x more than cockerill/Arcelor/Mittal !
And an estimation of 5.500 in Charleroi on current result.
(for comparison, BRU is 40.000 jobs)

[Flanker]

Flanker, I think you completely miss the point and it's gonna be very difficult for me to explain you why. It's a problem of life experience. You are probably a healthy person, with a healthy job and you are probably surounded by other healthy people like you (nothing negative about that, i'm in the same situation). But You don't even imagine how life is in some poor place in Charleroi. Go have a walk there, you will understand.

Mmmm, or maybe I know what it's like and I want a better future for my children/grand children.

This is the part you don't understand. Some of these people have issues. They are uneducated, they have barely no qualifitations, maybe they left school when they were 16. What do you want to do with those ? Trying to convince them to become a surgeon ?
Anybody who has a job will have my respect, even a mcdonald kind of job. At least he's living on his own and not on the system money. If only we were able to give a job to all, even low class jobs like turning screws all day at ford genk, this would be a much better country !

A mega-hospital is a city of its own that also requires lower quality jobs such as security, logistics, horeca, catering, care, taxi drivers, etc... However, the ratio of investment to job quality and investment to job counts is not comparable to investing in a low-cost airport.
With 3 billion euro, you can remove the dirty steel factories in Charleroi city and turn them into a mega hospital complex, creating not 2000 or 6000 jobs, but 150.000 jobs. You make the city look much nicer and you create an economy of its own. You can develop the traffic at the airport further in parallel by attracting people who come in for treatment, be it on a Ryanair flight if they are fit to travel, otherwise on private medical flights.

I tell you, the investments in CRL were good, but from now on, extra investments will not deliver marked results. It's time to invest in something else, something that Wallonia will really be able to brag about and put Belgium on the map.

You think that it's a stupid idea I guess.
I ask of you to reconsider. Here's an article with nice pics of the "clinic effect" in Cleveland where VIP's visit the Cleveland Clinic where they have a cutting edge specialty for cardiac treatments. It explains why in a sad airport like Cleveland, U.S., you can see the most uncommon private B747's land and take-off all the time.
http://www.opshots.net/2011/05/the-clin ... shots-net/

I have personally visited these hospitals and I have yet to find anything that looks remotely close to it in Europe. The Cleveland Clinic alone is much larger than CRL, and has revenues of almost 10 billion dollars, almost twice as much as the entire Ryanair group. As opposed to aviation where fuel dominates the bills, medical care is a manpower-intensive sector where most expenses are human labor, hence create much more end jobs than aviation investments.



http://www.hfmmagazine.com/hfmmagazine/ ... ntroom.jpg

[Acid-drop]

i do like the idea. not too far from that one btw :
http://www.meuse-rhine-journal.com/html ... 11638.html

[airazurxtror]

frankly you lose credibility with this kind of posts.

Of course, I realize that I can never hope to have your credibility on this forum.
Frankly, who do you take yourself for ?

[sean1982]

Flanker, you are way out of line:

If the best thing they see is an airport, they won't go to university, they'll try to become luggage loaders, check-in staff or cabin crew.

Can I ask you what is wrong with these jobs? Are the too "low" for you? Have you actually ever been in Charleroi or surrounding areas? Walked the streets there? Let's go and find people ther who are capable, due to social constraints, associated education costs, etc ..., to be "top surgeons" from your example (who you obviously view as "better people" then baggage loaders, check in staff or cabin crew!! Maybe you need to think about that the next time your suit case does not arrive on the same destination as you, or the cabin crew need to save your ass because you get a heart attck on board or your plane goes on fire!!

Let's take the following statement form a european commision report about hainaut:

Physical investments trough community programmes were limited: most measures of objective 1 programme were implemented via granting of aids. However, it can be expected that some direct public investments will show their results later. For example, a number of companies have settled near the Charleroi airport. Public investments in the accessibility of the airport, and the creation of skills centres nearby have attracted some laboratories of the university, some multi-media and high-tech businesses, and have influenced positively investment plans of air-carrier Ryan-air.

Seems like european commisioners don't agree with your theory about low educated jobs? Which credibility were you talking about?

Only a few people at CRL are directly employed by Ryanair and those are crews. The East European cabin crews are paid peanuts, the West European cabin crews and flight deck of whom a considerable portion are by the way non-Belgian residents/nationals are paid ok to good salaries.

again, your source please? My east-european colleagues are paid exactly the same as myself, depending on their position and seniority in the company. No difference is made. Salaries are good, approaching double of JU cabin crew in Belgian airlines. I'm not going to bput my salary on a public forum, but, taking into account I have 9 years seniority and hold an instructor position, I earn twice as much as my mother, AFTER tax who is approaching 50, and has also worked all her life. Not as a top surgeon though which maybe dissapointing to you. Yes we pay taxes in Ireland, completley according to the law regarding european transport workers. Shall we start talking about belgium's national sport of tax evading? The real problem is this country's ridiculously high tax burden, which has just increased even more. Ask any belgian person if they had to chance and they could pay their taxes in another country at a much lower tax rate, if they would do it? How many would refuse?

In short I think your comments are short sighted, unfounded and belittleling to a large part of the belgian population, especially the aviation part as well. Maybe you should think twice about making such statements on a public forum about people who work very hard every day to make sure people like you have a nice and enjoyable flight time and time again

[Flanker]

Let's take the following statement form a european commision report about hainaut:
Physical investments trough community programmes were limited: most measures of objective 1 programme were implemented via granting of aids. However, it can be expected that some direct public investments will show their results later. For example, a number of companies have settled near the Charleroi airport. Public investments in the accessibility of the airport, and the creation of skills centres nearby have attracted some laboratories of the university, some multi-media and high-tech businesses, and have influenced positively investment plans of air-carrier Ryan-air.


Seems like european commisioners don't agree with your theory about low educated jobs? Which credibility were you talking about?

I have to ask myself what you mean. I think that you don't understand the subject of the debate because the above article is a perfect example of what I say Wallonia has to invest more into. They created skills centres with high tech labs and a campus of ULB, which stimulate local job creation in high tech sectors which offer "good jobs".
It's also additional revenue for Ryanair and the same and even much more can be achieved with a mega medical center complex in that area.
You aren't exactly contradicting me here, you're helping me build my case

Can I ask you what is wrong with these jobs? Are the too "low" for you? Have you actually ever been in Charleroi or surrounding areas? Walked the streets there? Let's go and find people ther who are capable, due to social constraints, associated education costs, etc ..., to be "top surgeons" from your example (who you obviously view as "better people" then baggage loaders, check in staff or cabin crew!! Maybe you need to think about that the next time your suit case does not arrive on the same destination as you, or the cabin crew need to save your ass because you get a heart attck on board or your plane goes on fire!!

Belgium is one of few countries in the world where people are lucky enough to be offered advanced education almost for free. This is a country where households get helped in a way that you can dream of in other countries. Low income families can count on the assistance of many social programs.
Social constraints and poverty exist but they are by no means an excuse for someone to not go to school to get more education. It all boils down to individual choices and I don't see why the youth in and around Charleroi can't become top medical staff if they are offered all the possibilities.
The problem however, is that they aren't offered the inspiration to pursue such careers and though I believe that the new hospital in Charleroi will inspire many of them (only 130 million euro's for quite a hospital), it takes much more for a kid to say: "wow, I hope that one day I will work here".

Can I ask you what is wrong with these jobs? Are the too "low" for you? Have you actually ever been in Charleroi or surrounding areas? Walked the streets there? Let's go and find people ther who are capable, due to social constraints, associated education costs, etc ..., to be "top surgeons" from your example (who you obviously view as "better people" then baggage loaders, check in staff or cabin crew!! Maybe you need to think about that the next time your suit case does not arrive on the same destination as you, or the cabin crew need to save your ass because you get a heart attck on board or your plane goes on fire!!

Let's first make the difference of cabin crew jobs and the handling jobs at CRL.
Let's start with the handling jobs for instance handling of luggage:
There's everything wrong with such jobs when most people working them hope for a better future.
Baggage loaders... most people doing it don't last more than 2 years because they get acute back problems and also chronic fatigue. I have yet to meet someone who aspires for a career as luggage loader and not surprisingly you have to admit that recruiters target ethnic and socially-challenged groups for obvious reasons: cheap, desperate labor.
Now let's have a word on the cabin crew. Your Eastern European colleagues make 800 euro on average. Sources? I'm informed well enough, don't worry. I have even visited a house in Gosselies where they share accommodation.
You are probably yourself on a direct Ryanair contract and you have made it for 9 years. Then you should know what I'm talking about. How many people haven't you seen come and go? Why did you climb up the ladders and become purser and instructor if you were happy enough with your life as a normal cabin crew?
How many colleagues from 9 years ago do you still see around?

You are the lucky 1% working at CRL that has a good salary and a hard working but relatively good job.
But how many people are there in CRL who have your position and your salary? With 15 aircraft based, the most cabin crew Ryanair need is 200. Only a few of them, max. 5 would be my guess, are instructors like yourself.
How many of the 200 are on the Ryanair contract? I assume max. 80.
How many of the 200 actually have a permanent residence in Belgium? Maybe 60?
So if you look at the balance, Ryanair hasn't created many local cabin crew jobs.

Let's go further now:
Would you trade your job to become a luggage loader or check-in agent and make part of the other 99% who work harder to get screwed by the Belgian taxes and earn much less than you?
Why not if you don't see them as "bad jobs"?

You must understand that this debate has nothing to do with your situation and the path your life has taken.
You are the lucky 1% that is on the Ryanair contract and is doing well.

Next time you see a young kid in Charleroi, ask yourself if the best he deserves is for his government to throw another half billion euro's at CRL so that he can one day load millions of luggage for your employer who's already making big bucks, until his body lets him down. I would rather pray for him that he gets the inspiration to become a world class surgeon or medical researcher or a nurse and be proud to save lives.

[regi]

OK, can we go back to the reaction of Brussels? What effect does that reaction have?