All politics is local politics: local politicians get in on the state aid bandwagon<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Better to build back the way it was week<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It was state aid for the little guys\u2019 week, this week, the week that was. Anyone can do big and showy state aid for national champions. Real politicians, the best, most likely to get re-elected politicians, know that all politics is local politics. Giving complete fortunes to the national carrier is welcome, and it has a certain feel-good tinge to it, but there are drawbacks. First, unless you are the member for the seat that national carrier has its major airport in the middle of, the benefit of that aid \u2013 benefit here measured as photo-op moments; name in the local paper; bragging right benefits, are limited. Everybody wants a share of the glory. Politicians are not good at sharing. And, let\u2019s face it, most national airlines are not universally loved by the nation. BA is not only known as \u2018Bloody Awful\u2019 abroad. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
We have had state aid for the big guys. That is getting boring and predictable. Now is the time for the local politicians, the real down-there-at-the-coal-face politicians to have their day in the sun. The vaccine is on the horizon, Christmas is coming too. There is no time to lose! The window is closing, so it was a very busy week. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Monday<\/strong> kicked the festivities off with an announcement<\/a> that the Commission approved a Danish scheme to support flights between Bornholm and S\u00f8nderborg, but only for \u2018certain categories of passengers\u2019. Nice ones, perhaps? What about those that voted for us in the last election? No, this is not about those voters, it is about voters that will vote for the politicians that made this largesse possible in the next election: \u20ac1.3 million is a good start. Local politics at its most local. Still, mark my words, this will not be the last time you see the word \u2018connectivity\u2019 in a press release about state aid. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Oh, wait, no, here it is again, in the announcement<\/a> on Tuesday <\/strong>that the Commission had also approved Croatia\u2019s granting of \u20ac11.7 million in state aid to Croatian Airlines to compensate it for losses arising as a result of the Coronavirus pandemic. With no disrespect to Croatia, or Croatian Airlines, this is nearly as local as the aid given in Denmark. Not quite, but nearly. Still, fear not, our Croatian readers, the grant is a maximum amount and is subject to audit to ensure that only the losses attributable to the pandemic are compensated. Given that Croatian Airlines was not the rudest of health going into the crisis that will be an interesting audit. Still, it will be audited by one of the no doubt skilled and attentive auditors that do audits for all the other firms you read about in the papers… what could possibly go wrong there? There is no chance of local factors being brought into calculation as the money is distributed and accounted for.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Two days not in the limelight is about all that the major airline associations can bear to withstand, so the big boys roared back on Wednesday<\/strong> with a joint statement<\/a> demanding \u2013 ask for; requesting; wanting, are all too soft for this release \u2013 demanding that the world pay attention to their demand that quarantines be lifted on all air travellers, even out-of-towners, not just locals. The release came on the back of the release of new EASA guidelines<\/a> that are aimed at generating a coordinated and sensible response around Europe. It looks, in its own words, at finding \u2018effective and differentiated strategies\u2019 to enable informed decision making. Who would not vote for that? The issue is more the way that IATA, the A4E and ACI Europe chose to represent this: they claim that EASA rejects quarantine, on the grounds that transmission of the virus is already widespread. EASA\u2019s report notes that on-board transmission is low, so the issue is the destination you are arriving into that matters, and that should be a question of individual choice, given the current transmission rates. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Try telling that to the authorities in countries were transmission has been effectively stopped, such as Australia, Japan, Korea, New Zealand, Taiwan and Vietnam which all demand a fierce quarantine. The school of thought that says \u2018Everybody already has it, so what the hell?\u2019 has some work to do to convince the rest of the world. <\/p>\n\n\n\n