fshalom@thegazette.canwest.com
The Montreal Gazette
Rovinescu again took aim at Emirates Airlines, which he accuses of using predatory practices to dump excess capacity in Canada.
The Dubai-based carrier flies to Toronto and has been lobbying to gain more access, notably to Vancouver and Calgary, as well as more frequency to Toronto’s Pearson airport. Emirates contends it would pump $480 million into Canada’s economy and create 2,800 jobs.
Rovinescu last week bluntly called those assertions “fairy tales” and said Monday that “Emirates’s real aim is to dump its excess capacity resulting from too many wide-body aircraft … including A380s, into the Canadian market, just as it has elsewhere in the world.”
The “state-owned carrier with access to virtually unlimited capital” would siphon off Air Canada customers who currently take the Montreal-based airline to Paris, London or Frankfurt and connect to Dubai.
“The growth of airports such as Montreal, that rely on connecting traffic, would be stunted,” Rovinescu said.
“Rather than hubs, they would shrink to stubs at the end of a spoke leading only to Dubai. Instead of owning the podium, in this case the hub podium, Canada would be cheerfully surrendering it.”
Asked if travellers should make that decision, Rovinescu replied that market forces would not decide the outcome. Governments determine whether to allow foreign airlines access to certain cities.
In a statement, New York-based spokesperson Lori Traczyk of public relations firm M. Silver Associates Inc. said: “Emirates is confident our case for reasonable air access to Canada is overwhelmingly in the country’s national interest.”
fshalom@thegazette.canwest.com
The Montreal Gazette
Read more: http://www.montrealgazette.com/news/montreal/Airline+urges+swift+ride+airport/2687108/story.html#ixzz0iSamf48C
