Ryanair News

11.07.06

RYANAIR ANNOUNCES REDUCTIONS IN SERVICES TO SWEDEN DUE TO SWEDISH FLIGHT TAX

Ryanair, Europe's no.1 low-fares airline, today (Tuesday, 11th July
2006) announced significant reductions in its services to and from Sweden. The airline announced the cancellation of its twice daily service from Stockholm-Vasteras to London-Luton, a reduction in its Malmo-Sturup to London-Stansted from twice daily to a daily service and a reduction in its Gothenburg City Airport to Glasgow-Prestwick service from five weekly flights to three weekly flights. These reductions in service will be effective from the 28th of October 2006. Passengers will be re-accommodated on another Ryanair service or, in the case of Stockholm-Vasteras passengers will also be offered a full reimbursement
of their fare.

Ryanair has taken this decision due to the proposals by the Swedish Government to introduce a new 94SEK tax, which will effectively add a further 30% to the average cost of Ryanair's fares.

Announcing the decision at a press conference in Stockholm today, Ryanair's Deputy Chief Executive, Michael Cawley, said;

"The Swedish Government is destroying low fare travel for Swedes and for those people who want to visit this beautiful country by attempting to push up the average cost of Ryanair's fares by over 30%.
The introduction of this tax will make Swedish tourism uncompetitive when compared with cheaper alternatives in Spain, Italy and elsewhere in Europe. Tourism into Sweden has grown only due to the introduction of low fares by Ryanair. Last year, we carried over 2.4 million passengers to and from Sweden and Ryanair's incoming passengers contribute over 2bn
SEK to the Swedish economy. The volume of this tourism is completely
dependent on the existence of low cost air access. With the introduction of this tax the Swedish Government is now attempting to charge a premium for passengers to visit Sweden over and above the cost of visiting all their other destinations in Europe.

"On the one hand the Finance Minister Per Nuder is claiming that the Swedish travel industry must grow and that he intends to invest significant sums of money to attract tourists. However, his Government is putting in place policies which are destroying tourism and removing all the economic benefits which it brings. In addition, he is undermining the ability of Swedish industry to compete internationally by making the cost of travel more expensive.

"Finally, his Government is removing the benefit of low cost access which Ryanair and other low fare carriers have brought to the country.

"This is a very sad day for the Swedish consumer and Swedish tourism. We hope this Government will see sense and reverse its decision to implement this iniquitous tax".