July 1st is a flexible and wobbly date with a habit of turning into late summer and, today ‘October’ as the Portimão to Bragança air service remains grounded.
The latest excuse by the Seven Air Group is that the contract has been submitted to the Court of Auditors, as if this was an unforeseen occurrence in an attempt to blame this noble cadre for the delay.
The Court of Auditors confirmed today that it had received the contract between the government and the air service company but that it was received only last week for a service that was meant to have started on July 1st.
Aero Vip, a service run by the Seven Air Group, submitted the one and only proposal to operate the Bragança-Vila Real-Viseu-Cascais-Portimão air link.
"We hope that the license is approved as soon as possible. Our expectation is that we can begin the flights as early as October" said a spokesman from the Seven Air Group.
Aero Vip has a track record of running this route as it did so happily for 15 years to November 2012 when EC funding stopped and the Government refused to pay further subsidies due to budgetary pressure in these times of austerity.
The spurious reason for resurrecting this route at the taxpayers’ expense is to ‘encourage mobility and economic activity between regions, from north to South, providing better and faster accessibility between different parts of the mainland.’
The subsidy on offer is to a maximum of €7.8 million over three years depending on ticket sales which the operating company has no incentive to promote.
Earlier this year the mayor of Portimão was all for the new service and pledged an open cheque to bring the council-owned airport up to scratch, her head full of notions of ‘sustainable tourism,’ and ‘northern entrepreneurs.’
Mayor Isilda Gomes then changed her tune while confirming that the council still will undertake the ‘necessary upgrade work’ at the Alvor aerodrome, but that she had decided that the route will be ‘of little consequence’ to tourism in the region.
If the route is not based on economics or sound social mobility criteria, why is it being resurrected at the expense of the taxpayer when most other areas of government expenditure are being cut?
At the current rate of progress the route will remain pie in the sky, the €7.8 certainly could be spent more profitably elsewhere.
