Air Services
Dail Éireann — 2026-02-12
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Charlie McConalogue (FF), Donegal

Deputy Pat the Cope Gallagher and I, along with Deputy Doherty and all the other Oireachtas Members from the county, are at one on this in terms of trying to find a way forward and make sure there are flight times in place that suit and meet the needs of the people of our county. Deputy Doherty will see from the response how this evolved. We both heard at yesterday's meeting that the tender that was issued was the same as the previous tender.
There was no change but what came in as a result of that tender was different. As the response I outlined shows, there was only one applicant for the tender and it met the minimum specifications of the tender. As outlined, the reason the Department signed the contract was to ensure there would not be a discontinuation of flights from the county and a service would continue to be in place. The Department did that following legal advice.
From a Government point of view, there is very significant funding for the public service obligation, and rightly so. We fund and have a wonderful airport in Carrickfinn but we have to make sure the flights available best serve the public and connectivity from Donegal to Dublin, given all of the other challenges we have. The objective now, which we all discussed yesterday when we met with the Secretary General, is to find ways to have the afternoon flight restored and have the issue of the aeroplane overnighting in Carrickfinn considered and addressed.
The Department is working within a legal framework. There was no change in the tender that went out this time compared with the tender that went out the previous time. What changed was the response. There was only one response to the tender, it met the minimum requirements and there were legal obligations around that.
We now have to work collectively to make sure the investment we are making in terms of spending taxpayers' money on this service, and rightly so, best meets the needs of the people we represent. The Minister is committed to meeting with the cancer group next week and to meeting and continuing to engage with all of us to find a way forward here.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-02-12/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-09-14T01:01:02+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-02-12