Call for regional airport management

Staff Reporter FRANCESC Quetglas, Balearic Socialist spokesman in Parliament said yesterday that regional government participation in airport management would pave the way for the financing of the new inter-island public air service. The ex regional government minister for Public Works and Transport was speaking yesterday alongside Socialist Parliamentary group spokesman, Francesc Antich. A proposal was put forward that the role to be played by local government in airport management be put on the agenda of the next Chamber of Commerce meeting. In the proposal, the Spanish Socialist Workers Party (PSOE) asks that Parliament urge regional government to “formally” approach their central government overlords for “the beginning of negotiations to secure participation by the regional Administration, island councils and town councils in the management of local airports. Quetlas commented: “All the worries that we have for financing the public air service, all the problems that we have in relation to airport taxes, all these questions could be resolved through financial autonomy in regional airport management”. Quetglas added that the Spanish airport management system is the “most centralised in the world”, because the Spanish Airports Authority (AENA) constitutes “one single decision-making body”, something which, he claimed, is only witnessed in small European countries with only a single operating base. Antich defended the participation of local administration in the management of the airports as a “strategy of the future”.