Ryanair group chief executive Michael O’Leary said today he did not expect Heathrow’s third runway to be built any time soon, but he plans huge investment in other British airports with the deployment of 100 aircraft over eight years.
Michael O’Leary, whose airline has always shunned Heathrow due to its high costs and slow turnaround times, said the British government should focus on developing other airports and lowering passenger taxes if it wants to boost economic growth.
Ryanair today announced its London Summer 2025 schedule with 206 routes, including seven new routes from Stansted to Bodrum, Clermont-Ferrand, Dalaman, Münster, Lübeck, Linz & Reggio Calabria, as well as extra frequencies on 30 other London routes to Gdansk, Ibiza, Malaga, Milan, Rome, Turin, and Valencia.
To support this traffic growth, Ryanair said it will base a new B737 in London Stansted for S25.
Meanwhile the Ryanair boss also said today that UK finance minister Rachel Reeves “hasn’t a clue” about how to generate growth in aviation.
Mr O’Leary said the Chancellor should scrap air passenger duty (APD) rather than “waffle on” about Heathrow expansion, which he described as “a dead cat” that would not happen before the 2040s at the earliest.
In her budget in October 2024, Ms Reeves announced increases in APD from the 2026/27 financial year.
For passengers travelling in economy on a short-haul flight, this will raise APD from £13 to £15.
At a press conference in London today, Mr O’Leary said: “The UK continues to lose out on enormous growth opportunities because you have a Chancellor who hasn’t a clue about how to deliver growth, has had five years to get ready for it, and yet has managed to screw it up in her first budget.”
“Nothing is designed to damage growth faster than increasing taxes on air travel,” he stated.
Mr O’Leary described APD at £15 as “insane” as it represents “a rate of tax of 33% on Ryanair’s average ticket price”.
Ms Reeves announced earlier today that she is supporting a third runway being built at Heathrow, saying the UK government is “inviting” the airport to bring forward proposals.
“The third runway at Heathrow is a dead cat. If it ever arrives, it will be about 2040, 2045 or 2050, in fact long after I’ve departed from Ryanair,” Michael O’Leary said.
He went on: “Here’s the prize we’ve offered to Rachel Reeves. We deliver about 60 million passengers a year to the UK.
“Within five years, we could grow that by 50% to 90 million passengers, and all she has to do is abolish APD,” he stated.
This would cost the UK government £4 billion which would be “paid back two-fold within 12 months” because of growth in passengers, he added.
