European budget travel news

The Irish Ferries strike is dragging on. About fifteen crew members are still barricaded in the Isle of Innishmore in Pembroke Dock and in Ulysees in Holyhead Dock. The dispute which came about because Irish Ferries wants to lay off 500 staff and replace them with labour from Latvia and Eastern Europe as a drastic cost cutting exercise. The ferry line which moves 25% of the goods in and out of Ireland is tied up in port and the shock waves are starting to be felt at a national level. Taoiseach Bertie Ahern openly criticised Irish Ferries' handling of the dispute.

It is a long time since trains competed with the Stagecoach but up in Scotland, the bus company of the same name has taken on First ScotRail the train operator, Stagecoach has announced that it will run its buses on the Glasgow to Edinburgh route every ten minutes at peak times and every fifteen minutes throughout the rest of the day.

A dispute over the employment of overseas workers on Irish Ferries ships has led to the
Isle of Inishmore ferry, which was due to sail between Pembroke Dock and Rosslare, and the Ulysees ferry sailing from Holyhead to Dublin, remaining in port on Thursday night.

It is understood the dispute began on Thursday afternoon after new staff, including several eastern Europeans, were recruited on board the Isle of Inishmore which was due to set sail at 14h30 GMT.

The staff believe that Irish Ferries want to replace them with cheaper labour from overseas. They will replace staff who have accepted voluntary redundancy. Irish Ferries see the measure as a way of remaining competitive in a ferry market where the workforce is recruited internationally.

With my European Budget Airline posts now transferred to my European cheap flight updates, here is a bit of ferry news.

Hoverspeed the fast ferry Hoverspeed actually did operate hovercraft at one time, closed down operations on the Dover Calais route for the last time at the start of this month. Competition between the ferries and the Channel Tunnel along with the exodus of potential passengers to the budget airlines have meant that Hoverspeed have decided to Hoverspeed this route.

SpeedFerries who operate a fare structure similar to the budget airlines still operates the Dover Boulogne route.

Travelodge UK, the budget hotel chain has revealed plans to close its bookings call centre in Dudley, West Midlands. Currently 170 staff work at the centre.

Travelodge is looking to outsource the booking function, which is now increasingly taken through the Internet. It hopes to offer employment for the affected staff in other sectors of the business.

After years of negotiations that were usually blocked by one or both parties the United States and the 25 member countries of the EU are set to ratify a new "open skies" agreement. Under the proposals agreed on Friday 18 November, US airlines will be free to fly both to airports in the European Union and from there to third destinations.

Similarly, European airlines will be able to fly to US airports and from there to other destinations. It will make the air markets in both areas very interesting to say the least.

From March 2006, bmibaby will base a fifth aircraft at Nottingham / East Midlands airport as part of their ongoing expension programme. It will ensure that bmibaby remains the largest carrier at the airport. Eleven routes will be served by the airline offering cheap flights starting at a mere £16.99 one way including all taxes and charges. In 2006 bmibaby will operate a fleet of 19 aircraft with 5 of those based at East Midlands.
The routes served will be:
Paris (twice Daily Sunday to Friday)
Alicante, Amsterdam, Belfast (Intl), Edinburgh, Glasgow, Jersey, Malaga, Palama, Prague and a weekly service to Faro.

Wizzair already flies to Katowice / Cracow and Warsaw from Liverpool John Lennon Airport. From 1st of December 2005 they add Kaunas in Lithunia and Gdansk will be added 2 March 2006.

www.wizzair.com
I am very tempted by these flights.

The big news story today is that passengers on the Heathrow Express train into London will be checked using scanners and X ray machines. The results will be used to decide how to increase security on public transport throughout the UK. The London Underground will be the biggest challenge with 3 million passengers per day using the system.

Although not seemingly related to Europe, Air Canada is to strip the paint from one of its Boeing 767 jets. The logo and tail fin art will be left and the metalwork will be polished. This move is expected to reduce the weight of the aircraft by 360 pounds. This will lead to fuel savings predicted at $24,000 per year. It follows weight reduction measures such as reducing baggage allowances, removing pillows and blankets from flights. If successful and the whole Air Canada fleet adopts the measure it will save about seven tonnes of paint and reduce costs by $1 million per year. Air Canada has set itself a target of improving fuel efficiency by 1.5%. This would translate to savings of $45 million per year.

This highlights how airlines are being driven to make fuel savings to remain competitive. Ryanair reduced weight in its latest purchases of 737-800's by using non reclining seats and removing window blinds. They may well follow suit and remove paint from their aircraft. In any event rising fuel costs are driving an effort to operate more efficient aircraft such as the 787 Dreamliner and the Airbus A350. Other operators are fitting winglets that offer fuel savings in flight.

Just tried to update the settings on the template for my Blog. I am having difficulty getting the changes to display. I will get there I am sure. Have a good weekend!

On the 10th of November British Airways sold its third share in the London for £95. The BA London Eye was financed by BA in 1998. It put up the original £48 million to finance the construction, but has charged 25% interest ever since. The sale will include the debt. BA justifies its high interest rates saying that it was a high risk project that had to be built in 16 months in time for the Millennium. Despite being London's most popular tourist attraction the London Eye has made a loss every year since opening. This is due to these crippling interest charges. Last year the Eye paid BA £34.5 million in interest. Looks like BA have made a profit on the whole deal without even taking into account the advertising from the wheel being called the BA London Eye.
The new buyer is the Tussauds Group who own the waxworks in Baker Street, Alton Towers, Warwick Castle amongst its empire. Tussauds was itself bought by Dubai International Capital earlier this year.

It will soon be time to hear the Last Post as we remember those killed in war. Meanwhile I am starting this new travel news blog aimed at keeping abreast of the budget travel news in Europe.
To start with Air Berlin will start flights from London Stansted to Manchester and Glasgow from 16 December 2005. They will operate 2 flights a day to each destination. One in the morning and one in the evening.
This is excellent news in my eyes as Stansted takes a age to get to by train and up until now there were very few flights there from Manchester. Now perhaps I can fly there and connect to Ryanair's extensive route network or even Air Berlin, Germanwings or EasyJet.