Latest / Early Edition with Ryan Bridge / Duane Emeny: Air Chathams Chief Executive on Airways are upping fees for commercial airlines

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Duane Emeny: Air Chathams Chief Executive on Airways are upping fees for commercial airlines · Early Edition with Ryan Bridge

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: The cost of flying to and from every airport in
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  Speaker 1: this country is about to go up. Airways. These are
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  Speaker 1: the guys who run air traffic control. They're upping their
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  Speaker 1: fees seventeen point seven percent over the next three years.
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  Speaker 1: Dwyane Eminy is the Air Chatham CEO with me this morning.
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  Speaker 2: Dane, Good morning, very good morning, Brian.
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  Speaker 1: Good to have you on the show. What does this
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  Speaker 1: mean for you?
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  Speaker 2: Ah, well, it's another cost. It's another structural cost that
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  Speaker 2: we have no control over, that we have to you know,
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  Speaker 2: somehow absorb or attempt to pass on. So yeah, it's
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  Speaker 2: not a good thing.
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  Speaker 1: Is it enough to put you know, regional airlines out
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  Speaker 1: of business? I mean, we're seeing a lot of stories
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  Speaker 1: about regional airlines struggling at the moment. Is you know,
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  Speaker 1: obviously this is not a great move, But is it
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  Speaker 1: enough to tip some over the edge? Do you think?
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  Speaker 2: Yeah? I think what you've already seen it an't you?
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  Speaker 2: I mean with sounds, are you've got fruits being cut,
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  Speaker 2: you've got airplanes being sold? I can assure you that
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  Speaker 2: all regional airlines, including yourselves, are looking at similar things.
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  Speaker 2: So you know, it's it's not it's just not going
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  Speaker 2: to work long term if we keep doing the same
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  Speaker 2: old thing and hoping for a different result, I think, really,
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  Speaker 2: you know, in our opinion, we've got to really get
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  Speaker 2: back to the root cause of why why we have
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  Speaker 2: the issue that we have today. And you know, I
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  Speaker 2: look at it and think, well, we seem to have
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  Speaker 2: a more expensive system from a customer perspective, but we
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  Speaker 2: actually have a worse service. So why is that? And
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  Speaker 2: it was interesting I was coming on talking to you
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  Speaker 2: this morning. I was having a look back at some
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  Speaker 2: of the reports sort of November twenty fourteen and when
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  Speaker 2: Aysia made their decisions to cut one of the original
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  Speaker 2: carries at the time, which was Eager Air. They had
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  Speaker 2: a fleet of about eighteen small eighteen ceed aircraft that
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  Speaker 2: really connected a lot of regional New Zealand and at
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  Speaker 2: the time it was the decision was made to cut
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  Speaker 2: that because it was costing and test reluctance words a
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  Speaker 2: million dollars a month, so twelve million dollars a year.
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  Speaker 2: But that that airline would be cut and then the
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  Speaker 2: investment we're down into larger tubo proper aircraft. Ultimately everyone
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  Speaker 2: would get a bit of service at lower cost. Well,
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  Speaker 2: you know, we are ten years later and that's absolutely
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  Speaker 2: not the net result hasn't happened.
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  Speaker 1: What so, what do we need to do to fix
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  Speaker 1: this then? Because I mean airways, I mean, well it's
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  Speaker 1: a bit of a It's a monopoly, really, isn't it.
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  Speaker 1: I Mean they consult and then they just charge essentially
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  Speaker 1: what they want, but presumably they have costs they need
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  Speaker 1: to increase and cover as well. What's the solution?
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, well, I think you look at the airways example.
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  Speaker 2: I mean, and again this is my opinion, they hide
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  Speaker 2: behind their state owned enterprise band. Right, what's the legislative
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  Speaker 2: requirement to provide a profit back to their shareholder? Which
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  Speaker 2: is effective for a government, so you know, the government
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  Speaker 2: had some control over that cost. They could actually go
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  Speaker 2: to airways and say, hey, we needed a better here.
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  Speaker 2: You know, we shouldn't really be making a profit while
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  Speaker 2: these regional airlines and other airlines in general suffering. So
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  Speaker 2: you know, what can we do about that? Because the
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  Speaker 2: reality is there is no other that's going to come
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  Speaker 2: in and compete against them because the infrastructure costs required
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  Speaker 2: to do that are significant. So I think that's an
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  Speaker 2: area that needs to be looked at. And then again
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  Speaker 2: you've got to go back to the root course, like
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  Speaker 2: ten years ago, twenty years ago, we had a much
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  Speaker 2: more vibrant aviation ecosystem in this country. You had a
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  Speaker 2: lot more airlines, a lot more aircraft, so you had
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  Speaker 2: a lot more people playing into the system and paying
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  Speaker 2: into the system as well. But of course, as any
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  Speaker 2: zones made decisions to withdraw from these smaller regions, you know,
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  Speaker 2: cut its fleet size, consolidate into larger terbo proper aircraft
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  Speaker 2: and obviously into gen aircraft on some of these regional routes,
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  Speaker 2: it ultimately means you've got less planes, less frequency, in
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  Speaker 2: my opinion, or worse service, but you've actually got less
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  Speaker 2: people playing in. So then these bloated corporate organizations like
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  Speaker 2: your ways and the CIA is some extents, because they
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  Speaker 2: all run corporate structures, they have high pay salaries and
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  Speaker 2: really high overheads, they have to spread that across the users.
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  Speaker 2: And of course the only way you can do that
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  Speaker 2: is put the prices up. And that's what's happening, that's
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  Speaker 2: what you're seeing. That's what's airlines like us they're trying
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  Speaker 2: to put into ticket prices. The customers pushing back and saying, hey,
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  Speaker 2: this is too much. I'm jumping the car and drive.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's literally unaffordable. Doane appreciate that really interesting stuff?
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  Speaker 1: Dwyane Emini, who's Edge Adam's chief executive.
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  Speaker 2: For more from Early Edition with Ryan Bridge.
• 4:28
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