Herald.Wales - Richard Youle
A MEMBER of the ruling Labour administration in Swansea said he was “totally dissatisfied” with the situation surrounding the county’s airport, which the council owns.
Cabinet is to consider what further courses of action might be available for the authority, including their costs, but it’s not clear when the meeting will take place.
In January cabinet decided to negotiate a new lease with the existing operator to continue running the airport at Fairwood Common, Gower, despite complaints from users about the way they felt it was being operated. The council doesn’t want to run the airport on cost and environmental grounds.
Around three weeks later the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) provisionally suspended the airport’s operating licence due to a “systemic failure of safety management”. The operator, Swansea Airport Ltd, was given a chance to rectify the issues raised. The action plan it subsequently submitted was not deemed acceptable by the CAA but it was given further time to resolve the issues. Speaking in early April, Swansea Airport Ltd director Roy Thomas said things were moving in the right direction. He added that the airport had to be more business and leisure-orientated to make it commercially viable.
