Originally Posted by Typhoonpilot

EU: U.S.’s Delay In Granting Norwegian Application Breaches Open Skies Deal

Dec 4, 2014 Cathy Buyck | Aviation Daily


The European Commission (EC) will start discussing with its members states the actions it could take to press the U.S. authorities to approve low-cost carrier (LCC) Norwegian’s application for a foreign air carrier license for its Irish subsidiary, Norwegian Air International (NAI).

According to the EC, the U.S. has violated the principles of the open skies agreement between the U.S and the EU by stretching its review of NAI’s application over an indefinite period.

“According to the agreement, the parties shall grant authorizations to carriers of the other party swiftly, which was the case in previous applications,” the EC notes.

It adds that the EC “considers that there is a breach of the EU-U.S. air transport agreement by the U.S. authorities, regarding the application from Norwegian Air International to fly to the United States.

The U.S. authorities are taking too long to process the application and this delay is not compatible with the EU-U.S. agreement.”

The EU’s executive body called a meeting of the EU-U.S. Joint Committee under the EU-U.S. air transport agreement, signed in 2007, to discuss the matter and its concern “that the U.S. is not honoring the agreement.”

The meeting was held in Washington, D.C., on Nov. 25, and the next gathering of EU-U.S. Joint Committee is scheduled for January, an EC spokesman says.

“The EC will now discuss the possible next steps with the EU member states,” he confirms.

It is not clear whether the EC can take action, nor which actions it can legally take.

Moreover, getting consensus of all 28 member states, plus other European signatories of the EU-U.S. open skies agreement, including Iceland and Norway, is likely to be very difficult. Air France-KLM and Lufthansa are against the NAI plan and Norwegian long-haul model, with crew partially sourced in non-EU countries with third party contracts.

Irish authorities have granted NAI all necessary licenses, including its air operator certificate (AOC), and the country has repeatedly criticized the U.S.’s stance on delaying the LCC’s application for a foreign air carrier permit.

“Ireland’s civil aviation authorities, for instance, could block traffic rights of some U.S. carriers flying to the country as a sign of opposition,” a source notes. Ireland is considering opening up its fifth-freedom rights, and the Gulf carriers would likely to be very quick to capitalize and launch flights between the U.S. and Dublin.



Unintended consequences?

ALPA really needs to stick to air safety and aeromedical. Items they can actually help pilots with. Their forays into trying to drive the marketplace have pretty much all been abject failures and bad for the pilot profession in North America.



TP