O'Leary should land 300 jobs; Coughlan should take off

Sunday Tribune 21 February

There is an old schoolyard game called 'One, Two, Three O'Leary' you may have played as a child. It involves shouting out numbers and bouncing a ball between your legs. The rules, as with most childish pursuits, are arbitrary.
'Childish' and 'arbitrary' are good ways to describe the antics of another game-playing O'Leary. Last week, the Ryanair chief stood in the centre of the national schoolyard roaring about numbers and hopping the ball. The object of his bullying was Head Girl, 'Mary, Mary Quite Contrary' Coughlan. The pair spent the week brawling over a hangar at Dublin Airport. It took Williegate to dislodge them as lead story in the news. (By the way, if O'Dea is done for perjury, I'm starting the 'Free Willie' campaign. The logo will be a gun-toting whale with a moustache.)
O'Leary says he will create 300 engineering jobs at Dublin Airport. There are conditions, though. He won't talk to the DAA and he wants Hangar Six, which is leased to Aer Lingus. He contacted Coughlan to secure it for him, which she "failed" to do. The stupid girl.
The protagonists actually have quite a bit in common. Both are foul-mouthed and stubborn. Both are headline grabbers: O'Leary for putting his boot into the government; Coughlan for putting her boot in her mouth. She was the obvious choice for Villain of the Piece, 'cocking up yet again'.
In Leinster House, the opposition did more knee-jerking than a Riverdance chorus line. They howled at Brian Cowen to tear up Aer Lingus's lease. It was all just political hay-making, with insults tossed around the house by the country's best-paid tossers.
This was never a simple equation of 'Hangar Six minus Aer Lingus = 300 Ryanair jobs'. Aer Lingus's lease stated they could only be moved on the grounds of 'aircraft operation' or 'airport development' – not to make way for another tenant. Hangar Six is the only one capable of accommodating more than one of their wide-body Airbus A330 aircraft. They were staying put.
Coughlan offered O'Leary alternatives: Hangars One and Two or a newly-built premises. Sites at Shannon and Knock were also available. Like Andy, the churlish Little Britain character, he huffed, "I want that one", pointing at Hangar Six.
So why does he want Hangar Six so badly, given that he doesn't have any wide-body aircraft? He says he wants to move his HQ there. The suspicion, however, is that he wants to use it as a terminal. On Thursday, he produced a letter giving 'guarantees' to the IDA which he hoped would dispel this suspicion. It didn't. O'Leary knows that if he ever hopes to open Hangar Six as a terminal, then he must acquire it first. 'Guarantees' can be dealt with later.
Coughlan is an easy target for his criticism. Last week, Senator Eoghan Harris attacked O'Leary for demeaning the office of enterprise minister. In truth, Mary has done a fine job of demeaning it herself. Her handling of the Fás fiasco still beggars belief. We don't need O'Leary to tell us she is useless at her job – we already know it. The former Dell and Waterford workers know it. Cadbury's workers may know it soon too.
However, O'Leary's attack backfired as the week progressed. It became obvious he was playing a media game with her. Coughlan, he said, had "tragically" lost the 300 jobs. Why? Because he was asking for something he knew she couldn't give. He pined for the days when Haughey was running the country. Why? So he could avail of the services of a crook?
Lurking at the back of all this is O'Leary's penchant for score-settling. He's still seething over the government's €10 airport tax. It infuriates him that it's less money spent on his bagged alcohol or scratch cards.
If there is any lingering doubt that this is at the core of his manufactured row with Coughlan, then look at Ryanair's website. On 5 February, it announced it will be reducing its Shannon jobs from over 300 to less than 200 because of the tax. At the end of the statement it says, "these cuts would be immediately reversed if the €10.00 Visitor Tax is scrapped". Does that sound like he's holding hundreds of families hostage? O'Leary sees his employees and the unemployed merely as pawns. He's never experienced the soul-sapping desperation of being on the dole. To give jobless people hope and then take it away is cruel beyond comprehension. Whether those jobs materialise or not, he's dragged hundreds of vulnerable families through the ringer.
The bottom line is that he has 300 jobs in his gift. If he really cares about bringing employment to Dublin, then he should shut up, take what's on offer and create them.
Cowen, meanwhile, should start taking a Ryanair approach to his cabinet and stop placing loyalty above ability. Coughlan wouldn't be employed at corporate level in Ryanair. The Hangar Six affair may not have been of her making, but there are plenty of other reasons for hoofing her out of the enterprise ministry.
She has allowed O'Leary to play her like a ball in a schoolyard game. O'Leary should do the nation a favour and stop hopping the ball. It's One or Two, O'Leary… Hangar Six is out of the question. Now create those jobs or hop it.

dkenny@tribune.ie

February 21, 2010