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AP Photo/Matt Dunham

Stansted owner says it won't allow Ryanair to buy the airport

Ryanair had expressed interest in buying part of the airport – but now it has been excluded from the sale.

THE OWNER OF Stansted Airport in Essex has said it will not allow the airport to be sold to Ryanair.

Ferrovial, the majority shareholder in BAA, which owns the airport, will exclude Ryanair and any Ryanair-related consortium from the sale process, the airline said this evening.

Ryanair said that it has subsequently withdrawn from the sale process after being told that it has been excluded.

“While we fully accept that Ferrovial is entirely free not to sell to Ryanair, we fail to understand how it can comply with competition law if Stansted’s biggest customer, accounting for 70 per cent of the traffic, is excluded from this sale process,” said Stephen McNamara of Ryanair.

Ryanair operates 41 planes from Stansted which is the fourth busiest airport in the UK.  It had expressed interest in August in buying or taking a minority shareholding in the airport worth around £1 billion.

The competition authority in the UK had ruled in 2009 that the airport had to be sold by the operator because of the lack of competition between airports around London.

Stansted Airport had fought a legal battle against the enforced sale but in August said that it would no longer try to stop the airport from being sold.

The airline did not specify why it has been excluded from the sale and BAA was not available for comment.

Ryanair said that it has written to all investors and consortia it had held discussions with to advise them that it will no longer be a participant in the sale process or seek a minority stake in Stansted.

Read: Aer Lingus and Air Canada sign single ticket agreement >

Read: Irish authorities in talks with Spain over Ryanair’s safety standards >

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37 Comments
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    Mute David Harte
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    Oct 9th 2012, 6:25 PM

    Please kill the meteor advertisement.

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    Mute Des Keegan
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    Oct 9th 2012, 8:42 PM

    Ya its bloody annoying, and definitely not gonna make me ever switch to Meteor!!!

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    Mute SeanR
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    Oct 10th 2012, 4:18 AM

    Firefox + NoScript = No ads.

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    Mute Andrew P
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    Oct 10th 2012, 5:08 AM

    adblock plus and Firefox is your friend. Or buy an ipad.

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    Mute David Harte
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    Oct 10th 2012, 9:41 AM

    Cheers lads but im using the app on a sung galaxy. There is a full screen meteor add when logging in. Very annoying.

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    Mute Assel Dannourah
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    Mar 10th 2016, 8:50 PM

    BAA anti Irish

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    Mute Damien Kelly
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    Oct 9th 2012, 6:27 PM

    Makes sense. Can you imagine travelling through an airport run and owned by Ryanair. Horrific.

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    Mute BILL RYAN
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    Oct 9th 2012, 6:38 PM

    No toilets perhaps !

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    Mute Mark Larson
    Favourite Mark Larson
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    Oct 9th 2012, 11:05 PM

    Use Heathrow,Gatwick, Luton or City if you are not happy…. I don’t like Ryanair and never fly them, but the owner of a private owned airport should not careless who it sells to.

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    Mute Damien Kelly
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    Oct 9th 2012, 11:26 PM

    That’s great in theory, but one shambles of an airport would drag down standards in all the competing airports. Look at the effect Ryanair had on Aer Lingus. And the reasons why it matters who runs your airports is that it’s the first impression of the country you’ve landed in. The British government and businesses there have good reason to keep Ryanair out.

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    Mute Mark Larson
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    Oct 10th 2012, 12:32 AM

    Don’t be silly, Ryanair made Stansted the airport it is. Ryanair made Ferrovial the Billions the airport is worth. Ryanair in control of 1 of London’s 5 airports would more than likely do the exact opposite to what you say. Aerlingus and Dublin is completely different…..The British government and business has made hundreds of millions from Ryanair over the years. As i said im not a fan of ryanair, but a Stansted airport competing against Gatwick or Luton is very good for the UK consumer………..

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    Mute Barry
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    Oct 9th 2012, 7:44 PM

    Recently flew with ryanaur for the first time back in July to Belgium,

    -First off it was cheap for me and my wife return
    -it borded , left and arrived on time
    -ticket instructions were clear as was baggage allowence

    Overall I have no major complaints, flight was short, only small issues are

    -at the time of booking the flight on the website the session kept timing out after around 2min
    -the seats don’t recline at all

    I can live with the seats not reclining, overall I got what I paid for,

    Sure some of the fees are high for such things as not having a bording pass but then they make that clear, same for baggage limits

    Sure people may not like the owner but you can’t argue that he has a very good business model, I will fly with them again

    132
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    Mute Stephen O'Connell
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    Oct 9th 2012, 9:10 PM

    Guarantee if they had given u service like some people have received then you would be on here giving out about them. Ryanair are terrible but I don’t fly with them. If others want to then go ahead !

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    Mute Itchy Brain
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    Oct 9th 2012, 10:09 PM

    What I’ve learnt recently is if your baggage is overweight (15kG), you must pay €20 per kG. my bag was 18kG. Yes, €60 I had to pay!

    Just another thing you need to know!

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    Mute brian magee
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    Oct 9th 2012, 11:32 PM

    in reply to Stephen, when you fly 45million passengers a year, your going to have sine disgruntled people. on a whole as a percentage I’d say they have better customer experiences.

    18
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    Mute Barry
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    Oct 10th 2012, 9:09 AM

    Stephen, from what I’ve read, the cause of many people’s complaints about the company are generally down to the person not reading about the requirement to print boarding passes themselves to avoid charges or having a overweight bag.

    If my bag was heavier then it would have been my fault, not the company’s. When some people have a overweight bag they expect the rules to be changed for them so they don’t have to pay any of the charges that the company has clearly said would apply. in short…people are sometimes idiots.

    I’m a realistic person who read and understood the rules that apply to me when I use the company, i guess some people just don’t like rules applying to them.

    12
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    Mute Gillian Cafferkey
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    Oct 9th 2012, 7:05 PM

    If ryanair pulled out of Stanstead, how well would they fair out?

    86
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    Mute Micheal
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    Oct 9th 2012, 7:57 PM

    If Ryanair pulled out of Stanstead their network would collapse. As would the airport – 70% of flights are Ryanair.

    51
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    Mute Dennis Laffey
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    Oct 9th 2012, 7:01 PM

    I fail to see how that is legal. Regardless of what people think of Ryanair they provide a service people are willing to pay for, and it is one that is very different from the players who used to own the air travel market. No doubt that their product is not to every ones taste but they have as much right to do business as anyone else.

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    Mute Andrew Telford
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    Oct 9th 2012, 7:34 PM

    The government isn’t selling it, a private company is… A private company can decline to sell an asset to whomever it wishes for whatever reason it sees fit.

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    Mute Vocal Outrage
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    Oct 9th 2012, 8:37 PM

    Also, having an owner that also provides 70% of the business might also run afoul of competition law

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    Mute Sheila Byrne
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    Oct 9th 2012, 9:03 PM

    If I owned it, no matter what he offered to pay, I still wouldn’t sell it to him. He’s rude, arrogant, ignorant, obnoxious, bully, full of his own sh1te. Don’t fly ryanair and hopefully will never have to. I like to land softly and with fuel in the engines!

    53
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    Mute Andrew Telford
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    Oct 9th 2012, 10:12 PM

    Exactly…. Say you own three houses on a street and want to sell one, you have two offers, one from a young couple and one from a businessman who owns a chain of strip clubs… The businessman can offer you more but it would not be in your interest to sell to him… A company can make the proposition to its shareholders

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    Mute ronan kelly
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    Oct 9th 2012, 9:42 PM

    I love Ryanair

    46
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    Mute Una Dev
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    Oct 9th 2012, 9:01 PM

    If Ryanair buys Aer Lingus, say goodbye to low fares.
    Ryanair have a price policy known as “market penetration pricing” which initially starts at a low cost in order to capture the market and then increase the fares once they acquire a large market share. In other words, no competition.

    33
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    Mute Mark Vieregge
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    Oct 9th 2012, 9:35 PM

    RyanAir running an airport:

    Did you print your escalator usage pass? No? That’s 50€ for the use of the escalators and lifts.
    Immobility assistance? just 25€, leaving and then 25€ arriving.
    Sorry, that’s not a Ryanair boarding pass, you aren’t entitled to the 5% food court discount.
    Toilets? Sure, that’s €1.

    26
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    Mute Mark Dalt
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    Oct 10th 2012, 5:25 PM

    Ryanair (like most other private companies) are a monopoly. Never believe Michael O’Leary’s propaganda about the Government workers because he is trying to divide and conquer.

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    Mute Martin Matthews
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    Oct 9th 2012, 6:59 PM

    Rushdie are a business you get what you pay for and we are not bailing it out either

    25
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    Mute Paul Furey
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    Oct 9th 2012, 9:16 PM

    Hah! Nobody wants ruinair to buy them. Karma.

    22
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    Mute Kevin Blanche
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    Oct 9th 2012, 10:51 PM

    just more free publicity lads. if it’s not charging for the jacks or standing areas on planes it’s buying airports. none of it was ever gonna happen. got myself a return ticket to Barcelona for 65e last week…..considering it’s 50e return to Kerry on the train thats not too bad.

    21
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    Mute Tomas Phelan
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    Oct 9th 2012, 11:27 PM

    Flying with Ryanair should not cost you anymore than the airfare. It’s quite simple. Follow the instructions and you won’t get burned! The reason I don’t fly Ryanair is because their cabin crew are shower of ignorant f&@kers in my opinion. Aer Lingus all day long please!!

    20
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    Mute Sean Slevin
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    Oct 10th 2012, 2:26 PM

    It think that is wrong to say they are ignorant. Most Ryanair cabin crew are decent people forced to enforce draconian rules created by a pig ignorant boss and rules that you signed up to. It is a grossly unfair sweeping generalisation.

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    Mute McNamees On TheGreen
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    Oct 9th 2012, 10:44 PM

    I think all of us should boycott Meteor !!??

    19
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    Mute Bryan Smyth
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    Oct 9th 2012, 10:31 PM

    @ Sheila, please educate yourself with aviation regulations rules before typing..

    18
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    Mute eoghan
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    Oct 9th 2012, 7:16 PM

    If Ryanair had stansted it be great if u just want get to London cheaply then it great Gatwick and heathrow great if getting connecting flights but stansted is a last stop airport,they should of bought Shannon aswel

    17
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    Mute Paul Mallon
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    Oct 10th 2012, 2:05 PM

    I think Ryanair is only good value if you’re going for a short hop with no luggage. It’s about what you value I suppose, I’d rather pay a little more and know exactly what I’m getting from the start. Also, the if you’ve got kids then you can forget about Ryanair, too expensive.

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    Mute Aleo
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    Oct 9th 2012, 9:52 PM

    I’ve experienced the combination of Stansted and Ryanair, and I applaud Stansted’s position. It is an excellent airport, which doesn’t deserve the chaotic imitation of service brought to it by Ryanair. No amount of money is worth the damage Ryanair will do, long-term, to an airport’s image.

    16
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