Airport slots ‘not a property right’ – CJEU
The EU’s highest court has found that a cap of 32 million passengers a year at Dublin Airport can be taken into account when allocating slots for airlines.
The Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) was ruling on questions referred to it by the High Court in a challenge to the cap taken by the DAA and airlines.
Since the case began, legislation that gives the Minister for Transport new powers to change the passenger cap has been enacted.
Constraint
The High Court had asked the EU whether the passenger cap represented a technical, operational, or environmental constraint that must be taken into account in allocating slots.
The airlines had argued that the allocation of ‘historical slots’ could not be compromised, since it was a right enjoyed by the airlines.
In its judgment today (15 October), the CJEU held that the criteria for allocating slots must reflect, in operational terms, all the capacity that is actually available at a co-ordinated airport.
Disregarding the cap, the judges said, might lead to a situation where slots were allocated but some could not be used.
They concluded that such a limit must be taken into account when determining the ‘co-ordination parameters’ that govern the allocation of slots under EU rules.
Historic slots
The court noted that, under certain conditions,EU law granted priority to airlines that had already regularly used a series of slots, but it added that their allocation for next period depended on the available capacity at an airport.
“Accordingly, the taking into account of a passenger limit may exceptionally result in some series of historic slots, or components thereof, not being reallocated to airlines which would otherwise in principle be entitled to them,” the judges stated.
The court also found that such slots, given that they were temporary and have not been definitively acquired, did not constitute a right to property within the meaning of the EU’s Charter of Fundamental Rights.
The CJEU concluded that it was for the High Court to rule on the actions against the decisions relating to Dublin Airport in the light of its interpretation of EU law.