Billie Moore: NZ Airports Association CEO on the potential closure of its Westport-Wellington service

Westport’s only air link could be cut within months. 

Originair won’t guarantee its Westport-Wellington service beyond May after failing to secure Government and local funding. 

NZ Airports Association CEO Billie Moore says Westport is one of the last remaining airports still co-owned by the taxpayer. 

She told Ryan Bridge taxpayers already cover half the airport’s annual shortfall, just to keep essential services running. 

Moore says the public contribution needs to be beneficial. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Trouble on the tarmac for the coast less than eighteen
months in Origin there could be acting its Westport to
Wellington route. It's a bid for the government support that
looks like it's dead in the water. In New Zealand
Airport's CEO Billy Moore with us this morning. Hey Billy, Hi,
what's going on here?

Speaker 2 (00:16):
Oh? Look, it's it's a tricky situation. Originea has been
clear they'll keep monitoring the route until mid May. It
has to work commercially for them and we have to
respect that. The difficulty we see in the regions to
the place like Westport is that the demand for the
route is there, but it has to also be matched
by the frequency and timing of services. So passenger numbers

(00:37):
will depend on it having enough like frequency to make
it practical I say commuters, and if you can't get
that scale up, the overall financial sustainability of the route
is harder to maintain. So it's a bit of a
chicken and egg situation with the timing of the routes,
of frequency and getting those numbers up to Origin. That's
what the council will be grappling with. How do you

(00:59):
give it a jolt so it can become something sustainable.

Speaker 1 (01:03):
This is your classic regional airligned problem.

Speaker 2 (01:06):
Isn't it. It really is, and in a lot of
countries around the world, there are processes to provide a
bit of that baseline support and get it moving so
that it becomes more sustainable over time. The clincher in
this case is that we support is also a joint
need to airport. That means it's one of the last

(01:27):
remaining airports around the country five of them that is
also co owned by the taxpayer. So taxpayers will already
cover half of the airport short for each year just
to keep essential airport services open, so things like emergencies, healthcare, ambulance.
So the question for us is how do we make
sure that public contribution that will continue anyway, is also

(01:50):
supporting a passenger route to make the actual public good
of that money worthwhile. So we definitely need to find
solution here.

Speaker 1 (01:58):
One thing I've noticed, I've lot of friends who are
increasingly using regional airlines to get to places like Auckland
to Ketty Ketty with who does that one barrier barrier
Auckland to part up at our mood that's Chatham Air.
They're great airlines and they often have you know, good times.
They often have a flat fear structure, so it's a

(02:20):
lot more affordable than you know, your price gounging Air
New Zealand, et cetera. Is that how do you get
those airlines onto the search engines, because that's one of
the problems I reckon you find when you do a
search through an international that they don't pop up. You
just get jet Star and Air New Zealand.

Speaker 2 (02:38):
Look, you're absolutely right to putting that out. It's something
we've been talking to the government about these airlines. You know,
they are great operations, but they are small in scale,
so it is tough for some of them to invest
in the systems that allow them to be in those
search engines and some of the other capabilities that we
see from the big airlines. Ear chatam So does have
that capability, but we think there is some more things

(02:59):
we can do to make sure their great offerings are
exposed to more and more people. Say, as you say,
once you start flying on them, you do tend to
stick because it is a great.

Speaker 1 (03:11):
Service one hundred percent. Billy, appreciate your time this morning.
Billy Moore, who's New Zealand airport's CEO. For more from
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