HONG KONG LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL — - 15 February 1989
香港立法局 一九八九年二月十五日
Measures to increase flight capacity
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13. MR. DAVID CHEUNG asked: In view of the heavy demand for aircraft seats on some of the airline routes, will Government inform this Council what measures it has taken or proposes to take to increase the flight capacity between Hong Kong and other destinations; and whether such measures might include the designation of more than one Hong Kong airline to operate on those routes where the demand outstrips existing capacity?
FINANCIAL SECRETARY: Sir, it has not always been easy to obtain seats at short notice on flights on certain routes between Hong Kong and other cities in recent times. This has been a result of the rapid and unexpected increase in passenger demand in the past two years or so, and this situation affects not only Hong Kong but also many other places. Efforts to deal with this situation have been made by both the airlines and by the Government.
To meet demand, Hong Kong's airlines have expanded their scheduled services on the routes in question, where the rights to do so were available. This has also meant that the airlines operating the routes from the other end have also increased the number of their services correspondingly. A case in point is the expansion of services between Hong Kong and Japan.
Additionally, both Hong Kong and foreign airlines have operated extra scheduled services to meet demand, for example, the Hong Kong-Australia routes in recent months. Moreover, one Hong Kong airline has increased its charter operations, in particular to points in China for which there are no rights to scheduled operations. This airline has also inaugurated charter services in certain cases where capacity on scheduled services between Hong Kong and those cities was, for the time being, inadequate to meet demand.
It should also be noted that Hong Kong's passenger airlines have expanded their fleets, and there are plans to acquire more aircraft in 1989.
At the same time, the Government has been seeking, through negotiations, rights for additional capacity on certain routes. It is possible that, in some cases, more capacity could have been provided if the Government had been willing to conclude unbalanced arrangements in favour of those negotiating partners concerned, but that would have been detrimental to Hong Kong's overall, longer-term interests, and contrary to normal principles of reciprocity governing scheduled services.