Wizz Air calls on Walloon Government to abandon plans to tax passengers using Brussels Charleroi Airport

2013-07-25 — /travelprnews.com/ — Wizz Air, flying to Brussels Charleroi Airport since 2004, called on the Walloon Government to abandon plans for a new travel tax on passengers using Charleroi Airport. Wizz Air offers 7 routes to Brussels Charleroi, and carried, to date, 2.7 million passengers through the airport. Today the airline warned that further route and traffic growth, both supporting the local economy and job market, are in danger and could decline, should this travel tax be implemented.

Wizz Air’s Daniel de Carvalho said: “It beggars belief that after similar experiments with travel taxes in countries such as the Netherlands or Ireland, the Walloon Government would clamp down on its visitors and tax them instead of thanking them for bringing business to a region that has hugely benefitted of passenger traffic. Taxing travelers does not stop people from traveling – it simply motivates travelers and air carriers to choose alternative destinations. Wizz Air has build up a successful route network connecting Brussels Charleroi with 7 cities in the CEE, 6 of which are capital cities*, presenting the Walloon region as an alternative access to Brussels and convenient entry point to the Benelux countries, but taxing travelers will make Brussels Charleroi Airport a less attractive choice for our passengers and will influence our growth plans for this airport. We call on the Walloon Government to learn from those countries that have already toyed with travel taxes, damaging their economies and adversely affecting passenger traffic in the process.”

*Wizz Air flies from Brussels Charleroi to Belgrade, Budapest, Bucharest, Cluj, Ljubljana, Sofia and Warsaw

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