(Adds comments, details, background)
By Laurence Frost and Sarah Young
LONDON, April 7 (Reuters) - Airlines will fight attempts by
suppliers and airports, including Heathrow, to cover pandemic
losses by raising charges, the new head of industry body IATA
said on Wednesday, as he promised "strong and aggressive"
resistance to such moves.
"Some of these guys just act as monopoly suppliers," said
Willie Walsh, the IAG veteran who took over this month
as director general of the International Air Transport
Association, representing almost 300 airlines globally.
"We can work on their behalf to resist the efforts of some
suppliers to increase costs, which is total madness in this
environment," said Walsh - faulting air traffic controllers for
missing cost-cutting opportunities during the COVID-19 crisis.
As chief executive of British Airways and then its parent
IAG, Walsh often clashed with Heathrow over charges. On
Wednesday, he singled out price increases sought by the London
airport for criticism.
"It's the likes of airports like Heathrow who have clearly
demonstrated that they want to try to recover lost revenues,"
Walsh said, also accusing it of seeking to pass on the costs of
a politically fraught attempt to add a third runway.
"We expect the regulator in the UK to take a stand -
particularly where it's trying to recover money spent on the
development of a third runway that wasn't really supported by
the industry," he said.
The UK Civil Aviation Authority did not immediately respond
to a request for comment.
Heathrow said its charges had fallen by a quarter even as
customer satisfaction increased over the last seven years.
"The UK aviation industry has never been more united in
working tirelessly to safely restart international travel as
soon as possible," an airport spokesman said.
"We would urge Mr Walsh to build on that unity by working
together with us to decarbonise global aviation once travel
resumes."
Walsh sounded a more relaxed note about aircraft market
consolidation resulting from leasing giant AerCap's acquisition
of rival GECAS.
His immediate IATA predecessor Alexandre de Juniac said last
month the combination was "not good news" for airlines and could
lead to increased costs.
But Walsh said the aircraft leasing sector was a "pretty
fragmented industry" even after the tie-up.
"I'm not concerned about consolidation in the leasing
sector," he said, adding that sale-and-leaseback deals had
helped airlines monetise assets during the travel slump.
"In many cases lessors have been part of the solution to the
cash crisis that airlines have faced through 2020," Walsh said.
(Reporting by Laurence Frost in Paris and Sarah Young in
London; Editing by Kate Holton and Barbara Lewis)