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Jersey introduces pilot scheme to scrap passport requirement for French visitors

French visitors will no longer need a passport to travel to the UK crown dependency of Jersey for day trips, under a new pilot scheme launched to help deal with post-Brexit complications.

Jersey introduces pilot scheme to scrap passport requirement for French visitors
A photo shows the Saint Helier Marina in Jersey (Photo by Sebastien SALOM-GOMIS / AFP)

The Jersey Minister for Home Affairs, Deputy Helen Miles, announced via press release on Tuesday that French nationals visiting the island will no longer need to present a valid passport to visit for a day trip – as had been the rule since the end of the Brexit transition period.

Instead, French visitors will be able to travel on commercial ferries using just a national ID card in a pilot scheme set to begin at the start of the summer tourist season.

Since Brexit, the UK has required all EU visitors to show a passport, rather than a national ID card as was the rule before. This includes the Channel islands, since they are UK crown dependencies.

In her press release, Miles explained that since Brexit, all EU nationals have been required to show a passport to enter Jersey when visiting from outside the common travel area. 

“The current process has proven difficult for many French nationals, who may not possess passports and instead rely on ID cards. This has led to a significant decline in the day trip traffic to the Island”, Miles said.

“We are grateful to our partners in the UK and in Normandy for their help and engagement, and to the Minister for External Relations and his department for their support. It is important that we are all working together to enable French residents to visit our beautiful Island and give them the flexibility they need to do so.

Miles added that: “Arrangements will be made to make sure robust measures are in place to ensure the security of the border is maintained.”

Travel between Jersey and the UK does not require a passport, although photo ID may be required.

The Jersey government said that ID cards would only be accepted for people on a day trip who have a return ticket booked, and is being trialled only on the Manche Islands and Condor ferry routes from France, not for passengers on airlines or smaller boats. 

The statement from Jersey said that this rule would apply only to “French nationals”, not other EU passport holders taking a trip from France to Jersey, and the government later clarified that it would apply only to French citizens who hold a valid and in-date ID card.

The suspension of the passport requirement is not final – the scheme is “a provisional test” – it will be used to inform a more permanent decision to be made in September.

READ MORE: From ferries to Eurostar: How Brexit has hit travel between France and the UK

Miles’ statement comes just a few weeks after the president of the local authorities in the Manche département of France, Jean Morin, asked that passport requirements be lifted, with hopes of increasing travel to and from the islands.

Jean Morin told Ouest France previously that there has been a “considerable reduction in the number of passengers on routes between the Channel ports and the islands” and as a result the ferry service between France and the islands was seriously in deficit.

Only around half of French people have a passport, since the ID card issued to all adults is sufficient to travel within the EU. 

“On these lines, we will never make money, but we cannot be in deficit”, explained the Morin. 

READ MORE: France may cut Channel islands ferry service after post-Brexit collapse in visitor numbers

Morin threatened that local authorities would stop funding the shipping company DNO, which runs the Manche Îles Express ferry service, that if a solution was not found by the deadline of May 1st, 2023.

In response to the new scheme to suspend passport requirements, Morin told Actu.Fr that “this gives us hope that crossings to Jersey will be relaunched next season. Our wish is to return to financial equilibrium”.

Morin added that he would like to see a similar measure brought on by local authorities in Guernsey, the neighbouring Channel island, as soon as possible.

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TRAVEL NEWS

Are France’s loss-making regional airports under threat?

Just a quarter of France's airports break even financially with the rest - the smaller, regional airports - heavily subsidised by the state. But can this situation continue?

Are France's loss-making regional airports under threat?

France last year welcomed 199 million airline passengers – bringing the country numbers back to almost pre-pandemic levels. 

But it was only a handful of French airports that took in the vast majority of those millions – with Paris’ Roissy-Charles de Gaulle (CDG) and Orly airports responsible for more than half of the air traffic.

France’s Cour de Comptes counted 73 mainland commercial airports in their 2023 review of the airline sector – but only 15 of those actually break even, the rest rely on subsidies.

Some of these airports are exceedingly small, like Troyes which had just 1,562 passengers in 2023. Others, like Rodez with 31,577 passengers and Castres with 36,454 got a bit more.

Map of airports in France, including both passenger and non-passenger airports (Credit: l’UNION DES AÉROPORTS FRANÇAIS & FRANCOPHONES ASSOCIÉS – UAF & FA)

Limoges was larger, with 264,426 passengers in 2023, but it still paled in comparison to the 10.8 million that passed through the Marseille airport.

The cost of small-to-medium sized airports

The former head of the Air Transport Institute, Jacques Pavaux, authored a 2019 study on public aid to airports, finding that those with less than one million passengers per year are not profitable, noting that only 15 of France’s airports get enough traffic to be profitable.

As for the others, most have been loss-making for years, unable to continue services without significant aid from the state.

“Their chronic deficit has been filled by recurring operating subsidies granted over decades of existence. Almost half of them have never had, and will never have, any chance of reaching the traffic threshold guaranteeing financial balance,” Pavaux wrote. 

The study found that state and local authorities spend around €90 million every year to help keep the small-to-medium sized airports afloat. 

Of the 73 airports listed in the Cour de Comptes report, a little over half (38) counted fewer than 700,000 passengers a year. 

The Cour de Comptes called these “the most economically fragile”, noting that they depend on aid from local authorities to balance operations and carry out the necessary investments.

On top of that, many do not have negotiation options and find themselves competing with neighbouring airports, leaving them forced to take on contracts with low-cost airlines. 

As of 2021, low-cost air traffic represented more than 90 percent of commercial traffic for airports in Dôle, Vatry, Limoges, Bergerac, Nîmes, while it constituted all of the traffic at the Carcassonne, Tours and Béziers airports.

Over-density of airports

Some areas stand out for having a particularly high volume of commercial passenger airports, like Occitanie along the Mediterranean coast in southern France, which is home to nine.

The Cour de Comptes report found that in Occitanie 71.5 percent of regional airport traffic occurred at the Toulouse airport, followed by Montpellier with 14.4 percent.

The other seven – Carcassone, Tarbes, Perpignan, Nîmes, Béziers, Rodez and Castres – combined provided the remaining 14 percent of traffic. 

Valérie Renet, the head of the Occitanie Regional Chamber of Accounts, told France 3 that it is this ‘over-density’ that leads to financial losses, as “operating deficits are covered by public subsidies, that is to say that taxpayers’ money is used to balance the operation of these airports, usually for the benefit of low-cost companies.”

Last year, the airport of Bézers, which is “totally dependent on Ryanair”, received €5.1 million in public money to reach equilibrium, which equates to about €20.69 paid out per passenger, France Bleu reported. 

As for Ryanair, the company benefits from over €30 million in public subsidies – or €16 per passenger – from regional airports in Occitanie alone.

The picture is similar in Brittany, which is home to eight airports, though over 80 percent of traffic is concentrated in Brest, which has a little over one million passengers a year (as of 2018).

The future for small-to-medium sized airports

Building new airports has already become controversial – a proposal for a new airport at Notre-Dame-des-Landes near the city of Nantes was the subject of huge protests for years until in 2018 the project was officially abandoned.

But that doesn’t mean that the loss-making existing airports are under threat. 

In terms of what to do with the loss-making airports, Renet focused on the situation in Occitanie. She told France 3 that she was “not advocating for getting rid of the airports. They serve other needs specific to the region, not just commercial flights.”

For example, the Nîmes airport is a national hub for air rescue and civil protection operations, meanwhile ‘pelicandromes’ which are used to fight forest fires, are installed at the Béziers, Carcassone and Perpignan airports. 

Instead, Renet and the Cours de Comptes advocated for streamlining the management of airports to a regional, rather than local level. This would help to avoid overlapping flights – like a Pau-Paris and a Tarbes-Paris that take off around the same time.

The situation may also change in 2027, when the European Commission is due to examine public aid given to airports and whether large subsidies given to airports constitutes unfair competition.

There are also climate concerns, as France moves to invest more train transport to reduce carbon emissions. In 2021, the country passed a law banning domestic air links of less than two hours and 30 minutes when an alternative train option exists.

However, this law has so far only banned three routes: Orly-Bordeaux, Orly-Lyon, and Orly-Nantes.

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