I think you're throwing away our only fair chance at safeguarding the second most important economic pilar of our country's economy if you outright reject that idea!
In the past, you've been very much in favour of an IAG alternative, but so far I haven't seen any sort of an advantage of such a plan for our country:
- would a full alternative be up in the air faster?
- would it carry more passengers?
- employ more staff?
- on better terms?
I doubt it on each account, so exactly where is the public benefit in it then, if I may ask you?
Remember the bottom line profitabily of a company is of no direct concern to us, for as long as we're no shareholders of it. What matters to us as taxpayers are the answers on the above questions, as these are the parameters that determine the value of a privately held company to a country's economy and ultimately its fiscal budget.
Whether or not Brussels Airlines -or any alternative to that- would have booked huge profits over the past 5 years, they would still be asking for public money today given the worldwide slump in traffic, so to us the outcome would be exactly the same. It might make you more proud if 'our' airlines make as much money as SWISS reportedly does, but what truly matters to a non-shareholding citizen is if it can contribute as much to our country's economy as SWISS reportedly does.