A Ryanair spokesperson said yesterday that the company had asked Manchester airport to cut landing charges in order “to reflect the lower fares being paid by passengers in the current recession”. Manchester offered to go down to as low as three pounds per passenger but this was not enough for Ryanair. An airport spokesman said: “With all of our investment in Manchester airport, including during the current recession, we don’t believe that charges of £3 per passenger are unreasonable. Clearly Ryanair do and that is regrettable.” The defection from Manchester airport will cost 600 jobs locally and follows Ryanair’s move to cut flights at the international airports in Stansted and Dublin. Stansted charges more than six pounds per passenger and so last year Ryanair cut their flights from Stansted by a third. The 44 weekly flights which will no longer run from Manchester airport (beginning October 2009) would have carried around 600,000 passengers through the airport every year. Affected passengers will receive an email and an alternative flight offer from airports such as Leeds Bradford, Liverpool and East Midlands. Bremen, Brussels Charleroi, Cagliari, Düsseldorf Weeze, Frankfurt Hahn, Girona, Marseille, Milan Bergamo and Shannon are the routes from Manchester airport which will be affected. Ryanair will email affected passengers and offer a full refund or alternative flights from East Midlands, Leeds Bradford (where it has opened a new base) or Liverpool airports. It plans to run more budget flights from these smaller airports. Data shows that once airports get over the five million mark in terms of passengers they become extremely profitable due to the parking and retail revenue. Andrew Fitchie, an aviation analyst with broker Collins Stewart said: “The big incentive is to discount landing charges to drive up passenger numbers because once you are through the magic five million mark, the money from retail and parking and so on really adds up.” Manchester international airport remains one of the busiest in England with more than 20 million passengers using it every year, compared to the five million or so passengers who use Liverpool and East Midlands airports. Car Hire Manchester Airport is available at a cheap price.