Belfast City Airport’s highest paid director received a £653,000 package last year, documents filed with Companies House reveals.
The aggregate emoluments stated in the annual report represent a £244,000 increase on the 2022 sum.
Aggregate emoluments are the total amount of remuneration paid to directors of a company for their services, including salaries, fees, bonuses, and commissions.
It’s understood the package was paid to the airport’s chief executive Matthew Hall, who took over from Brian Ambrose in August 2021.
The £653,000 package makes the former London City Airport chief commercial officer one the highest paid CEOs in Northern Ireland.
It comes as Belfast City Airport reported its passenger numbers jumped by 28% last year, with the terminal edging closer to pre-pandemic levels of activity.
Some 2.115 million passengers used the east Belfast airport in 2023.
That was 460,000 more than in 2022, but still around 342,000 lower than the 2.46 million passengers recorded in 2019.
The latest set of accounts for Belfast City Airport Ltd reveals its annual turnover jumped by 25% last year to £23.5 million, almost £5m more than in 2022.
The accounts published by Companies House confirm the airport business also reported its first annual operating profit since the impact of Covid-19 in 2023.
But despite recording an operating profit of £1.5m for the 12 months to December 31 2023, Belfast City Airport officially ended last year with a pre-tax loss of £1.93m.
That was due to £3.537m in interest and banking charges, the bulk of which (£3.453m) was recorded as ‘interest payable to group undertakings’.
The airport, which was bought by pension funds managed by 3i in late 2016, has never reported a pre-tax profit under its new ownership.
The airport incurred significant losses in three years following the collapse of anchor airline Flybe and the declaration of the Covid-19 pandemic in March 2020.
Annual turnover fell to just £6.3m in 2020.
However, like Belfast International and City of Derry airports, Belfast City was in receipt of government support during the worst days of the pandemic.
Accounts filed for the company valued the government support at around £7.8m across 2020 and 2021.
However, the airport has bounced back with Emerald Airlines and EasyJet now operating 20 routes between them.
EasyJet and Lufthansa have also further expanded the airport’s reach into mainland Europe.
The airport said its efforts to diversify its portfolio of airlines meant no single carrier had greater than 40% of total passengers during 2023, with up to 10 airlines in operation.
Belfast City Airport had 81 staff on its books at the end of 2023, four more than in 2022, with £4.9m paid in wages last year, a 14% increase on the previous year.
