Gibraltar, a little closer
 

The Spanish and British governments have agreed to begin air services between Madrid and Gibraltar, presumably by December, together with lots of other measures designed to bring the three parties closer together.

(all of the above is just my reading of the news, not a direct quote).

Edited to add a link in English: http://news.independent.co.uk/europe/article1616640.ece

Should just clairfy here:

The agreement is between the British, Spanish and Gibraltar governments.

That is the only reason this agreement has been possible, the previous 1987 airport agreement was never implemented beacuse the Gibraltar government was not consulted and did not approve of it (giving up partial sovereignty of their own airport just to be treated with neighbourly respect).

Anyway, the Spanish government have finally realised that discussing Gibraltar without the Gibraltarians is just quite simply not going to work and utterly pointless in practice, if you want things to work you need to talk to the competant authorities - in this case the Government of Gibraltar.

All three governments took part eqaully, and for the first time respected their differences of legal opinion between Spain and Gibraltar and the UK (though the UK and Gib govt are in agreement on 95% of their legal poistion).

The proposed operation is very sensible, there will be a special entry/exit route from the new airport terminal located in Gibaltar but connecting direclty to Spain.

As such, customers using Gib apt from Spain who are flying to or from a Spanish airport will not have to clear Gibraltar imigration and customs only to then repeat the procedure moments later.

Also, any passenger departing from Gibraltar airport to a Spanish airport - regardless of whether they are flying from Gibraltar normally (or using the new special entrance) - will be 'pre-schengen-cleared' enabling them a much more rapid entry at their spanish destination airport.

Spain will also finally recognise the official +350 dialing code for Gibraltar, and abandon the silly number prefixing and number shadowing game which resulted in different numbers needing to be dialed to reach a phone depending upon where you are.

Iberia will start a new daily service MAD-GIB on 16 DEC.

Another means of avoiding the cross-London shuffle! Hooray!

Now you get to travel from T4 to T4S at MAD, which is almost as far as LHR-LGW (or certainly feels it!!).

This will be quite a novelty - a pre-cleared Schengen flight!

GB Airways Press Release (20/03/07) FLIGHTS TO MADRID FROM MAY 1, 2007
 

For your info;

GB Airways has confirmed the start of its new flights to Madrid from Gibraltar this summer.

The flights will start on May 1, 2007 with a daily service to the Spanish capital. The Spanish carrier Iberia will code share with this British Airways service.

Operating every day, flights will depart from Gibraltar at 1940* arriving at 2100 and from Madrid at 2130 arriving at 2240.

On confirming the schedule, Kevin Hatton, GB Airways managing director said: “Gibraltar is at the very heart of the airline and we are very pleased developing Gibraltar’s air services.

Our partnership with Iberia is key to the development and the schedule opens up the possibility of short business trips to the Rock and the surrounding region. ”

One-way fares will start at £32 plus taxes from Gibraltar, 48 euros plus taxes from Madrid. ^

I wish we had that same pre-clearance flying from the UK to the rest of the EU...... :(

Even better would be to sign up to Schengen, although I can't see the UK and IRL governments doing that any time soon.