KEY POINTS:
If grumpy Air New Zealand executives were to sneak up behind Don Huse and poke him with a stick, they'd still be unlikely to get a rise out of the former stockbroker who now runs New Zealand's biggest airport.
The softly spoken 60-year-old exudes calm. He isn't about to get drawn in to a public slanging match over how much he plans to increase airline landing fees.
"We actually have a very constructive engagement," says Huse of the consultation process with Air New Zealand - his biggest customer.
That's not quite the way the airlines have been playing it.
Air New Zealand said it was "shocked and stunned" by the draft proposal on new landing charges.
Local industry body BARNZ (The Board of Airline Representatives) has begun lobbying the Government for increased regulation of airports.
And the Geneva-based chief executive of the International Air Transport Association has called the New Zealand Government's reluctance to regulate airport monopolies an "embarrassment".
Last month Air New Zealand tried to reveal details of the confidential landing charges document - a move that forced Auckland Airport to seek (and win) a High Court injunction.
Huse is unfazed.
"There are some tensions, which I would like to see as constructive tensions," he says.
He is unsurprised by the strong reaction as they get down to the business end of the pricing process - something done every five years.
After 16 years' running three different airports - first as chief executive in Wellington, then chief financial officer at Sydney Airport before taking the top job at Auckland - he knows the game.
"That response is consistent with the response I have experienced from the airlines in connection with pricing in Sydney and also in Wellington," he says. "To that extent it comes with the territory."
Huse took on his first airport job when he became chief executive at Wellington in 1991 and saw the company through to privatisation in 1998. He then moved to Sydney as chief financial officer where he oversaw the upgrades needed for the 2000 Olympics and then the sale to investment bank Macquarie in 2002.
The following year he took the top job at Auckland.
After graduating from Victoria University, he worked as a stockbroker - in London and in Wellington with Daysh Renouf & Co (Sir Frank Renouf's firm).
The closer he got to business as a broker the more he wanted to get involved, he says. So he returned to university to qualify as a chartered accountant and then went to work in senior corporate finance with companies such as Cable Price Downer.
His first chief executive role was "something of a baptism by fire" as he was handed control of Downer subsidiary Rex Consolidated - a manufacturing company that was effectively rendered obsolete by the economic upheaval of the mid-1980s.
Without import controls and quotas, businesses like Rex were in an almost impossible position, he says.
"What we eventually ended up doing was selling off the different component parts of the business to different owners."
But, as much as it sounds like a nightmare, Huse applies his understated positivity.
It was challenging, he says. "But it also meant you learnt an enormous amount about business and managing change. That has been good for me ... in areas of infrastructure where there has been a great deal of change."
Prior to taking on the Wellington Airport job he became a director of Hutt Valley Energy and oversaw its transition to a listed company - initially as Energy Direct Corporation and then finally as Trans Alta.
He is proud of his involvement with New Zealand's two major airports.
"Across New Zealand infrastructure there are big deficits in any number of critical sectors," he says. "You don't find that in New Zealand Airports."
He attributes a lot of the success in the sector to the regulation the airlines are currently rallying against.
The regulatory environment islargely the same as it was 20 years ago, he says.
The original aim of the legislation, from a public policy point of view, was to encourage investment in capacity; encourage economic growth; and provide the incentive for improved productivity on airports.
"I believe that policy has been very successful because that is what has been delivered at Auckland, Wellington, Christchurch and Dunedin airports." What upsets the airlines is that the current regulation regime ultimately gives the airports final say on price setting.
There might be some consultation but there is no real negotiation, they argue.
Even Huse describes the current regulatory regime as "light-handed" but he doesn't accept it is a one-sided and he remains relentlessly positive.
The airlines do have significant power under the current regime, he says.
"They are able to use the media and lobbying to articulate their position very powerfully. In the event there is a dispute, there are judicial review proceedings. A high court judge has the opportunity to look at expert evidence and make an informed decision."
If the airports don't meet the standards required the Government can step in and change the regulatory environment, he says - although he doesn't expect that to happen anytime soon.
Huse is also keen to emphasise that, while there are passengers to consider, there are also 53,000 shareholders who need a fair return on their investment.
"The vast majority of them are mums and dads who've committed their lifetime savings at least in part to invest in this company. Of those 50,000 you have a number of professional investment funds ... which in turn are investing on behalf of tens of thousands of additional people," he says. "I have, through the board, a real responsibility to protect that and grow that investment."
And grow the airport must.
It is about halfway through a $500 million capital expenditure programme.
Auckland Airport has peak-hour capacity of 2000, which will grow to 2500 in the next couple of years - an increase of 25 per cent.
But visitor growth is expected to grow at 4 per cent for the next six years. So it won't take long for the airport to reach capacity again.
Air traffic growth is exceeding GDP growth almost everywhere in the world, he says.
From the threat of terrorism to bird flu to the growing panic about global warming, nothing has been able to stop that.
"You have to trust in growth," Huse says. "But you also need the flexibility to undertake investment in an incremental way. So you have a period of expansion that gives you a bit of excess capacity, then the growth comes through and you allow it to get a little bit tight under the armpits again."
For example, the main runway has been upgraded to handle the new Airbus A380 supersized jumbo jets even though there is little chance the planes will become regular visitors for many years.
"It is important that we don't become a branch line out of Sydney."
That meant investing in assets and staff. and the costs of that must be met by the users.
"If the user doesn't pay for it then some other party is being asked to subsidise the provision of those services. There may be the case for that in terms of the certain social services. But if you're looking at a public transport facility like ours - people who use it should reasonably expect to pay for it."
Don Huse
Chief executive Auckland International Airport
Age: 60
Married with two adult sons.
Grew up in the Hutt Valley.
Went to Nelson College.
A chartered accountant, with a degree in economics from Victoria University of Wellington.
Is a member of the New Zealand and Australian Institute of Directors.
1998-2003: chief financial officer of Sydney Airport Corp.
1991 to 1998: chief executive of Wellington International Airport.
Hobbies: Golf, boating, theatre.
