Blame game won’t fix this travel fiasco
Who is responsible for the shambolic scenes at some of our airports, where scores of cancelled flights have ruined family holidays? The travel industry, the airports, the airlines and Government ministers all accuse each other of a failure to prepare for a rapid recovery in demand after the pandemic. Stuck in the middle are the poor holidaymakers who bought a package or a flight in good faith, turned up at the airport on time only to find their hopes of a half-term break in the sun wrecked with hardly an explanation.
At Manchester, it fell to the police to tell travellers bound for the Greek island of Kos that their plane was cancelled “for operational reasons” and that they were entitled to a refund plus a voucher. Why on earth was this made the business of the police? Perhaps the anger was such among disappointed travellers that there was a fear of disorder, but that is no excuse for those directly responsible to pass the buck.
To some extent it is hardly surprising after locking down the economy for the best part of two years and banning overseas travel that there should be problems when the restrictions are removed. But the pandemic controls were eased in January and most of the problems seen this week are to destinations in Europe that have been open for months.
It cannot have come as a surprise that this half-term, on the cusp of summer and containing two bank holidays, would be especially popular with would-be travellers. So why were preparations so inadequate? More to the point, if the airlines could not cope, why did they sell the seats in the first place?
Even travellers who have managed to get away face long waits for their bags to arrive in the terminal on their return. Airlines or their contractors appear to have laid off too many staff during the pandemic and then failed to recruit enough to meet the resurgent demand.
Labour has blamed the Government and certainly the confusing traffic light system that operated, largely unnecessarily, towards the end of the pandemic created uncertainty for the travel trade and cost it dearly. But Labour supported these measures, so it is a bit much to turn around now and blame ministers for the mess.
The cause of this fiasco is a chronic shortage of staff. Instead of blaming each other, the various groups responsible need to get together and sort it out.