Aviation bosses call for further easing of UK travel restrictions

Aviation bosses called on ministers to further ease travel restrictions ahead of the peak summer season as thousands of holidaymakers flew out of the UK on Monday following the latest lifting of coronavirus restrictions.

Airports saw a small rise in the number of people travelling after the partial lifting of tight border rules, removing a months-long ban on international leisure travel.

But passengers from Britain are only able to visit a handful of destinations such as Portugal and Gibraltar without quarantining on their return.

There was a steady trickle of passengers inside Heathrow Terminal 5’s cavernous check-in area on Monday morning, normally the busiest time of the week. The airport was expecting 11,000 departing passengers, more than in recent weeks but just 10 per cent of pre-pandemic levels. 

“It is a slow and steady start to travel, but just the fact it is legal again to get on a plane is transformational,” said John Holland-Kaye, Heathrow’s chief executive.

It was a similar picture at the UK’s other major airports, with the number of people flying still a fraction of what they would normally be at the beginning of the peak tourist season. One airport executive said some flights to “green list” countries such as Portugal were only half full.

“It’s a small step but it’s an important one,” said Sean Doyle, British Airways chief executive. His airline had 80 flights scheduled on Monday, about a tenth of normal levels. 

At Gatwick airport there were 57 flights scheduled, a measure of relief after falling to around a dozen during lockdown this year, but down from 838 on the same day in 2019.

A Ryanair flight to Faro in Portugal at 6am marked East Midlands airport’s first passenger flight in six months, while 5,000 passengers at tourist-focused Stansted represented just 6 per cent of normal levels. 

Doyle and Holland-Kaye both said the US, large parts of Europe and the Caribbean should be added to the UK’s “green list” for foreign travel in time for the summer holiday season.

But the government has been urging caution in recent days as concern has grown over the rapid spread of a Covid-19 variant first identified in India. Ministers have said people should not travel on holiday to countries on the “amber” list, which includes key tourist hubs such as France, Spain and Italy.

“Today the world is not open to us,” Doyle said.

The industry also wants ministers to publish a list of countries expected to be put on the “green list”, to encourage more people to book a summer holiday, and to exempt vaccinated passengers from expensive testing on their return.

“We are not advocating for an immediate return to unrestricted travel, but we can now responsibly allow travel to other low-risk destinations,” Holland-Kaye said.

Searches for holidays to Portugal rose sevenfold compared with the previous week after the country was put on the green list earlier this month, said BA, while there had also been a rise in interest for trips to Spain and the US, despite returning passengers facing self-isolation.

But after months of yearning for the return of passengers, airports are worried about huge queues at immigration if people return en masse this summer. Border Force officers are conducting checks on every returning passenger, to verify Covid-related documents including proof of a negative test. 

Queues have stretched to as long as six hours on occasion at Heathrow, but Holland-Kaye said he has received a personal assurance from Border Force that immigration queues will be manageable this summer. He said some electronic passport gates have been reopened after being upgraded with new technology to handle the new Covid documents.