Airports: Standards

(asked on 6th June 2022) - View Source

Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what recent discussions he has had with airport leaders on disruption and delays at UK airports.


Answered by
Robert Courts Portrait
Robert Courts
Solicitor General (Attorney General's Office)
This question was answered on 14th June 2022

Since the beginning of the year, Ministers and Officials have been engaging extensively with the sector to gain a greater understanding of the issues facing the industry. We have taken action in a range of areas, including security alleviations, skills and recruitment to support the aviation industry. This includes the Secretary of State changing the law on the 29 April to alleviate pressures on industry background checks for new recruits going through training and has allowed HMRC Employment History letters to be used as part of the background check, with suitable safeguards in place. This will help speed up the recruitment process.

On 12 May Minister Hinds, Minister of State for Security and Borders and I, hosted a roundtable with leaders from across the aviation industry. This meeting addressed the upcoming increase in passenger demand for the May Half Term and Summer holidays as well as providing industry with a comprehensive update from Border Force on their preparations.

At the same time Senior Officials established the Summer Resilience Group ahead of the May half-term that brings together Operational Directors to work through key resilience issues, which continues to meet regularly in addition to regular bilateral meetings.

On 1 June, the Secretary of State and I chaired a meeting with airports, airlines and ground handlers in order to understand the specific issues they were facing over half term and the actions they were taking to result these.

An action from this meeting was to set up the Strategic Risk Group which I am now chairing on a weekly basis. This will bring together senior representatives of airlines, airports and ground handlers to focus on solutions that minimise disruption over the summer for the public.

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