UK airport company, Heathrow, has called for the significant expansion of “green” countries and a list of countries expected to be open for summer holidays. Heathrow lost 6.2 million passengers in April, down 92.1%, compared to pre-pandemic 2019 figures, following over a year of restrictions on non-essential travel.
“Whilst we welcome the lifting of the travel ban from 17th May, the green list is overly cautious, given the other controls in place on passengers travelling from low risk countries. The next review in 3 weeks’ time should bring a significant expansion to the list of “green” countries, including the United States, to increase trade, reunite friends and families with their loved ones. Government should help people plan ahead by publishing a list of countries expected to be on the green list for the summer holidays so that passengers are not faced with high prices for last minute bookings” commented Heathrow in a press release.
The airport stated that the rapid progress on vaccination and increased confidence in its effectiveness against variants of concern should allow a “significant simplification of the “traffic light” system at the end of June, including allowing fully vaccinated people to travel without restrictions”.
Commenting on concerns regarding border queues, Heathrow stated that it welcomed UK Government plans to automate border checks, but until they have been implemented, says that “Ministers should ensure that every desk is staffed at peak times to avoid unacceptable queue times in immigration.”
Heathrow CEO, John Holland-Kaye, said: “The Government’s green list is very welcome, but they need to expand it massively in the next few weeks to include other low risk markets such as the United States, and remove the need for fully vaccinated passengers to take two expensive PCR tests. Border Force’s claims that “long queues in immigration are inevitable” smack of complacency – they are completely avoidable if Ministers ensure that all desks are staffed at peak times.”
Meanwhile, it has been revealed by BBC News that Heathrow Airport is considering contingency plans to divert aircraft to other UK airports or EU hubs if queues at the border become too long.
The airport has seen queues of up to six hours at the border over the last few months as the number of checks and paperwork for UK arrivals increased.
A Heathrow spokesperson said: "Instead of telling passengers to brace themselves for a long wait in immigration queues, Border Force should step up its efforts to automate checks for green list countries, and put in place additional resource for passengers where manual checks might be needed. Accepting delays is a further demonstration of complacency from them on the matter.
"There are protocols in place to hold passengers on planes or divert them to other airports, to prevent excessive, unnecessary and completely avoidable queues in immigration halls."
A Home Office spokesperson said: "Protecting public health is our priority and as we reopen international travel safely, we will maintain 100% health checks at the border to protect the wider public and our vaccine rollout.
"While we do this, wait times are likely to be longer and we will do all we can to smooth the process, including the roll-out of our e-Gate upgrade programme during the summer and deploying additional Border Force officers.