UK air traffic control price hike ‘rewarding failure’, says Ryanair
James ChappleRyanair has condemned the CAA’s decision to allow the UK’s air traffic control provider, Nats, to hike its charges by more than a quarter – months after a catastrophic failure of its systems over the August bank holiday weekend.
The budget carrier said the decision, which will see the fees rise from an average of £47 per flight to £64 per flight over the period to 2027, an increase of around 43p per passenger, would tacitly reward Nats for its failure.
Tim Alderslade, chief executive of Airlines UK, the trade body representing UK registered airlines, described the decision as "another kick in the teeth for passengers" whom he said would "inevitably end up footing the bill of millions of pounds".
The CAA’s decision came a little over a week after Nats chief Martin Rolfe was hauled up before parliament’s transport committee to defend its handling of the outage, which affected thousands of flights leaving hundreds of thousands of passengers in limbo or stranded.
Appearing before the committee, Ryanair and easyJet have demanded compensation for Nats, claiming the incident cost them in the region of £15 million each. Nats later traced the issue to a single rogue flight plan.
In late September, Gatwick was forced to cap air traffic movements owing to shortages of ATC staff. Chief executive Stewart Wingate pinned the decision on high levels of short-term sickness.
Ryanair, which claims it pays Nats almost €100 million a year for UK ATC services, said the UK’s ATC provider "should not be rewarded for these repeated failures", adding that until Nats is able to provide full staffing at weekends during the summer peak, it should not be allowed to increase its fees.
It has reiterated its call for Rolfe to resign, and has urged the CAA to reverse its decision.
"Ryanair calls on the CAA to reverse this illogical decision to award a 26% price increase to Nats and believes no increase should be awarded until Nats delivers the service it is already being paid for without staff shortages, without capacity restrictions and without complete system shutdowns," said O’Leary.
Posting on LinkedIn, Loganair chief executive Jonathan Hinkles warned larger airlines could seek to avoid UK airspace as a result, with any additional fuel burn made up for by the savings on Nats charges.
This, he cautioned, would generate less income for Nats, increasing the burden "for those left behind but have no alternative" but to use UK airspace, such as regional carriers like Loganair.
The CAA said its decision would allow Nats to continue recouping its losses from the pandemic, and reinvest in strengthening its service and resilience.
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