UK kicks off quarantine that will further slam airlines

London

THE UK is pressing ahead with a two-week quarantine on international arrivals, a move British Airways and other carriers say will devastate tourism and wreck any chance the summer holiday season could spark a recovery from a virus-induced slump.

BA, EasyJet Plc and Ryanair Holdings Plc have threatened to sue the government over the policy, which was to take effect on Monday, saying the restrictions will be ineffective at curtailing Covid-19 while threatening to destroy thousands of jobs. The airlines fear the move will make lockdown-weary customers put off bookings just as carriers add capacity.

"Even those people who would have thought about going away on holiday in July or August are now holding off from making bookings since nobody really knows how long the rules will last," said John Strickland, director of JLS Consulting in London, who has held senior positions at BA and KLM. "Being locked down at home for two weeks after a holiday is something that a lot of people can't really afford to do."

With virus infection levels on the decline in most European countries, governments have been easing travel restrictions, and beaches are opening in places like Greece, Spain and Portugal. Airlines are trying to salvage the summer season when tens of millions of people generally travel. The UK is one of the world's top 10 tourist destinations and attracted more than 35 million visitors last year, spending more than US$50 billion.

The quarantine would torpedo BA's plans to resume about 40 per cent of its scheduled flights in July and force it to continue burning £20 million (S$35.3 million) a day, the carrier said. EasyJet is planning to resume some of its scheduled flights from June 15, while Ryanair plans to restart flying July 1.

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London Heathrow may need to cut one-third of its 7,000 employees if the UK government doesn't indicate soon when it plans to relax the quarantine rule, the airport's chief executive officer, John Holland-Kaye, said in a CityAM podcast on Monday. Europe's busiest hub has already eliminated a third of operating costs and management posts, he said.

In a "pre-action" letter to the Home Office, IAG SA, the owner of BA, wrote that the quarantine is stricter than the one applied to people infected with Covid-19, and exemptions for people living in Ireland and workers who commute from France and Germany will make it ineffective. Ryanair and EasyJet also signed the letter.

"In our view, the government has failed to identify a valid justification for the blanket nature of the regulations, more especially given the extremely severe nature of the self-isolation provisions that apply," it said.

The Home Office declined to comment on the potential legal action, but James Slack, spokesman for Prime Minister Boris Johnson, told reporters last week the government wants to work with the airline industry as the UK moves through the pandemic.

The government defended the measure, saying it's a key part of the strategy to avoid a second wave of infections that could overwhelm the healthcare system and further devastate the economy. Britain has recorded 40,542 deaths, 10 per cent of the global total, though the number of cases and fatalities is gradually declining, with 77 deaths reported on Sunday. BLOOMBERG