Over 600 British tourists were stranded at the airport of Chania on the island of Crete on Friday due to disturbances in UK airports.
A total of 614 British tourists were bound to leave for Manchester and London. However, the three flights were cancelled due to lack of necessary ground staff at the respective UK airports, local media cretalive reported.
According to information obtained by local media cretalive.gr , the travelers were informed shortly before the departure time that they will not fly due to lack of necessary ground staff at the respective UK airports.
According to the local news website Cretalive, with the care of the airlines, the 614 passengers spent the night in hotels in the city of western Crete.
The phenomenon is obviously not observed only in Crete but in all airports with airlines struggling to cope with staff shortages and strikes in UK tha force them to cancel hundreds of flights in view of the peak of the summer season, noted cretalive.gr.
According to the government’s own figures there are currently more job vacancies in the UK than there are unemployed people. Given that many of the unemployed will not have the necessary skills to fill the vacancies, how are companies supposed to fill them. The government will only grant visas to allow people from abroad to fill these posts for high paid jobs but many of the jobs are not paid enough. From where can the airlines recruit cabin crew? From where can the airports recruit baggage handlers and security staff? The government itself wants to cur public sector posts so there are nowhere near enough immigration officers. One day recently there were 3 immigration officers on duty at Gatwick airport at peak travel times.
It doesn’t just affect travel. Many venues in the hospitality industry have simply not reopened, or are open reduced hours since COVID restrictions were lifted because they cannot recruit enough staff. Government ideology is destroying the UK economy and travellers are simply collateral damage in their culture wars.
Totally agree.
Cabin crew and baggage handlers are extremely skilled jobs and full university degree should be the absolute minimum for applicants.
Your idea about more public sector workers is also spot on.
We should keep expanding the public sector until all the unemployed are found some kind of job and their salaries will make a great contribution to our economy – to say nothing of the gold-plated pensions.
I am sure that if we nationalised the hospitality ‘industry’ it would solve the recruitment problems.
Up the workers!
I’m in Greece. There are enough problems in Greece without fearmongering about the UK’s labour market problems (I do hope the 600 have recovered after their ordeal). The UK has left the EU. Maybe in the near future there will be new partnerships / alliances formed. At the moment the UK will have to adapt to the changing labour market forces through the transitional phase post Brexit and the Covid. There’s a difference between the unemployment rate and people who are economically inactive. London, alone, where over 300 languages are spoken has been at the forefront as a multicultural city (I am not sure what you mean by culture wars). In London alone the are over 500 skyscrapers planned or being built, together with the near completion of Crossrail, shows that the UK has the capacity to get those strawberries picked or enough bag handlers available.
It’s an EU problem too and nothing to do with the government, we have the same problems in Greece since Corona Virus and our German friends said they have exactly the same problems there!!!
There seems to have been a lack of forward planning by the airline/tourist industry/government in the UK. What a surprise: post-Covid bringing an easing of travel restrictions, summer holiday time after two years of lockdown and everyone wants to get away but the aforementioned didn’t see it coming.
Strangely, Leeds/Bradford airport reported a few days ago that they were fully staffed.
How did they manage that? Guess work?
Talking to new arrivals on Zakynthos, they all report no real problems at regional airports such as Exeter, Doncaster, Leeds/Bradford, etc. Only the major airports seem all at sixes and sevens. Maybe I’m wrong but is there a moral to be learned here: bigger is not always better.
There is a staffing shortage here in the bars and restaurants so the sensible approach seems to have been to pay higher wages to attract more people. Magic? Not really, just good business sense.
Finally, can anyone explain why the major tour operators/airlines like Tui and EasyJet are still selling holidays when they can’t cope with existing demand. Perhaps I’m being naive. Wouldn’t be the first time.