Till yesterday, it was the airlines , travel agancies and other associated industry players complaining of the air travel shut down, battered finances but for the first time UK goverment felt the heat as it has lost a whopping £3billion due to the fall of air passenger duty revenues.
The lost air passenger duty revenues has definitely made a point to UK government to expedite the reopening of quarantine-free international travel from May 17, which is just 12 in number till date.
Practically, many of the destinations have very strict entry requirements on UK tourists. Portugal and Gibraltar are the only practical countries from the ‘green list’ that will see some travel movement from the UK.
It is expected that more European hotspots might enter the green list by the end of June once three-weekly reviews get under way. The first may be on June 7th.
It has come to the limelight that the UK Treasury received just £582million in air passenger duties between the period of April 2020 and 2021, compared to a pre-pandemic amount of around £3.6billion annually.
Also , the wider associated economy has taken a further toll of billions of pounds due to the shutdown of international travel.
Gloria Guevara, of the World Travel and Tourism Council, said: ‘After suffering the biggest fall in contribution towards GDP from travel and tourism of the ten most important global markets – by a staggering 62.5 per cent – the UK can ill afford to be this cautious.’
Karen Dee, of the Airport Operators Association, said: ‘The figures show just how near-complete the collapse in air traffic has been as a result of the pandemic. ‘ It is disappointing that the number of nations on the green list remains extremely limited and that vaccinated people are subject to restrictions when travelling to low-risk nations.’
Chairman of the all-party future of aviation group and Tory MP Henry Smith, said:
‘We need to re-open to more nations as soon as possible to allow much needed summer holidays, to restart leisure travel and to reunite families.’
