To ask IF this government have done enough to help aviation?

[mummsnetty]

With all the news of baggage issues, flights being cancelled, queues to check in and security the government response has been that they have done their bit.

Have they?

Did they but they should still do more now?

Yep

Why should the govt help an industry that is directly contributing to the climate crisis?

I think the only thing the government could have really done is extend the furlough scheme solely for hospitality, events and travel which couldn't operate at normal capacity.

My local airport have been advertising for staff for months and months. But like everywhere else offering fairly low paid work with crap hours, they're struggling to fill roles.

How long does it take to get a train further than Europe?

The aviation industry provides a huge amount of jobs directly and indirectly, and supports millions more by allowing people to travel, not to mention the huge number of people who travel for leisure and the massive amount of goods which are shipped around the world. Letting the industry go bust or being reduced to just a small number of operators would be devastating.

I wondered that, too. Crawley had a large Polish community and an awful lot of them worked in airline related stuff at Gatwick. I wouldn't be at all surprised if many of them went back home.

My employer (not aviation related!) lost a lot of EU staff because of Brexit, even though they put a lot of effort into helping them apply for settled status if they wanted to.

Relax some of the ludicrous safety regulations ?

Maybe instead of adverts of people who do ballet retraining in "cyber" they should have retrained in "flying" ?

The real truth is 2019 isn't ever coming back. WIth the price of everything increasing, the age of "cut price" travel is long gone. And while it's annoying with fripperies like flying abroad, it's going to be more serious when it's the really skilled staff we realise aren't there.

There are only two ways to solve a "skills crisis". You either raise the skills of the workforce (by education and immigration). Or you decrease the "skills" needed for the job. Personally I am amazed we still waste years training doctors when you've been able to become an expert in hours on Facebook and Twitter.

The problems at airports aren’t necessarily the fault of the airlines. Manchester airport employs some its own staff and other staff are provided by subcontractors. If people don’t want to work in airport-based roles for the salaries offered, then the airports need to offer better salaries. They aren’t incentivised to do that, though. They would prefer to let the passengers take the pain by queuing for hours at security or waiting hours for their bags to be unloaded, etc.

Re the airlines (who a PP said were making ‘obscene profits’ before the pandemic: trust me, they were not! I spent five years in the industry and it’s actually quite difficult to make money out of offering flights alone), I can see why they shed operational staff during the pandemic if it was that or seeing the business fail, but it’s not exactly difficult to recruit extra cabin crew and pilots. Candidates are generally banging the door down. I suspect that what we’re seeing is a lag between recruiting and training.

That doesn’t make it any easier for people having their holidays cancelled at short notice, but what do you expect the tour operator to do? Cut corners and take risks? That would be a good look, wouldn’t it? A PP noted that airlines and tour operators are wet leasing, but that’s not infallible.

As for ‘let them go bust’: I saw quite a few statements of that nature on here in 2020 when posters were complaining about the cost of the furlough scheme. Let hospitality go bust, let aviation go bust etc etc. Forgetting, as @captainmarvel notes upthread, that aviation and associated industries provide a load of skilled and well-paid jobs, both directly and indirectly, as well as lower-paid roles. So I wouldn’t be so quick to bash the airlines.

You can't entirely blame an industry that has basically been unable to make money for 2 years being optimistic and ending up in this situation though. Yes it's been mismanaged horribly but you can see why the situation has developed.

Compared to other EU countries the government DID make it far more difficult than it needed to be with their inability to land on a consistent set of rules and slowness of response in providing support to the industry.

Well put. I say this as someone who lives in the EU and needs/needed to come to the UK regularly for work. The management of the pandemic when it comes to travel in UK vs EU was vastly different.

The UK implemented travel restrictions late - they were always one or two steps too outdated compared to the rest of the world. There were no clear parameters as to how and when a country would end up on red/amber list. My company couldn’t just monitor Covid levels and predict when the UK would shut its borders to XYZ country - something we could do for virtually any other EU country.

When vaccinations kicked in, it took the UK eight months to acknowledge that an international vaccination certificate had the exact same validity as an NHS one. Prior to that, people who had been vaccinated abroad - even if a British national - were required to quarantine and/or pay hundreds in tests. Simply because the nurse that had jabbed their arm them was not an NHS employee but a French / American / Norwegian equivalent. Madness.

The key words in the quoted poster’s comment are slowness of response. Everything was one step too slow or too behind. When the EU was actively upping its travel offer for Christmas holidays, the UK was implementing a lockdown towards the end of a wave, after failing to put it in place when the numbers were actually climbing. When the EU relaxed its summer restrictions, the UK was too concerned with ‘eat out to help out’ instead of also thinking about the travel industry.

Furlough was offered but airlines also chose to lay off people. The airports were not running kept at minimum capacity, instead they went below that level. Travel rules would be put in place whenever the public kicked off a bit, instead of thinking of what would be most beneficial long term - that was definitely not shutting down virtually the whole industry.

This is not an EU vs UK post, I just wanted to compare the two situations. Not only the travel industry in the UK has suffered from slowness of response and passive decision-making - other industries such as the arts have also been decimated by it.

I’m in the arts and where I live we were offered tests, new ventilation and decent public funding to acquire cameras and move all our production online, but with in-person work. Not one major outbreak. My colleagues in the UK were kept at home for an entire 18 months because it was too ‘dangerous’ to work. Same with travel. It wasn’t dangerous to travel - you just needed to throw the necessary resources at it, and think long-term of an industry that employs and moves millions of people each year.

The Govt was VERY generous with furlough, loans, grants, etc., to the entire aviation industry, from airports to airlines. There's a limit to how much a govt can continue pumping millions/billions into what is a private industry. It was entirely reasonable that the businesses themselves and their owners stump up out of their reserves/personal wealth to keep their businesses from going under. At the end of the day, far too many businesses sacked their staff to go on benefits, in the glib assumption they'd coming running back when wanted. The businesses have been caught out and are now suffering from their mistakes.

The government did very little to support the aviation industry in comparison with the costs involved. It states it gave £8 billion in support. This is peanuts. BA burnt through most of their £9 billion cash reserve for example. TUI had monthly costs of £600 million (although it got a lot of support from the German government - £6 billion I think). This is just two airlines.

We need aviation to connect us with the rest of the world (now more than ever after Brexit). There are consequences to the "shut the border", "just stay at home" "holidays are illegal" mantra. Red lists / amber lists / green lists etc. You can't shut an entire industry for 2 years and expect to click your fingers and it still be there when you want it.

The phrase "use it or you will lose it" springs to mind.

Also furlough wasn't a cost less system. It still cost the airlines to have the employees on their books so these needed to be accounted for. Also furlough only paid up to a certain amount. Lots of people at airlines and airports topped up their salary with overtime / flight pay etc. 80% of £2500 (if I recall correctly) simply didn't pay the bills for them.

The underlying issue is that the aviation industry just doesn’t pay enough to attract staff.

Ground staff have pretty miserable, hard work, with poor pay, conditions and hours.

There are many other jobs that pay much the same, yet are much easier and more pleasant across the board.

Why would the average baggage handler/security guard want to go back?

It’s all the airlines. They sacked staff for no reason who could have been furloughed. They treat their staff like crap. The bought in hefty pay cuts and now the industry is back to earning billions in profit they don’t want to give their staff their pay back to what it was. They are having their cake and eating it at the expense of the staff.

The underlying issue is that the aviation industry just doesn’t pay enough to attract staff.

The wider underlying issue is entire industries have been insulated from the need to pay their staff decent wages for years. Now the tide has turned and because the cost of living has (and will continue) to outpace the governments ability to skew the field, they are discovering a lot of staff simply can't afford to work for them (that's before you get to the fact peoples work choices have undergone a paradigm shift).

The bottom line is prices will increase and customers able to pay - by mathematical necessity - will decrease.

And all of that comes on top of a climate situation that is going to make the idea of moving masses of people around in planes look like a very bad idea even if the passengers put their arms out the windows and flapped to their destination.

Already the age of the huge 747s had passed. With fewer people able to travel the aircraft industry will be on slowdown.

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I worked in the airline industry many moons ago. It was a great job with good career progression, a good salary, a proper shift pattern where you were asked for your preference and a pension . In return, we were well educated, mostly all of us spoke a second language and we were loyal.

I have two friends still left in the industry, one a pilot and one ground staff. The job is now unrecognisable. 0300 starts! Minimum wage, split shifts. Who honestly would want any of that!

I worked in the airline industry many moons ago. It was a great job with good
career progression, a good salary, a proper shift pattern where you were asked for your preference and a pension . In return, we were well educated, mostly all of us spoke a second language and we were loyal.

As Mythbusters Jamie would say: "That's your problem right there". Luckily the investors stepped in to correct it to:

The job is now unrecognisable. 0300 starts! Minimum wage, split shifts. Who honestly would want any of that!

Now coming to a company near you. Who said P&O ?

I'm sorry, but this just displays a complete misunderstanding of how the industry works.

The government were slow to provide inadequate support and consistently moved the goalposts regarding restrictions. The aviation industry has huge fixed costs and run at tight margins so we can all fly from Edinburgh to London for £30. The "owners" of these companies are shareholders, what huge reserves of cash do you think these companies have to go 2 years without income? Airlines going under costs hundreds of jobs, reduces competition and reduces capacity and impacts us all.

Brexit is a factor, though some of those who returned to their country of birth or heritage would not return even if we were still in the EU. I know of several people who did not want ever to be in the position again of not being able to travel to loved ones such as elderly parents and re-evaluated their priorities.

I maintain that although low wages, cutting costs etc is the airlines and airports decision, government can set standards and regulations for consumer protection. No-one should have to wait to find out their plane is cancelled until they are at the airport, unless it is for weather related reasons.

I know of several people who did not want ever to be in the position again of not being able to travel to loved ones such as elderly parents and re-evaluated their priorities

Good point i know of people who have returned to the UK for the same reason.

Covid has made people look at their choices closer.

There’s also the fact that govt has specifically changed rules so that airlines must schedule minimum 70% of the airport slots they have in order to keep them. And many airlines weren’t able to robustly staff this number of flights.

www.independent.co.uk/business/airlines-forced-to-operate-more-flights-to-avoid-losing-airport-slots-b1999133.html?amp

Exactly. Not everything is the government’s fault.

Should government be helping aviation? You could argue that flying has been far too easy for far too long.

The airlines need to sort this. If they can't recruit they'll have to pay more and put up prices, which will reduce demand and mean they need fewer staff anyway. An adjustment from the days of very cheap and plentiful airtravel was needed IMO. It's amazing how things do find their equilibrium.

Aye, because 2 years of the government restricting air travel has nothing to do with the government.

Flying causes all sorts of issues for the planet and humans. We should stop doing it.

The eco conferences were only too quick to hop back on a plane to tell the poor they shouldn't fly.

Not flown since 1990. By choice.

With the cost of living increases about to bite it is unlikely this initial surge of travel may be sustained. Brexit may have had a role in difficulties reemploying former non UK based staff but they -airlines, tour operators, airports and support functions - made majority redundant rather than furlough so there are difficulties recruiting and training now. I think people also misremember some of the problems with luggage processing, delays, IT and cancellations which existed pre Pandemic. Security has been an issue since 9/11.

They are private companies who stand or fall based on their own merits. They did get help during the pandemic, but the issue with staffing etc are theirs and theirs alone- some of it coming from the manner in which they let staff go and also about pay and conditions prior to the pandemic.

we need to stop looking to the government to sort out every single negative/difficult situation by stepping in financially or practically- whether as individuals or businesses.