Heathrow unveils voluntary redundancy plan

LONDON: Heathrow Airport has launched a voluntary redundancy scheme and warned it cannot rule out further job cuts.

The company, which has around 7,000 directly employed staff, said it had agreed the scheme with unions as it battles to recover from the coronavirus crisis. It has already cut a third of its managerial roles.

Chief executive John Holland-Kaye said: “Throughout this crisis we have tried to protect frontline jobs but this is no longer sustainable, and we have now agreed a voluntary severance scheme with our union partners.

“While we cannot rule out further job reductions, we will continue to explore options to minimise the number of job losses.”

British Airways, which operates the most flights to and from the airport, has previously announced a plan to cut up to 12,000 jobs. A total of 76,000 people are employed across 400 different companies at Heathrow.

Holland-Kaye told the City AM podcast last week that cuts being made by airlines mean around 25,000 of these jobs could be at risk. Oliver Richardson, national officer for aviation at trade union Unite, said: “The jobs announcement at Heathrow is simply the latest blow to the aviation sector, and tens of thousands more jobs are at risk unless the Government gets a grip of the challenges the industry faces.”

He called for the Treasury to provide a “bespoke financial support package” for aviation. Just 228,000 passengers travelled through Heathrow in May, down 97 per cent on the same month last year.