Abta warns pandemic threatens more than 90,000 travel jobs

Mark Tanzer, Abta chief executive, said: “With the government’s stop-start measures, the restart of travel has not gone as hoped for the industry, and sadly businesses continue to be adversely affected and jobs are being lost at an alarming rate.

"Coming towards the end of the traditional period for peak booking, we have hit a critical point as existing government measures to support businesses begin to taper off, the consequence of which, according to this survey of Abta members, will be ruinous for more people’s livelihoods.

“Travel desperately needs the government in its next [spending] review to provide tailored support or tens of thousands more jobs will be lost. We have already seen well-known and respected businesses that would normally be successful falling into administration, and more are sadly set to follow unless the government can Save Future Travel.”

Abta’s plan calls for a regionalised approach to quarantine, without which the association believes it will be difficult to engage "critical trade partners" such as those in the US.

Additionally, the association says it is vital to start incentivising consumers to book holidays, and has called for an Air Passenger Duty holiday covering summer 2021 to help cut prices.

Abta’s five-point Save Future Travel plan includes:

1. Regionalise quarantine – moving to a regionalised quarantine and Foreign Office travel advice policy will provide additional certainty for businesses and consumers;

2. Introduce testing – introducing a testing regime will enable travel to resume to major global trading partners and mitigate the risk of infection from high risk countries;

3. Grant an APD holiday – to boost demand for travel, including summer holidays in 2021;

4. Provide recovery grants and other business support measures – travel agents, the vast majority of whom are SMEs, receive the majority of their income through commission that is paid on the departure, so these businesses will need support to get them through to the next major travel period next Easter. The government can support these businesses by issuing another round of grants, based on those offered to retail, hospitality, and leisure businesses earlier in the crisis, and extending other business support measures into 2021/22;

5. Give ongoing salary support – with the furlough scheme drawing to a close at the end of October, the government should consider extending support for businesses that have not seen a significant recovery in revenues, as has happened elsewhere, such as Australia. Targeting salary support where it is needed until March 2021 would reduce the cost to the Treasury and could preserve tens of thousands of jobs in travel.