Merriman told TTG’s Agenda 2022 seminar he would put together his ideas during parliament’s summer recess, reasoning there had not been enough interaction between government and industry during the pandemic.

"I’d like to see a rules-based approach so everyone can see how decisions are made and everyone is collectively making them,” he said. The government, he said, had given “warm words” on this, but made no firm commitments.

“That’s not good enough," Merriman continued. "We can’t have this industry shut down again for no justifiable reason.”

Lessons could be learned from other nations, he said. “We went to Germany – what was really telling was we sat down with officials from the department responsible for travel restrictions alongside the industry, they were joined at the hip.”

Merriman criticised the lack of sector-specific support during the pandemic, and singled out agents as needing particular help. “One of the things that struck me most was that it was the agent that was a special case within the special case – they were having to compensate one side and were not receiving anything on the other. That marked them out uniquely.

“There could have been some regulation changes, which struck me as common sense, that were brought to me by two agents from Hertfordshire and we couldn’t get the government to act on it. I think we owe it to the agent sector to look at where they are particularly negatively impacted by regulations to ensure those loopholes are closed off.”

Merriman said he wanted the transport committee to be involved in reform, adding work would continue over parliament’s summer recess. “I’d like to put together a shopping list of change and I would like to help champion that change," he said.

"We owe it to parts of the sector that have been the most impacted to ensure that if there’s any positive that comes from a terrible negative, it’s to ensure that type of thing can’t happen again.”

He said the government “must stop sacrificing travel” and work with the industry in future crises, describing its attitude during Covid as: “Let’s just shut down international travel – it looks like we’re doing something”.

He added: “That’s caused me great concern because I don’t believe the evidence and the data justified some of the decisions we saw being made. My concern then was if business can’t be done, there needs to be a sector-specific deal to compensate. Furlough alone is never going to be enough.”

On aviation, Merriman praised Gatwick for assessing summer and deciding it could only manage 825 flights a day in July and 850 in August compared to the 900 airlines wanted. He said this allowed airlines to consolidate in advance with less inconvenience to passengers.

“I was surprised other airports didn’t follow that approach. Only recently, Heathrow put a cap on passenger numbers rather than flights; I would have thought flights was the right thing.”

Merriman said the CAA should have more powers to intervene on issues like airport capacity. He also called for reform on airline insolvencies. “Every time there’s an insolvency we’re promised reform and it doesn’t happen.” He added collapsed airlines should be allowed to repatriate passengers.