CALLS FOR DISMISSAL OF FAILED NATS CEO AFTER 4^TH ATC COLLAPSE IN 4 YEARS 

Ryanair, the UK’s No.1 passenger airline, today (Wed, 23 Sept) launched its Winter 2026 schedule from London and the UK, under which it will offer 435 routes (including 3 new routes from Stansted to Glasgow, Malmo and Parma & 1 new route from Luton to Venice) as well as another 18 new routes from 19 other UK airports. Ryanair continues to invest in and grow UK air travel and tourism despite the failed policies of the Labour Govt, which increased APD to £15 per passenger in 2026 – the highest visitor tax in Europe. And now, the new Labour Govt is proposing to “double tax” visitors by allowing Regional Mayors to impose a second “visitor tax” on hotel nights. Ryanair believes that visitors should be taxed only after they have arrived in the UK and called on the UK Govt to abolish UK APD, which deters visitors, especially price sensitive families, from visiting the UK in favour of lower cost, tax free jurisdictions elsewhere in Europe. 

In recent years Sweden, Slovakia, Albania, Hungary, and four of the bigger regions in Italy have abolished visitor taxes. The UK has gone the other way by raising APD to £15 per passenger, and now the new Burnham Govt proposes to “double tax” visitors by allowing Regional Mayors to levy a tax on hotel overnights. This double taxation of UK visitors will mean millions of UK visitors switching their travel to continental Europe and away from high tax UK. If the UK is serious about growing aviation and tourism, especially in the Regions, then it should abolish UK APD altogether at a cost of £2.5 billion p.a., as this would see a surge of new routes and growth in visitors to the UK in general, and to the UK regions in particular. 

Ryanair expects to carry 63M passengers to/from the UK in 2026. This makes Ryanair the UK’S biggest passenger airline, carrying almost double BA’s UK traffic. Ryanair has already submitted plans to the Labour Govt to grow UK traffic by 27% to 80M passengers by 2030, but this growth can only be delivered if the Govt abolishes its damaging and penal APD tax, which is now the highest in Europe. Sadly, these proposals didn’t even elicit a response from failed Chancellor Rachel Reeves, and we now call on new Chancellor, John Healy, to respond to this ambitious growth offer. 

Ryanair’s CEO, Michael O’Leary, said:  

“Imposing a second visitor tax on hotel nights will deter even more visitors coming to the UK. While we believe visitor taxes are appropriate once visitors are in the country, APD has failed to make the UK competitive or an attractive visitor destination, especially for families. We call on new Chancellor, John Healy, to abolish APD, which will stimulate rapid capacity, new route and traffic growth, and will dramatically boost the visitor taxes being charged by Regional Mayors in regional cities.  

If this double taxation goes ahead, Ryanair will review its capacity in the UK and we will inevitably switch some of this capacity to zero tax, lower cost destinations elsewhere in Europe. Potential visitors to the UK will switch to visiting Barcelona, Rome, Milan, Madrid, Stockholm, and other EU countries where there is no visitor tax at the point of entry (APD), and where costs are generally lower, and where accommodation and food costs are generally lower. If the UK wants to be competitive, it must abolish APD in favour of this new lower cost and competitive visitor tax on hotel nights You cannot double tax UK visitors and not lose them.. 

Ryanair also called on Transport Secretary, Heidi Alexander, to dismiss overpaid failed NATS CEO Martin Rolfe. After 4 significant collapses of the UK ATC system over the past 4 years, he has proved himself again and again to be incompetent. No other ATC system across Europe has suffered these systemic collapses over recent years, and it is time for NATS to appoint a new and competent CEO who will develop an effective backup system which can actually avoid mass flight cancellations and delays such as those that Martin Rolfe has presided over in July 2023, Aug 2025, and again in Sept 2026. 

The Government owns 49% of NATS, and their continuing failure to replace Martin Rolfe is typical of the incompetence of the Dept of Transport in general and the Aviation Ministry in particular. Martin Rolfe claimed on 8 Sept that he takes “full responsibility” for these repeated failures, yet clearly he does not because he remains in post, taking home pay and bonuses of £1.5 million p.a. It is time for this overpaid failure to go, and if he won’t accept responsibility and resign, then Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander should dismiss him.”