CAA REPORT SHOWS NATS MISLED PARLIAMENT OVER FLIGHT DELAYS, ENGINEERS AT HOME
AND LACK OF PRE-PLANNING

Ryanair, the UK’s no.1 airline, today (14 Mar) welcomed the CAA’s interim report into NATS’s ATC collapse on 28 Aug last, which disproves false claims made by CEO, Martin Rolfe, in NATS’s “Whitewash” Report published last Sept, including;

1. NATS claimed just 575 flights were “delayed” (approx. 100,000 pass.), but CAA confirms over 700,000 passengers were disrupted.
2. NATS CEO, Martin Rolfe, claimed “engineers worked as quickly as they could”, yet CAA confirms NATS engineers were not at work but were “at home due to the bank holiday”.
3. Under Martin Rolfe’s management, UK NATS has a lack of pre-planning, documentation, and coordination.

Given their mismanagement and incompetence, UK NATS must now reimburse airlines and passengers for the costs they suffered as a result of NATS’s system collapse on 28 Aug last. NATS overpaid CEO (£1.3m p.a.), should now be dismissed and get someone competent to run the UK ATC system for airlines and passengers.

Ryanair’s CEO Michael O’Leary said:

“Today’s CAA report rubbishes many of the false claims made by NATS in their Sept 2023 “Whitewash” report. The CAA confirms that over 700,000 passengers were impacted, and not just 575 flights (approx. 100,000 passengers), which Martin Rolfe originally claimed in front of the UK Parliament Transport Committee.

The CAA report confirms (unbelievably) that NATS engineers were sitting at home in their pyjamas on the UK’s August bank holiday weekend, which is one of the busiest travel weekends of the year for air travel. In any properly managed ATC service, engineers would be onsite to cover system breakdowns instead of sitting at home unable to log into the system. The fact that key NATS engineers were sitting at home during one of the peak travel weekends, combined with findings that NATS has a fundamental lack of pre-planning, documentation, and coordination, clearly demands senior management changes. Overpaid NATS CEO Martin Rolfe’s position in untenable. He should be removed, and somebody competent employed to run UK ATC, to ensure its engineers are at work during busy weekends and to ensure that UK NATS has a management team delivering a functional ATC system with adequate pre-planning, documentation, and coordination.  

UK airlines and passengers are paying NATS among the highest ATC fees in Europe. In Ryanair’s case, we pay over £100m p.a. and we are entitled to expect an efficient well-run service, rather than mismanagement and incompetence we suffered on 28 Aug 2023 due to the NATS system collapse. It’s time for Martin Rolfe to go, and if he won’t quit, then Transport Secretary Mark Harper (who owns 49% of NATS) should remove him.”