BMI has confirmed Scottish agents’ fears by withdrawing from the Glasgow-Heathrow domestic trunk route from the end of March. The airline said forthcoming rises in domestic passenger charges from £13 to £20 at the London hub had made the loss-making route “unsustainable”.
BMI, which runs up to seven flights a day on the route, will drop the service on March 27. The Lufthansa-owned carrier will instead concentrate on profit-making international routes and other services, including new flights between Heathrow and Bergen and Morocco this summer.
BMI employs 138 staff at Glasgow airport and admitted around 80 to 90 were now “at risk of redundancy”. A 30-day formal consultation process with employees and unions has started to try to reduce the number of redundancies and redeployment options will be offered.
Confirmation that flights will be suspended from the start of the summer schedule follows attempts by the Scottish passenger Agents Association and MPs in Scotland to try to preserve the route which is seen as key for travellers wanted to transfer onto long haul services.
A BMI spokesman said: “Due to the recently announced increases by BAA in domestic passenger charges at London Heathrow effective 1 April 2011, BMI will regrettably suspend its seven daily flights between London Heathrow and Glasgow, from 27 March 2011.
“The increase in charges will make the already loss making route from London Heathrow to Glasgow unsustainable. The domestic passenger charges are now the same charges that a passenger would pay on an international flight to an EU destination, despite the fact that domestic passengers do not use the same facilities as international passengers, such as customs and immigration channels.
“In addition, landing charges at London Heathrow for an A320 family are the same or higher than an A380, which is unfair discrimination against domestic and short haul operators. BAA is favouring long haul carriers.”
The airline added: “Unfortunately due to the suspension of the Glasgow route a number of employees at Glasgow will be at risk of redundancy.”
BAA challenged the reasoning behind BMI’s decision, with a spokesman saying: “It has little to do with airport charges. BMI has taken a commercial decision to transfer slots from a loss-making domestic service to more profitable long-haul routes.”
BMI chief executive Wolfgang Prock-Schauer said last October: “Our focus will be to further reduce our domestic flights and shift capacity to our continental Europe and Middle East routes.”
The decision will leave British Airways as the only carrier offering direct flights between Glasgow and London. In a statement, BMI said: “BMI is committed to Scotland and regards its UK and Ireland network as part of its core business.”