With more than one million holidaymakers returning to the UK after the Bank Holiday getaway, the Managing Director of the UK’s largest independent travel retailer has backed the Competition Commission ‘emerging thinking’ report on BAA’s airport monopoly, and has slammed the organisation as “inefficient, ineffective and complacent”.

Mike Greenacre, who is Managing Director of The Co-operative Travel and a Board Director with ABTA, also believes that unless the government intervenes many UK airports will grind to a halt.

“BAA’s main focus in its offering to the consumer revolves around how many designer shops, cafes and restaurants it can provide in order to extract as much revenue as possible from the captive audience that are its millions of travellers,” he said.

“The ridiculous queues at both check-in and security – where there is inconsistency and confusion amongst holidaymakers – come as a direct result of a lack of investment from BAA, both in terms of staffing and equipment.

“The solutions to these problems can only arrive through increased competition, which will result in more investment in airport infrastructure, a comprehensive review and standardisation of security procedures and a minimum service level agreement for customers.

“As part of our pro-active approach towards ensuring that our customers enjoy their entire holiday experience, we will be pushing for improvements to airport procedures.  If these issues are not addressed, it will not be long before some of our airports come to a grinding halt,” concluded Greenacre.