CONFERENCE The Travel Convention 2019:Abta’s annual forum, themed Brave New World,


Tanzer: Government was right not to step in with £200m for Cook


T


he government made the right decision not to step in and save Tomas Cook, the boss of Abta believes.


Chief executive Mark Tanzer said


the speed at which Cook “unravelled” suggested the £200 million the group sought from the public purse would not have saved it in the long term. Responding to questions


from delegates, Tanzer said: “Te government was right not to [bail out Cook]. If you do it with Tomas Cook, why not do it for all companies?” He denounced the demise of


Tomas Cook as “more a failure of corporate finance than a failure of travel” and said there will be “a lot of competition” within the industry for Cook’s £9.5 billion in sales. He said its media depiction as a “dinosaur in a digital age” masked the real problems. Last week, Tomas Cook staff


protested outside Parliament. Tey demanded the government hold an


It was more a failure


of corporate finance than of travel. There’ll be a lot of competition for Cook’s £9.5bn sales


inquiry into the failure and called for wages to be paid to the 9,000 UK staff who lost their jobs. Tanzer distanced Abta and the


wider industry from responsibility for Cook’s demise, saying other firms could not be blamed for taking “commercial decisions”. He added: “Te stories about Cook’s financial state were not a secret.” Tanzer said the association would


resist any increase to the £2.50 Atol Protection Contribution (APC) as a result of Cook’s failure, but admited it “has made a big dent in the Air Travel Trust fund” and would


lead to higher insurance premiums. Asked if the fund could be rebuilt


with the existing fee, Tanzer said: “Yes. Tere aren’t many companies of the scale of Tomas Cook, so it doesn’t take long to get back to a fund that can deal with normal-sized failures.” He praised the CAA for its


two-week repatriation of 800,000 passengers, which concluded on Monday morning, and insisted the Package Travel Regulations “worked”. Tanzer called on the government


to launch a “full consultation” on the findings of the Airline Insolvency Review, which concluded in May but has not yet been responded to by the government. In light of Monarch’s failure in 2017, he said the review “recognised the problem of an unfunded obligation or political need to repatriate, and recommended a risk-based insurance scheme to


provide funds for repatriation”. i Get Social, page 31


EasyJet Holidays to launch new website in time for peaks


EasyJet Holidays is testing its new technology and website ahead of its planned launch at the end of December. Chief executive Garry Wilson


said: “Te tech was finalised last week and it’s all flowing through now. We’re on track to launch in time for the peak sales period.” Te tour operator will be relaunched with a significant


marketing campaign, using mainstream media, including TV ads promoting flexibility, and targeted promotions. “Usually flexibility means cost,


but we are looking to do it at great value,” said Wilson. “We are the second-largest airline, with more than 1,000 flights a day. Tat scale and the flexibility that comes with that, coupled with direct relationships with hoteliers, can’t be matched.”


He added that easyJet Holidays


will have a trade portal and was looking to be “somewhere in between” Tui’s model of not working with many third-party agents and Jet2holidays’ model of courting the independent trade. Wilson would not disclose the size of its Atol licence, but said:


“We want to be a major player.” i Full interview at travelweekly.co.uk


COLLAPSE


THOMAS COOK


Oliver Brendon


6


10 OCTOBER 2019


travelweekly.co.uk


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