Ms Lynne Embleton:

The Deputy is absolutely right that the Heathrow-mandated cancellations have been a more recent event. However, the problems across aviation have been ramping up over the summer. There have been one or two extraordinary events, such as the baggage system failures at Heathrow's terminal 2, where we operate, and in Amsterdam. These caused particular spikes.

We started the summer with enough aeroplanes, crew and ground staff to allow us to be ready for a normal summer, with some extra disruption. The flight departs, it picks up delays because of the need to wait for customers to get through screening and for passengers with restricted mobility to come off aircraft. It also picks up delays because stands at other airports are congested. Those delays mean that passengers miss connections, and crew have extended hours and can come up against their duty limits. The delays have been prevalent all the way through the summer and it is those delays that have started to impact significantly on our operations. I come back to the point that the vast majority of our customers are still travelling with their bags. It is only in the case of a small number of passengers that the process gets disrupted. However, when it gets disrupted, it does hurt. This has been increasing as the summer has progressed and has culminated in the mandated cancellations from Amsterdam and Heathrow.