Strikes by Border Force staff at UK airports could go on for months unless the government enters talks over pay, the head of the PCS union has said.
Strikes by Border Force staff at UK airports could go on for months unless the government enters talks over pay, the head of the PCS union has said.
Mark Serwotka said the PCS had a “mandate” for walkouts up until May.
Thousands of travellers arriving in the UK have been told to expect disruption over the festive period as passport control staff began strikes on Friday.
Congestion and delays on major roads is also expected as people turn to cars as the Christmas getaway begins.
The AA and RAC motoring groups said Friday would be the busiest day on the roads this week, with an estimated 16.9 million journeys being made across the UK.
At airports, about 1,000 Border Force staff – many of whom check passports – are staging the first of a series of strikes from Friday to 26 December and from 28 to 31 December.
Employees will walk out at Heathrow, Gatwick, Manchester, Birmingham, Cardiff and Glasgow airports, as well as the Port of Newhaven. Military personnel and civil servants have been drafted in to cover strikers.
The sector is the latest to take industrial action over pay, jobs and conditions, with postal workers also walking out on Friday and national rail strikes starting again from Christmas Eve.
Mr Serwotka said disruption for passengers was an “unfortunate reality” of the strikes, but added any anger should be directed at the government, who he claimed had “ignored” the union.
He said the union was raising cash for a strike fund which meant members could “sustain” strikes “for months and after Christmas”.
“Not only could it be six months, I think in January what you will see is a huge escalation of this action in the civil service and across the rest of the economy unless the government get around the negotiating table,” he said.
The union boss said the strikes were a “last resort” and were because the government had refused to increase an offer of a 2% pay rise.
The Home Office said it had been working to minimise delays for passengers.
This will be the busiest Christmas for airports since 2019, and the first without any Covid restrictions in place. Some 579 flights are due to land at Heathrow on Friday.
However, early on Friday, passengers reported no issues at Heathrow or Gatwick.
Heathrow, the UK’s busiest airport, said passengers on departing flights would be unlikely to be delayed. It said arriving passengers would be able to use passport e-gates as usual. But these cannot be used by all passengers, including children under 12.
Adam Jones, head of passenger operations at Gatwick, said in a worst-case scenario, there would be queues of two hours for passengers arriving at the airport, but added there were no plans to hold people on aircraft.
Aviation consultant John Strickland told the BBC’s Today programme that each airport would be affected in different ways by the strikes.
He said because Gatwick deals with mostly short-haul, European flights, more passengers would be eligible to use e-gates, which should ease pressure.
However, at Heathrow, which has longer-haul flights, Mr Strickland said fewer people arriving into the airport would be eligible to use e-gates, meaning there could be more pressure.
Jasmine O’Donoghue, 25, has been in Costa Rica since 16 November and is due to travel to Heathrow then on to Jersey on 27 December, which is not a strike date.
Nevertheless, she has been advised she should change her flight due to the impact of the strikes on domestic transfers.
“Right now I don’t know if I’m getting on the flight, or will change my flight,” she said. “It would be nice for my family and my boyfriend if I was at home for New Year after being away for so long.”
Aviation data firm Cirium said 1,290 flights are scheduled to land at affected airports on Friday, capable of carrying more than a quarter of a million passengers.
Steve Dann, Border Force chief operating officer, said military personnel and civil servants, “many of whom are sacrificing their Christmases”, would “not be able to operate with the same efficiency as our permanent workforce”.
Arriving airline passengers may also be affected by rail strikes by several unions, which are due to run from 23 to 29 December.
Members of the Unite union are striking on Friday and Christmas Eve, which will affect East Midlands Railway services, while TSSA union members will walk out on Boxing Day and 27 December, impacting CrossCountry services.
The TSSA will also strike on 28 and 29 December, affecting Great Western Railway and West Midlands Railway.
Thousands of members of the Rail, Maritime and Transport (RMT) union at Network Rail will go on strike on Christmas Eve, which will cause train services to stop running at around 15:00 GMT on that day, until 06:00 on 27 December.
The RAC warned the M25 clockwise between junction 7 and junction 16 would be a good area to avoid on Friday afternoon. Other roads likely to be hit by congestion include the M60 near Manchester, the M6 in north-west England and the M40 in Oxfordshire.
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