Ministers ‘monitoring’ how passengers looked after following Heathrow shutdown

Ministers are “closely monitoring” how airlines look after their passengers following the “unprecedented” Heathrow shutdown, the Transport Secretary has said.

Heidi Alexander told the Commons the Government “is acutely aware of the need to ensure that passengers are well looked after”, after around 200,000 passengers were disrupted by the closure.

A fire at the North Hyde electricity substation last week disrupted power supplies at the West London hub.

Ms Alexander said “back-up systems ensured safety and security systems and protocols were maintained at all times”, but these systems – including diesel generators – were not designed to support the airport’s full operations.

Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer said earlier on Monday he was “not comfortable” with the shutdown.

At the despatch box, the Transport Secretary said: “The Government is acutely aware of the need to ensure that passengers are well looked after and their consumer rights are protected.

“This is why UK law ensures that airlines must provide passengers with a refund within seven days or to be rerouted to their destination under the same conditions.

“We are closely monitoring to ensure that passengers are properly supported.”

Ms Alexander said the Government temporarily lifted restrictions on overnight flights to ease congestion and allowed rail passengers to use their tickets flexibly during the disruption.

Conservative MP Mark Pritchard alleged some customers had been “ripped off, with huge hikes for alternative flights, car hire, and hotels”.

The MP for The Wrekin asked: “Isn’t it time the Government brought forward robust anti-price gouging legislation? And in fairness to her and the frontbench, I also asked the previous government (who) did absolutely zero on it as well.”

He also called on the Government to review the “monopoly of the operators of hotels in Heathrow and the lack of competition of airlines coming into Heathrow”.

Ms Alexander told MPs: “It wouldn’t be right for anyone or any business to be capitalising from this disruption.

“And whether it is airlines or hotels, I would be expecting those organisations to be doing everything they can to support travellers who have been disrupted by this incident.”

Ms Alexander had earlier described the fire as an “unprecedented outage” and added that “it wasn’t the result of a single point of failure on the electricity transmission or distribution system”.

She said North Hyde was one of three electricity feeds into Heathrow Airport, and the remaining points “continued supplying” the airport throughout the incident.

“Heathrow’s view was that this supply was insufficient to ensure the safe and secure ongoing operation of all systems across the whole airport,” Ms Alexander continued.

She later said: “Heathrow does day-in, day-out very successfully provide services to hundreds of thousands of passengers and businesses, so whilst it’s right that we do everything we can to interrogate the causes of this incident and learn any lessons, I do believe that Heathrow Airport can continue to be a trusted partner for Government in the longer term.”

Father of the House Sir Edward Leigh, the Conservative MP for Gainsborough, asked for assurances the Government’s net-zero aspirations would not “affect the sustainability and safety of our vital transport systems”.

The Transport Secretary said in her reply: “There were some other honourable members of this House who aren’t present in the chamber today who were busy pedalling some myths on Friday morning about this issue.

“It was very clear to me that the backup power supplies that Heathrow have consist of both diesel and electricity generators, so no matter what some other honourable members might be saying, those systems did work.”

Munira Wilson, whose Twickenham constituency lies in west London, said the substation fire “crippled Europe’s busiest airport” as she called for a “better Heathrow, not a bigger Heathrow, ie: we need to focus on the infrastructure in and around Heathrow to improve resilience, to improve security, to improve the passenger experience”.

The Liberal Democrat MP said a third runway at the airport would make the impact of a similar incident “all the greater”.

Ms Alexander replied: “I am not putting all of the country’s aviation eggs in one basket.

“At the moment we don’t have proposals before us for a third runway at Heathrow. We will look at those proposals carefully when they are submitted.”

The Transport Secretary had earlier said Heathrow Airport’s potential expansion and “this very rare, unprecedented event are two entirely separate issues”.

Nigel Wicking, chief executive of Heathrow Airline Operators’ Committee, representing more than 90 airlines, told Sky News he hoped an agreement over the costs they incurred from the closure could be “amicably settled at some point in time”.

But he said “there might be a case for legal action” if they did not get “good enough recourse and repayment in terms of the costs”, adding: “I would hope not. But in some of these situations that’s the only course once you’ve gone through everything else.”

Heathrow is Europe’s largest airport, with more than 83.9 million passengers travelling through its terminals in 2024.

An internal review of the airport’s crisis management plans and its response will be undertaken by former transport secretary Ruth Kelly, who is an independent member of Heathrow’s board.