Edinburgh airport passenger numbers drop to 1995 levels

SNP spokesperson blames ‘the God-given right to go on holiday’ for increase in cases in Scotland

Better times: Edinburgh airport in 2019 (Simon Calder)

Scotland’s busiest airport has gone back a quarter century in terms of passenger numbers as a result of the coronavirus pandemic.

During 2020, Edinburgh airport handled only 3,478,501 passengers, less than a quarter of the previous year.

With the nation’s main international gateway currently at one per cent of normal travellers, the airport’s boss has warned that “choice of airlines and destinations” may be much smaller once recovery begins.

Gordon Dewar, chief executive of Edinburgh airport said: “The fall in our passenger numbers is only one reflection of the long-term damage being inflicted by Covid-19 on Scotland’s economy and its social fabric, but it is a worrying one and there is no clear path to recovery.

“Nobody should assume that when the pandemic subsides, life will go back to normal. At the airport, we will be starting from a low level of activity not recorded here since 1995 and the choice of airlines and destinations may be dramatically different  to those we had worked hard to build before 2020 and on which many people depend for bringing visitors to Scotland and for holidays and business.”

The vast majority of Edinburgh’s passengers travelled before the pandemic hit in March 2020. Numbers were down to one per cent between April and June. They recovered significantly in July, August and September to one-sixth of 2019 figures, but then declined to 10 per cent between October and December.

With a complete ban on leisure travel at present, Edinburgh airport is once again at one per cent of normal levels.

Numbers may fall still further when the Scottish government brings in “managed isolation” as Nicola Sturgeon has promised.

David Linden, the SNP’s work and pensions spokesperson, told BBC 5 Live: “We want to see a more strict version of quarantining for people arriving in Scotland.

He blamed holidaymakers for the upsurge in coronavirus cases in the autumn of 2020.

“With the relaxation of restrictions, loads of people having the God-given right to go on holiday and bring back all sorts of new strains of the virus.

“We just almost eliminated Covid in the community in the summer in Scotland, then all of a sudden people then start to come into the country and we find ourselves back at square one.

“It’s hugely regrettable, it’s been negligible and it’s because of a lack of border control by the UK government.”

More details of England’s proposed hotel quarantine scheme were expected today. But the announcement has been delayed until next week.