RYANAIR boss Michael O’Leary has made the headlines today, calling for an early-morning ban on airports serving alcohol to passengers.
He’s calling for the big change following a rise in badly behaved passengers that have caused flights forced to divert.
He told The Times: “It’s becoming a real challenge for all airlines
“I fail to understand why anybody in airports bars is serving people at five or six o’clock in the morning. Who needs to be drinking beer at that time?
“There should be no alcohol served at airports outside [those] licensing hours,” he said. “We have been calling for many years for a limit of two drinks per person per airport, why don’t you limit people by boarding pass?”
So should we be banning morning beers at UK airports? Our travel experts go head to head…
‘Please don’t deny hard-working Brits this small holiday pleasure’ says Caroline McGuire, Head of Travel (Digital)
AIRPORT breakfast beers are one of those quirky British traditions, much like the Wetherspoons table number game and the dirty birthday pint.
It is pretty much guaranteed that you will see a number of sleepy-eyed Brits sinking a lager at the airport pub, no matter what time of day you arrive.
While I personally can’t stomach a drink before midday, I’m also not a fan of telling hard-working Brits how they can spend their precious seven days of holiday that they’ve been saving for all year.
Michael O’Leary has long called for there to be a two-drink limit on people drinking at airports and that is something that feels like a reasonable compromise to me.
But to ban airport bars from serving any booze outside of normal UK licensing hours – typically from around 10 or 11am – seems pretty unfair when passengers can still buy a drink on the actual Ryanair flight.
Pubs are under a huge amount of financial stress these days, thanks to a raft of anti-hospitality measures introduced by our current chancellor, Rachel Reeves.
Around two pubs are closing in the UK each day – more than 2,000 since the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic in 2020, should we really be penalising them any further?
Add to this the fact that pubs pay an extremely high rent for their airport locations, do we want to see boozers also disappearing from here too?
I’m not sure that cutting out morning drinking will see the solution to the problem that airlines are clearly having such a huge issue with, because it won’t have any effect on the thousands of flights that fly out of the UK post-midday.
I’ve been on more late-evening Ryanair flights to Ibiza than I care to remember, when I have deep sympathy for the cabin crew serving very rowdy passengers.
Mr O’Leary has been in the industry for a long time, in fact he’s one of the most experienced airline bosses in the business, and we should be listening when he says it’s a huge problem that needs sorting.
The measures he has taken in recent years to hold disruptive passengers to account with huge court fines is clearly a huge step in the right direction, although I appreciate this is a time-consuming and costly process.
But banning the small joy of a breakfast beer in these stressful modern times, with everything that’s going on in the world? Please no.
‘More drastic measures are needed’ says Kara Godfrey, Deputy Travel Editor
LOOK, I get it – you finally got that time off work, and you’re ready for a week of sunshine and relaxing.
But it has forever baffled me as to how that translates to a pint of beer or glass of champagne at 6am when normally you wouldn’t even be awake.
I can’t think of anything worse than sinking a Guinness when I’m waiting for my flight, and certainly don’t want that sloshing around in my stomach before a long journey.
If people could restrain themselves then a ban wouldn’t be needed but sadly, without airports willing to put a cap in place, it seems more drastic measures are needed.
Haven’t we all been on that awful flight where rowdy passengers just make it worse for everyone?
With Ryanair saying that as many as a flight a day are being diverted, those costs are likely to be passed onto the passenger too.
So those drunken idiots are essentially going to make your flight more expensive.
Maybe a full ban is too far, but I would say that a drink limit is definitely needed.
I’d back airports being required to scan boarding passes, with a cap on 1-2 boozy beverages before you get on a plane.
Lets save it for the all-inclusive pool bar, guys.