If you are like me you will have been delighted to hear the news this morning that the proposed strike by thousands of airport workers has been resolved after operator BAA agreed to a new pay deal for its staff. The proposed action would have not just have affected me in my business travel, but hundreds of thousands of holidaymakers who faced travel chaos over the August Bank Holiday after more than 6,000 union members voted for a walkout in protest at a one per cent pay offer. The airports that would have been affected were Heathrow, Stansted, Southampton, Glasgow, Edinburgh and Aberdeen airports, workers will now be urged to accept the deal, according to a union spokesman.

We do not know the details of the settlement but if you were going on a cruise and stay holiday to the Caribbean, it would almost certainly have involved flying from Heathrow or Glasgow. Holiday makers going on a trip to an apartment or hotel in Spain or Majorca may not have had their holiday spoiled if they were flying from an airport not affected. What could have made it worse of course would have been to have flown out this week, only to find that you could not fly back in! Common sense has prevailed; let’s hope that BA can sort out their dispute as well.

Customers now need reassurance that they will not see problems further down the road and it is time that the split-up of the BAA monopoly at London and in Scotland is resolved once and for all. When will the sale of Stansted and Edinburgh or Glasgow International go through and help to prevent consumers being held hostage to one union in the future?