Americans should be allowed to jump the border queues at Heathrow by using the e-gates reserved for British and EU travellers, the airport has demanded.
Heathrow’s boss said some immigration queues for non-European passengers had reached “completely unacceptable” levels and called on the Home Office to change the rules.
John Holland-Kaye, Heathrow’s chief executive, said queues were increasing, citing a recent queue of close to three hours for non-EU passengers at the airport’s Terminal 4. He said allowing low-risk passengers to use e-gates was an easy solution.
“There’s no reason we should treat a passenger from the US any differently from one from Lithuania. We have 60 e-gates at Heathrow and you’ll never see them all in use,” he said. “Sajid Javid [the home secretary] could tackle this at the stroke of a pen.”
Holland-Kaye said he believed Brexit would not worsen immigration queues but should be used as an opportunity to change the rules.
“If the Americans aren’t considered safe then no one is – they’re at least as safe as our European partners. What better way on 30 March to show the world has changed than have Americans, Canadians and Australians use the e-gates? You know who is coming to your country, why do we need to treat everyone like a criminal when they get to the border?”
Currently only travellers from the European Economic Area and Switzerland who are issued with a biometric passport can use the e-gates.
The Home Office, which is deploying 200 additional Border Force staff at the airport this summer, said more than 95% of the 40 million annual arrivals at Heathrow passed immigration within an agreed time of 25 minutes for EEA nationals and 45 minutes for others.
A spokesperson said: “Every effort is made to keep delays at the border to a minimum, but we also have a duty to maintain the security of the UK border – which means checking 100% of scheduled arriving passengers.”
Holland-Kaye also called on the government to “win some ground back from the terrorists” by lifting the ban on packing liquids, following tests of new airport security scanners. “We’re very pleased with the trial we’ve seen so far. We need the Home Office to give us the approvals and then we are ready to go. There is no reason why the technology can’t be used here.”
Since 2006 passengers have been able to take liquids or toiletries of up to 100ml on to a plane in hand luggage, and have been asked to display them in transparent plastic bags to pass security.
Heathrow announced record passenger numbers for the first half of 2018, with 38.1 million people travelling through the airport until 30 June. Pretax profits dipped slightly to £95m, and the airport paid £228m in dividends to its shareholders, led by Ferrovial and the sovereign wealth funds of Qatar, China and Singapore.
Questions have been raised about the airport’s ability to fund its expansion plans, but Holland-Kaye said the investors were “incredibly well-funded and committed” and the airport had raised another £1bn in the bond market already in 2018.
He said the expansion question had been settled since the Commons vote in June, and the airport would invest £160m this year in the planning process for a third runway.
“The argument was always that it was politically impossible but it’s now the overwhelming will of parliament,” he said. “What is the alternative in a world outside the EU to keep Britain a thriving economy? Heathrow is the only game in town and as people see that investment creating jobs up and down the country, who would want to turn those taps off?”
