Three Months In, UK Travel Industry Learning to Live With Brexit

Three months have passed since the UK voted to leave the European Union and still no-one is certain what Brexit will mean. What has become clearer – especially in light of the governing Conservative Party’s recent conference – is that publicly at least the politicians in charge of pushing it through are determined to play hardball with the rest of the continent. There has been an escalation in anti-immigrant rhetoric and any possibility that Britain could remain loosely tied to the EU through retaining some form of loose trade association through the access to the single market seems remote. This leaves the travel industry in a very difficult position. Many businesses in the UK backed "remain" and are now having to plan for a future that has yet to take shape. Get Your Tickets to Skift Global Forum: Europe Now Issues such as how UK airlines will access the single aviation market and whether the new Package Travel Directive, which update rules on the sale of holidays, will ever be implemented, remain up in the air. Last week EasyJet, Europe’s second largest airline, once again blamed the impact of the Brexit vote for its poor performance in 2016 (other travel firms such as TUI and Saga have seen no adverse effect). Elsewhere, though, people and companies are trying to