Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, in the light of NATS’s regulated funding model and substantial capital investment, what assessment she has made of whether the recent technical failure is primarily a question of management and regulatory oversight rather than resources.

The Government apologises to passengers across the United Kingdom who faced significant disruption as a result of the issues that impacted NATS’ operation on 8 September, resulting in delays and cancellations for a large number of passengers, as well as the disruption that it has caused for industry. Let me be clear that disruption of this kind is absolutely unacceptable.

NATS is regulated by the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) and the CAA is required to investigate major incidents to establish their causes, identify remedial action and minimise the risk and impact of recurrence.

However, the Secretary of State has asked NATS to provide a report by 16 September setting out the cause of the incident and the actions taken in response. The Secretary of State has also asked the CAA to conduct an independent review and will provide an update within 6 months. This is crucial to ensure that lessons are learned and that any necessary improvements are implemented to ensure that this cannot happen again.