Heathrow air traffic may not recover until 2026

The boss of London's Heathrow Airport has warned air traffic may not recover completely until at least 2026 despite signs of huge pent up demand for travel.

John Holland-Kaye told the BBC that Britain's busiest airport was still making losses even though international travel rules were easing.

He also hit back at the aviation regulator for limiting a rise in what it charges airlines for using Heathrow.

Airlines at Heathrow make a good return and investors want the same_ he said.

Mr Holland-Kaye said the airport was still only seeing passenger traffic at around 45% of 2019 levels. "It's definitely been a tough 18 months but we are starting to see the recovery coming through_" he told the BBC's Today programme.

"Now all we need to see is stability in the travel rules_ so people are confident of what we need to do and the airlines can build it into their systems."

The airport has faced criticism about long queues and its ability to cope with a growth in passengers. But he said: "We are hiring people right now to make sure that across the airport we can meet the demand that is starting to come through.

"We're still at around 40% to 45% of the levels even on the busiest days of where we were back in 2019."

Among the job vacancies Heathrow is trying to fill are security staff and engineers to help maintain the airport.

Any shortage of passport control staff_ which has lead to headlines about long queues_ is the responsibility of Border Force_ which is part of the Home Office.