Reuters reports that travel industry body ABTA said that Britain's travel sector is bracing for a new wave of job cuts.

Airlines and travel companies have slammed Britain's travel rules as overly expensive and complicated, and blame them for a second lost summer of holiday trade in 2021.

ABTA said that new bookings were 83% lower in summer 2021 compared to their pre-pandemic levels, and as a result most of its members were planning more job cuts at the end of this month when a furlough scheme ends.

Estimated new redundancies will bring the total number of jobs lost during COVID-19 to nearly 100,000 in the outbound travel sector, said ABTA, a figure which rises to 226,000 once the impact on the supply chain is included.

ABTA echoed calls from airlines and airports for the government to scrap the requirement for fully vaccinated travellers returning to the UK to take expensive PCR tests.