Following the start of the Covid-19 pandemic, the rules around parking planes in airports were loosened so airlines were only obliged to use them 50 per cent of the time.
This decision was made in order to provide some relief to the sector, which was one of the worst hit by the pandemic as people drastically reduced the amount they travelled between countries.
But airlines will now be forced to use their airport slots 70 per cent of the time from 27 March in order to keep them as demand for flights slowly returns to pre-pandemic levels.
But a complete recovery could still be years away. A poll in April found that 40 per cent of European business travellers said they would travel by plane less in the future, and analysts have predicted that a full recovery may not occur until 2024 at the earliest.
The government said that while airlines will need be expected to meet the new terms to keep their slots, they will also benefit from added flexibility over when...