THE boss of Edinburgh Airport has accused Nicola Sturgeon of "campaigning" against his industry.
Gordon Dewar also branded the Scottish Government's vaccine rollout plan "woefully inadequate".
He made the comments after the First Minister advised Scots not to start booking summer holidays abroad next year.
Speaking to Holyrood's Covid-19 Committee, Mr Dewar said: "We have a First Minister campaigning against our industry."
The chief executive of Edinburgh Airport said "hurdle after hurdle" has been thrown in its way as it tries to set up "a robust aviation testing regime".
He added: "Even though we have that capability in Scotland, we are still the only country in Europe - and I repeat that, the only country in Europe - that is not using a testing regime to support and make flying safe again."
Mr Dewar was highly critical of the Scottish Government's vaccine plans.
He said: “We've looked at the designs that they're looking at for their vaccine rollouts, and they are woefully inadequate.
“They will not deliver a wide vaccine capability until the back end of next year as it stands.
“Put this in context - they're not even attempting to start vaccines at mass drive through centres until February.
“I genuinely think we've got an extremely high probability that come March, we will have availability of vaccines - potentially multiple vaccines in fridges in Scotland - and no method of delivering them while people are still dying of Covid.
“And there will be no prospect of taking away travel restrictions.”
He earlier said: "We've arguably had one of the worst-managed Covid crises in Europe if you judge it by any of the statistics about levels of infections and deaths."
Giving evidence to the committee later, SNP Constitution Secretary Michael Russell and Scotland's National Clinical Director Jason Leitch both refuted his vaccine claims.
Mr Russell said the criticism was "simply not accurate at all" and he would be "delighted" to see the aviation industry flourish.
Mr Leitch said: "There is a plan. The plan is clear."
He said he was a keen traveller and looks forward to the day "when that all returns".
An expert report published yesterday found Scotland came close to eliminating coronavirus during lockdown but new strains were introduced when the country opened up and people began travelling again.
During the Scottish Government's coronavirus briefing, Ms Sturgeon was asked if Scots should feel confident booking a summer holiday next year.
She said: "No, I wouldn't be right now booking a holiday for next [summer].
"Not because I don't hope that we are in a much better place next summer.
"But right now I think we've all just got to focus on getting through this.
"I very much hope that the prospect of being able to travel by next summer will be there for all of us.
"But it would be, I think, a bit foolish of me to stand here right now and advise people what to be doing next summer, when we're still trying to navigate our way through this pandemic."
Responding to Mr Dewar, a Scottish Government spokesman said: "These claims are simply not true – it is precisely because we value the aviation and travel sector so much that the current measures won’t be in place for a moment longer than is necessary to protect public health and stop transmission of the virus.
"We absolutely do not underestimate the impact Covid-19 has had on the industry, which is why we are the only government in the UK to offer rates relief to the sector.
"We know how essential the aviation [sector] is to our economy and the challenges that are ahead in helping it to recover."
"Our decisions on testing and quarantine throughout this pandemic have been informed by clinical and scientific advice to minimise the risk to public health – while we have not yet made a decision, we are not yet satisfied that moving from quarantine to testing would provide enough protection.
"Meanwhile we are doing everything we can with the limited resources available to us to support the travel sector through the current crisis."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel