Making frequent flyers pay more for air travel is an idea that continues to circulate around Europe and beyond. The concept was aired again earlier this month when French transport minister Clément Beaune announced he would seek a European Union regulation to reduce carbon emissions by imposing a minimum fare on flights. Environmental and social campaigners retorted that a frequent-flyer levy would be fairer for the less well-off.
Any levy of this kind would inevitably hit regular business travellers especially hard. Yet if the business travel sector is serious about sustainability, arguably there is a case for accepting a principle of “polluter pays”, and an additional incentive to travel only when truly justifiable.
How a levy could work
According to A Frequent Flyer Levy, a paper published in the UK jointly by the New Economics Foundation and environmental campaigners Possible, the first outbound flight in a year for a traveller would be levy-free. After that, each outbound flight would attract a surcharge that would escalate for each subsequent trip.
The levy would replace the current UK air passenger duty, which varies according to distance travelled and cabin class, but a tax would also be introduced on kerosene.
The paper calls for the levy to be hypothecated, in other words ring-fenced, in this case to fund more sustainable methods of travel, such as rail. However, in practice, governments rarely allow hypothecation because it constrains their ability to make spending choices.
The US-based International Council on Clean Transportation has published a similar proposal, although the levy would kick in from the third flight in the year, at US$9. By the 20th flight, the hit would be $177. The ICTT estimates global introduction of such a levy would raise $121 billion annually.
As to how a levy would operate technically, details from proponents are thin. Aviation campaigner for Possible, Rob Bryher, tells BTN Europe that passport numbers fed by the airline to a government database could act as unique identifiers for tracking the number of flights taken and the consequent levy to be paid. “You would need to iron out how it works but I am confident there is a way this could be managed,” he says.
What’s the case for a levy?
Around 70 per cent of flights in the UK are taken by only 15 per cent of the population, Possible claims. Even more dramatically, the ICTT claims that in 2019 two per cent of the world’s population flew more than six times, accounting for 40 per cent of total passenger flow.
Although a frequent-flyer levy could raise substantial revenue, and mainly from wealthier people who tend to pollute most, that is not the key objective, according to Bryher. “We are in a climate emergency,” he says. “All this is about the economics of how we get people to fly less. Aviation is a sector that is very difficult to decarbonise.”
According to Possible, that difficulty means aviation will eventually consume one-third of the UK’s carbon budget. “The aim is to have a fairness to the system while at the same time reducing demand for, flying” says Bryher. “If we have fewer people flying, the number of flights comes down.”
Bryher adds that the idea of a levy is popular, scoring well in polling as is often the case for tax proposals that do not hit most people being asked the question.
What’s the case against a levy?
The concept does not enjoy widespread support within corporate travel. The closest BTN Europe could find to a positive was from the Danish Business Travel Association. “If done wisely and specifically earmarked for sustainability improvements, it could be okay,” says general manager Jens Søndergaard. “But if just another tax, then no. Flight charges are already in place in many countries or on the verge of being introduced and I do see these as a kind of levy on frequent flyers, as you pay on every trip you take.”
The Global Business Travel Association is more unequivocally opposed. “Carbon pricing is part of the basket of measures to be explored further to encourage more sustainable travel behaviours,” says Catherine Logan, regional senior vice president for EMEA and APAC.
“GBTA, however, believes that a tax on frequent flyers is not an effective approach to decarbonise aviation. What we need is direct government action to directly promote technological innovations and incentivise decarbonisation solutions, such as sustainable aviation fuels.”
Logan also makes the case for companies voluntarily imposing internal carbon fees on their flying, again assigning that revenue to decarbonisation efforts, including SAF. However, many environmental campaigners do not regard SAF as a viable way to decarbonise aviation.
The UK’s Institute of Travel Management, meanwhile, thinks frequent business travellers are the wrong people to penalise. “Arguably a leisure traveller who flies very frequently and, by definition, entirely discretionally, would be a more appropriate target for punitive measures than a business traveller whose work requires them to travel extensively,” says CEO Scott Davies. “In the latter case only the employer could reasonably be charged additionally – presumably through the paid fare – and this would appear fraught with complications.”
Davies continues: “Carbon accountability is a growing priority for organisations, meaning there is already a focus for many on ensuring travel is purposeful and those travellers will not have an option to travel less – therefore it doesn’t seem fair to penalise them. What about those who have to travel for disaster recovery or charitable reasons: would they be exempt?
“Rolling out a tax would also need to be globally adopted given the global nature of organisations and ability for business travel to originate from any office,” he says.
Travel management companies are not keen either. Abby Penston, CEO of the Focus Partnership, a consortium of independent TMCs, echoes many of the points made by Davies. She adds: “There could be huge implications in terms of privacy, as it would mean that a government body is monitoring an individual person or company’s flights.
“There’s also social equity to consider: the fair distribution of the environmental responsibilities associated with business travel across all departments in an organisation, rather than placing the burden solely on frequently travelling employees.”
What are the chances of a levy becoming reality?
The Spanish government announced a frequent-flyer levy as a policy intention in 2021, driven largely by minority coalition partner Podemos. However, Podemos has largely imploded since then, and Spain has a new caretaker government following inconclusive elections in July 2023.
In the UK, there is no chance of a levy under Rishi Sunak after the Prime Minister cited aviation taxes last week when vowing not to impose “heavy-handed measures” to meet Net Zero commitments. “Experience shows that the effectiveness of levies as incentives for cleaner/quieter aircraft is doubtful,” Sunak said. “No government that introduced a ticket tax has demonstrated that such a tax reduced CO2 emissions.”
Bryher is therefore pinning hopes on a change of government, claiming that although Labour shadow Chancellor Rachel Reeves has said she instinctively dislikes the idea, other shadow cabinet colleagues are more sympathetic. “Labour is not putting it in the manifesto, but implementing it outside the manifesto during a term of office is certainly not beyond the realms of possibility, particularly as the climate crisis will worsen and become more of an everyday occurrence,” Bryher says.
Does Bryher believe the levy will eventually be introduced? “Yes I do, because if it doesn’t happen, then we haven’t done anything about aviation emissions, and global warming gets worse and worse, and more lives are ruined,” he says.