Around 2,000 air passengers in the Highlands and Islands will have their travel plans disrupted on Monday 23^rd June due to strike action by trade union Unite.

Highlands and Islands Airports Limited said that the strike action at nine of its airports was now unavoidable because the trade union could not agree to take a joint approach to securing pay settlements at this time.

Unite represents fire fighter, leading fire fighter and engineer grades within the company and is staging 24 hours of industrial action on 23^rd June and 4^th July.

HIAL has this afternoon advised airlines and flight operators that its airports at Barra, Benbecula, Campbeltown, Islay, Kirkwall, Stornoway, Sumburgh, Tiree and Wick will be closed to scheduled traffic on 23^rd June due to the unavailability of rescue and fire fighting staff.

Members of staff at Inverness are not taking the action and the airport will be operating as normal although flights to Orkney, Shetland and the Western Isles from Inverness will be affected. Dundee Airport, also operated by HIAL via a subsidiary company, is not affected by the strikes.

HIAL said it was disappointed that the union had declined to take a joint approach to the issue of pay and had moved to strike action when there were still avenues to be explored.

An HIAL spokesman said: “We are very disappointed that we now face strikes closing airports and that the opportunity to potentially achieve better pay settlements for all employees is being missed. The strike action is not going to get the company a better pay deal but working together could have.”