Fast-track airport checks planned

Fast-track lanes for Americans and visitors from some of the biggest countries in the Commonwealth will be set up at Heathrow Airport after the Olympics, Damian Green has said.

The Border Force will pilot a scheme where low-risk tourists from trusted countries will be directed to fast-track lanes in a bid to cut queues, the Immigration Minister said.

If successful, the Government could even ask the countries involved to set up reciprocal arrangements to make it easier for Britons travelling abroad, Mr Green told MPs.

An earlier pilot scheme was unsuccessful as visitors struggled to identify which queue they ought to be in, Mr Green told the Commons. But a new scheme will start after the Olympics for visitors from the United States, Australia, New Zealand, Canada and Japan, he said.

"We did a very short pilot for Australians and Americans, Japanese, New Zealanders and Canadians," Mr Green told the Commons Home Affairs Select Committee

But he said the pilot was "causing more problems than it solved" because of how the terminal was configured.

"The pilot did not work particularly well because it involved moving people around the terminal to different queues, so we intend to return to it," he said. "But for obvious reasons we're not going to do that before the Olympics.

"The idea of differentiating people so that those who don't need visas - and therefore already we feel more confident about them than those who we do require visas from - to have them in separate lanes in the airport is something worthy of looking at.

He went on: "Let's solve the problems we have here then see if that can give us some advantages for British citizens around the world. The first gain will be for everyone. If it works, there will be a group of people who will have better experiences at Heathrow. That's beneficial in itself.

"If it has benefits for other British citizens as well, then absolutely we would be interested in pursuing that."

The Press Association