There could be further confusion regarding taking liquids through airport security as the European Commission (EC) said in a statement that it is to consider ways of reducing confiscation of duty free liquids at community airports for passengers arriving from third countries.
According to ACI (Airports Council International) one of Europe”s major hubs is impounding more than two tonnes of so-called ”illegal” shipments daily.
As things stand a passenger cannot take more than 100ml of liquid in any one container into the duty free area, whether they are coming from landside or in transit. Once in the duty free area you can buy whatever is available. This rule is particularly difficult to understand for transit passengers who have been allowed to take larger amounts of liquid through their departure airports or have purchased items in the duty free.
The regulations have led to widespread confiscations, confusion and delays at airports. Many passengers arriving and transferring at European airports are unaware they are not allowed to take liquids bought in countries outside the EU on board connecting flights when they change aircraft in Europe.
The new rule the Commission proposes only exempts liquids purchased in airports in third countries, subject to verification of the security standards in force there. For example, a bottle of wine bought in San Francisco Airport would no longer be confiscated at Heathrow from a passenger flying from San Francisco via Heathrow to Aberdeen.
Even more chaos could ensue due to the problem of separating incoming passengers from different flights. The only way that this can be done in a realistic sense is to have security positions at each gate and at the airside bus arrival point.
Just to make everything even more complicated, although this would be an EU directive it would need legislation by individual countries. As things stand the UK is out of sync with every European country by only allowing a single piece of hand luggage into the security area. It is possible that the UK would not follow the new guidelines.
ACI Europe director general, Olivier Jankovec, highlighted the UK problem in a statement regarding the proposed new policy: ”This is an additional step towards international harmonisation of aviation security which needs to be further pursued as a matter of priority.” In other words if the UK was out of step with this regulation too chaos might follow. Heathrow is Europe”s busiest airport and would be clearly effected.