Regular readers can stop reading right now if they don’t want to hear me talk again about providing an adequate safety net for passengers outside the ATOL bonding scheme.

As you probably all know by now, those passengers who bought a package holiday under the Globespan name are probably protected under the ATOL system. Those of you who bought just a flight with a credit card (not a debit card)and paid more than £100 may be able to claim a refund from the credit card providers. The rest of you, I’m afraid, will probably be out of pocket. And for those of you who are covered then you still have the hassle and probable expense of rebooking with another carrier if there is availability. To check your position, see www.caa.co.uk/default.aspx?catid=1985&pagetype=90.

The collapse of the Globespan group will hit Scotland particularly badly.

Starting today, the EU will consult with the travel industry over the next 8 weeks before coming up with new proposals on giving greater protection to travellers.

A spokesman from TUI (the owners of Thomson and First Choice) said this week that if a bird swims, quacks, waddles and looks like a duck then it must be a duck. The courts think otherwise. Most of you will never have heard of a company called Travel Republic but the result of a court action against it by the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) might actually help travellers with better consumer protection for our flights and holidays.

A couple of weeks ago another airline company went bust. Sky Europe only flew out of two UK airports so you can be forgiven for thinking it is of little consequence. But it follows in the wake of others including XL and Zoom which has a much bigger impact. After those collapses as well there were calls for a tightening up of customer protection and nothing happened. In fairness Ryanair and easyjet offered special fares to help passengers return home which neither of them needed to do.