Cabin workers could cause major travel disruption by going on strike over the festive period, including on Christmas Eve and Boxing Day.

12:39, Thu, Dec 11, 2025 Updated: 12:46, Thu, Dec 11, 2025

Airline passengers checking flights on a departures board display screen

Cabin crew working for Scandinavian Airline Services are threatening industrial action this month (Image: Getty)

Cabin crew working for Scandinavian Airline Services (SAS) have threatened strike action over Christmas, potentially throwing winter holidays into turmoil. Over 130 airline staff based out of Heathrow are planning to walk out on December 22, 23, 24 and 26 after allegedly being forced to use food banks by bad pay deals.

SAS, based in Sweden, is popular among Brits for festive winter breaks, including to Finnish Lapland, widely considered the home of Father Christmas, alongside Copenhagen, Stockholm and Oslo.

Sharon Graham, general secretary for the Unite union, says: "Scandinavian Airlines publicly praise their cabin crew yet in private it is cynically trying to short-change them. This is totally unacceptable when the airline depends on their expertise and passengers rely on them for safety. Cabin crew [are] not eating correctly or sleeping properly because of poverty wages. Unite will be fully supporting its members through this dispute."

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Santa Claus village in Rovaniemi, Finland

Trips to Finnish Lapland will be disrupted by the strike action (Image: Getty)

The union says cabin crew are so poorly paid that they have to use food banks in Scandinavia to access food before flying back to the UK.

SAS has reportedly offered staff a 3.5% pay increase, below the current inflation rate of 4.3%.

Callum Rochford, regional officer for Unite, adds: "This is real Grinch-style behaviour from SAS - it is taking advantage of the goodwill of its staff and will now be responsible for the cancelled Christmas flights.

"It's a good job Santa has a flying sleigh because he wouldn't be going anywhere on Scandinavia Airlines on Christmas Eve.

"SAS needs to come back to the negotiating table with a proper pay offer for cabin crew or face the wrath of angry passengers for a dispute of its own making."

An SAS spokesperson told LBC: "We are currently engaged in negotiations with the relevant parties. As the talks are ongoing, we are unable to comment further at this point in time."