I have decided to come out of the closet. For years I have poured scorn on airport security internally and to those nearby but never online, in public as it were. However, with my second post in a year on the subject I cannot restrain myself any longer.

Airport security is a joke. Originally l Liittle more than a job creation scheme encouraged by governments it now feels like a profit creation scheme in the hands of private security companies. The latest fiasco happens at Gatwick North Terminal where new x-ray scanners require that everything is placed in a tray before scanning. Yes, even your bag that previously went through a scanner perfectly happily must now be placed in a tray. This requires you, yes you, to pick a tray off the return conveyor yourself. Of course, there has to be a security drone to instruct you on this but don’t worry the machine is designed so that they cannot, in any circumstances pick up the tray for you. After scanning there is another drone to tell you to put your tray on the return conveyor. No way that they can do that themselves. Physically no way. A perspex screen exists on their side of the conveyor.

A side note: the newsagents in Gatwick North (W.H.Smugs by another name) now has self-scanning checkouts. These are laughingly called express checkout (or some such). I would willing do the security scan myself and have a person who has been trained at swiping a bar code handle my weekly “Radio Times” purchase.