NEW YORK, Sept 23 (Reuters) - British Prime Minister Boris
Johnson on Monday questioned whether the directors of companies
such as collapsed travel company Thomas Cook were properly
incentivised to avoid bankruptcy.
Thomas Cook, the world's oldest travel firm,
collapsed on Monday, stranding hundreds of thousands of
holidaymakers around the globe and sparking the largest
peacetime repatriation effort in British history.
Johnson said Thomas Cook had made a request to the
government for around 150 million pounds but that bailing it out
would have set up "a moral hazard in the case of future such
commercial difficulties that companies face".
"We need to look at ways in which tour operators one way or
another can protect themselves from such bankruptcies in future
and clearly the systems that we have in place to make sure
(they) don’t in the end come to the taxpayer for help," he told
reporters on the plane to the UN General Assembly in New York.
"One is driven to reflect on whether the directors of these
companies are properly incentivised to sort such matters out."
Johnson said his thoughts were with customers.
"It is a very difficult situation and obviously are thoughts
are very much with the customers of Thomas Cook, the holiday
makers who may now face difficulties getting home we will do our
level best to get them home," he said.
"One way or the other the state will have to step in quite
rightly to help stranded holidaymakers," the prime minister
said.
(Reporting by Kylie MacLellan; editing by Guy Faulconbridge)
