Speaking at the Holyrood magazine’s Small Country, Big Plans conference, Gordon Dewar said he understood the frustration with queuing, whether at check-in, which is the airline’s responsibility, or at the security gates that BAA looks after.

He said: “Since August last year, when the government changed the rules about liquids and single bags, clearly, that put a huge amount of pressure on us and we didn’t have any planning opportunity because that was a change overnight, quite literally.

“So our response to that since then has been over 230 new frontline jobs in Scotland, about putting people where they are needed to ease that queue and a huge investment in infrastructure in terms of x-rays and so on to get there. And I’m pleased to say that, certainly in Glasgow, and I think my colleagues are doing equally well in other airports, that we are getting 98 per cent of passengers through in under seven minutes.

“So here’s a challenge. If you get a delay of more than ten minutes going through security at Glasgow Airport, please give me a call personally because I’d really like to know about it, because that’s not good enough.”

The general enquiries telephone number for Glasgow Airport is 0870 040 0008.

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