'No more now'- EU airlines to ban extra charges for children to sit with family members 'very soon'

The Transport Committee of the European Parliament has voted on a series of reforms to improve air passenger rights across the EU. 

Extra charges on family members to sit next to their children under the age of 12 on flights were voted by the Committee to be banned, according to NewsTalk on Wednesday June 25.

As well as this, a 7kg luggage carry-on has been voted to be a passenger's given right free of charge.

Fine Gael MEP Regina Doherty was recently on NewsTalk Breakfast to discuss these changes that she said is to come "very soon".

“Airlines, I felt, were taking advantage of the fact that if they wanted to sit their families together, they had to pay extra charges.

“No more now; the Committee voted yesterday that airlines will not be able to charge families extra for sitting together,” Regina Doherty told NewsTalk.

The proposals will be voted on by the European Parliament in the coming weeks and if they are approved by MEPs, they will then be discussed by the European Council, NewsTalk said.

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“We had little or no resistance because I think everyone knows this is a commonsense approach,” Ms Doherty told NewsTalk.

“The second thing is; we’ve seen in recent months a controversy where people were getting charged extra for bags.

“One of the things we voted on yesterday was that people will have a right to have a 7kg carry-on roller bag with them as a right, once it gets through the Parliament.”

Ms Doherty added that while any change in the law will likely come after most families’ summer holiday this year, she still expects it to happen “very soon”.