Thomas Cook directors under scrutiny over bonuses

As the British government started flying155,000 stranded holidaymakers home from 18 countries on Tuesday following the collapse of the United Kingdom holiday giant Thomas Cook, the spotlight swung onto the company's senior managers and the role they played in the bankruptcy.

Lawmaker Andrea Leadsom, who is the UK's business secretary, has asked the official receiver, an office that oversees liquidations, to study whether the tour operator's executives contributed to the meltdown.

In an open letter to the insolvency service, she wrote: "I ask that the investigation by the official receiver looks, not only at the conduct of directors immediately prior to and at insolvency, but also at whether any action by directors has caused detriment to creditors or to the pension schemes."

The request followed reports that senior directors of the ailing company paid themselves a combined 50 million pounds ($62 million) in salaries and bonuses in recent years.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson questioned whether they should have pocketed "large sums of money" as their business went "down the tubes" when he spoke to reporters during a visit to New York.

"I think the questions we've got to ask ourselves now (are): How can this thing be stopped from happening in the future?" he said. "How can we make sure that tour operators take proper precautions with their business models where you don't end up with a situation where the taxpayer, the state, is having to step in and bring people home?"

The opposition Labour Party's shadow chancellor, John McDonnell, told the BBC he would like to see Thomas Cook's bosses pay those bonuses back.

"I think they need to really examine their own consciences about how they've brought this about and how they themselves have exploited the situation," he told the broadcaster.

Thomas Cook went into liquidation on Monday with debts of around 1.7 billion pounds. The company, which was started in 1841, operated 105 aircraft and had 200 own-brand hotels and resorts globally, with an international workforce of 22,000 people, of which 9,000 were in the UK.

Thomas Cook had been struggling for some time but appeared to have found a way forward when it secured a 900-million-pound rescue deal in August led by its largest shareholder, the Chinese company Fosun. However, a subsequent demand from creditors for an additional 200 million pounds sank the deal.

Sky News reported on Tuesday that some airlines seem to be exploiting the company's collapse by hiking the cost of some flights.

The broadcaster said a spokeswoman for budget airline Jet2.com said: "Our pricing, as is common practice in the travel industry, is based on the principle of supply and demand … However, we are looking at adding more supply (flights and seats) to help customers at this time."

The Sun newspaper said a return flight with TUI between Glasgow and Gran Canaria nearly doubled in price, from 320 pounds to 620 pounds, because of what the company described as its dynamic pricing model. And the paper cited a British Airways flight from London to Orlando that rose in price from 437 pounds to 1,978pounds in a matter of days.

The UK's Civil Aviation Authority is overseeing the repatriation of stranded holidaymakers and hopes to bring them all home on their scheduled return dates, an operation that should take around two weeks.