LONDON - Airline passengers arriving in Britain escaped chaos early Wednesday despite dire predictions of long waits, as border staff joined teachers, hospital workers and weather forecasters in the country's largest strike in decades.
The one-day strike has been called in protest at the government's plan to make public sector pensions less generous in the years ahead. The pension reforms are part of a package of austerity measures designed to get a grip on the country's high borrowing levels.
London's Heathrow Airport and scores of airlines had warned that international travellers could be held in lines for up to 12 hours at immigration halls as a result of staff shortages. But airport managers said flights arriving early Wednesday from the United States, Asia and Europe were largely unaffected, in part because of contingency plans which saw bureaucrats drafted in to staff border desks.
British border staff, teachers, weather forecasters join 1-day strike over pension reform
