Simon Vermeulen has met with Aurigny's chairman, Kevin George, over a number of serious concerns about 'governance' and reputational issues.

Deputy Vermeulen says that months of poor reliability, cancelled and delayed flights and too few aircraft is damaging Guernsey's reputation.

The former hotelier is the tourism lead for the Economic Development Committee and says he's 'getting more and more alarmed':

"I hope that this is taken seriously and that the board do act us on this immediately."

He believes Aurigny has overstretched itself:

"It was an over ambitious plan to fly all these routes and they just haven't got enough aircraft.

"Even when they've eventually got the five ATR aircraft, the five 72 seaters, I think we're going to be severely challenged. The public don't seem to like to travel in them, they're hot, they're noisy, they seem to be unreliable. Spare parts seem to be an issue, for this airline at least."

He is worried about the impact of Aurigny's performance on finance and tourism:

"The banks in Guernsey, this is our golden egg that we've got, they think it's damaging the finance sector,. The hotels... it's costing tens of thousands of pounds in cancelled bookings because people can't fly over.

And people who make it through all this swear they'll never come back to Guernsey again, but if they did, they'd travel by sea. This has been going on too long now."

The meeting addressed 'governance issues' that deputy Vermeulen did not want to be drawn on. Deputy Peter Roffey, who represents the States as the sole shareholder, was also present.

Aurigny bosses will hold a meeting with all States members later this week.

Separately, Aurigny won't disclose to Island FM how much the mail drop to all Guernsey homes has cost the States-owned airline. It has confirmed its jet, the E-195, was flown to the UK on 31 May but its sale has yet to be completed.