Carnival UK has announced a sweeping round of job cuts. 

“The Covid-19 pandemic has not only affected the holidays of our guests but it has also impacted every part of our business; our future deployment; the guest experience; our supply chain and our people on ship and on shore,” said President Simon Palethorpe in a prepared statement. 

“Due to this impact we have had to take some really tough decisions to ensure that we can sustain and protect our business for the future. Following a period of collective consultation nearly a third of our shore based staff will very sadly be leaving our business on June 30 and another significant proportion will take a period of sabbatical,” said Palethorpe. 

“We are devastated to have to take this action which has affected so many talented and dedicated colleagues.

“We appreciate it is a very difficult and unsettling time for everyone but we have followed a clear and fair consultation process and considered all individual suggestions for new ways of working.

“At the current time as our operations are paused, we are working at the highest levels to develop a comprehensive restart program to phase our ships back into service with enhanced and approved protocols that will keep everyone on board well and still give our guests an amazing holiday.”