Government remains confident in under-pressure Martin Rolfe but transport secretary believes glitch was avoidable

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The head of the air traffic control provider Nats has been given a week to report back on the reasons for a technical failure that grounded thousands of flights, as the transport secretary declared she did “not believe the issue was unavoidable”.

Heidi Alexander said on Tuesday she had also commissioned an independent review by the Civil Aviation Authority into the latest Nats meltdown that severely disrupted travel for hundreds of thousands of passengers.