A judgment handed down today by the Court of Appeal has effectively brought to an end the long-running claim made by the liquidators of Goldtrail Travel – PwC – against Onur Air, the Turkish-based airline.

The court found that a decision made in May 2014 that Onur Air "dishonestly assisted" the director of Goldtrail, stands.

The claim against Onur Air was brought at the same time as a similar claim against Phillip Wyatt, Magnus Stephensen, Halldor Sigurdarson and Black Pearl (whose appeal was dismissed in an earlier Court of Appeal judgment).

The judgment states that Onur Air must now pay more than £5 million costs.

The largest creditor of Goldtrail is the Air Travel Trust (ATT), which is owed about £20 million. 



Ian Oakley Smith, Goldtrail Travel liquidator and director at PwC, said: “We are very happy that this matter has finally been concluded and we are now free to recover monies from Onur Air, which should benefit the creditors of Goldtrail Travel.”

A spokesperson for the CAA added: “We expect Onur Air to respect the judgment of the Court of Appeal without the need for further enforcement action by the liquidators.

“The ATT spent significant sums in dealing with the collapse of Goldtrail and any recovery will be spent in continuing to protect consumers who book Atol protected holidays.”

Kit Jarvis, the litigation partner at Fieldfisher who advised the liquidators, said: “I would like to pay tribute to the excellent teamwork between the PwC team, the Fieldfisher team and the counsel team over a protracted period that has led to this result.

“We are all looking forward to recovering this judgement sum from Onur Air and are considering our options for enforcement should that be necessary.”