Tour operator Thomas Cook triggered outrage this week with its response to the deaths of two children on one of its holidays in 2006. Bobby and Christi Shepherd, aged 6 and 7, died of carbon monoxide poisoning in Corfu. The cause was a faulty boiler in their hotel room. Thomas Cook did not own the hotel, but an inquest that ended this week found that the group had not done enough to ensure the property had carried out proper safety checks.
During the inquest, chief executive Peter Fankhauser said he sympathised, but that Cook had "no need to apologise" as it hadn't done anything wrong. It also emerged that the company had received £3.5m in compensation from the hotel owner, around ten times the sum the family had received.
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