Flybe ran into financial difficulties last year and was rescued by a consortium of Virgin Atlantic, Stobart Group and Cyrus.

This week it announced that the airline would be rebranded Virgin Connect, an exercise that will begin next spring.

Chief executive Mark Anderson spoke publicly yesterday for the first time, making it clear that a major restructuring exercise was under way.

He did not deny that job losses would be required, but said it was too early to be specific, saying: “It could be that there will be a number of roles that are impacted, but we haven’t yet got to numbers.