Autumn Statement 2016: air travel
A Virgin Atlantic flight had to stop after a passenger got rowdy when he drank too much iStock

Two senior British peers have called for the aviation industry to have the same licensing laws as pubs and nightclubs following a spike in arrests for drunkenness among passengers.

There has been a steep rise of 50% in the number of air passengers arrested for drunken misbehaviour in the last year.

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Cabin crew have reported being abused both physically and verbally by drunk passengers and police figures show that this year there were 387 arrests for alcohol-related offences on flights and airports, up from 255 from February 2015-2016, BBC Panorama will report on Monday (14 August).

In May, a Virgin Atlantic flight from London to Jamaica had to stop in Bermuda when a drunken passenger allegedly got abusive to air stewards after consuming alcohol on board.

Another man was fined £575 after he urinated on an Easyjet flight from Bristol to Newcastle and then fell down the aircraft's stairs while trying to escape upon landing.

There has a call by the House of Lords select committee for MPs to agree that airports should not be exempt under the Licensing Act.

Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town, a Labour peer and founding director of the charity Alcohol Concern,said airports were selling alcohol around licensing hours and without asking how much people have already drunk.

Meanwhile Baroness McIntosh of Pickering, said: "We didn't hear one shred of evidence to show that the voluntary code was either working now or had any possible vestige of success in working any time soon. I would urge . . . the Home Office to really take this problem seriously," the Times reported.