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British Airways (BA) lost more luggage than any other major European airline last year, new figures released today have shown.

The airline lost an average of 23 bags per 1,000 passengers it carried in 2006, according to data from the Association of European Airlines (AEA).

It was also revealed that more than 5.6 million bags had been reported missing by passengers across 24 of Europe's largest airlines.

An average of 15.7 bags went astray for every 1,000 carried according to the AEA figures, which were published by the UK's Air Transport Users Council (AUC).

TAP Air Portugal was the second most prolific offender, losing an average of 21 bags per 1,000 passengers, followed by Lufthansa, which lost 18.1 and Air France which mislaid 16.6.

Larger carriers tend to lose more bags than smaller ones as a result of operating at larger airports where a number of passengers take connecting flights, said the AOC, with the risk of baggage being mishandled greater at major hub airports.

The report also revealed that while 85 per cent of missing bags were reunited with their owners within 48 hours, many were never returned.

In a response included in the report, BA director of operations Geoff Want said that the number of bags being processed by the airline at Heathrow had risen by 25 per cent since the introduction of a security regime last August, when the UK's airports suffered severe disruption as the result of an alleged terror plot to blow up transatlantic airliners.

He said that the additional volume of luggage had resulted in an increased number of bags being delayed during the second half of 2006, but acknowledged that BA's performance was below standard.

"The volumes of hold baggage going through Heathrow, the change in security procedures and some baggage system failures within terminal four has not helped our performance, but we accept that overall the levels of service we offered to our customers has not been up to an acceptable standard," said Mr Want.

"We fully apologise to customers who have been affected by delayed baggage in the past year," he added, stressing that BA had undertaken a "significant amount of work" to improve its performance.