One can imagine the pressure being placed on the controllers concerned.
The controllers sitting on the console are the final link in their system. Just as the pilots and engineers are on the flying side.
"mis-management" driven by bean counters, looking at numbers have successively failed to realise that revenue is not generated from financial accounts and people sitting driving desks but from the operational staff.
Driving those people's morale into the ground with an adversarial culture, cost driven policies and kpi's(for managers) have delivered a system where operational staff will push back, be they pilots, engineers or in this case controllers. It is us collectively who hold aviation together. The link is being stretched too far. It is not the regulator, it is certainly not mis-management but the guys/girls at the pointy end of the respective operations that do their best to ensure safe skies and know full well who carries the can on a badddd day!