I would blame LHW and not the hotels.

Most mainstream loyalty schemes pay the hotel 90-100 per cent of average daily achieved rate when the property is 95 per cent full. This means that they are still happy to take redemptions at peak periods. (At quiet periods, they tend to get £20 to cover cleaning costs!)

Clearly LHW is only offering peanuts to the properties which is why they are blocking off anything even vaguely peak.