Friday, 28 February 1997

The Secretive way to do business

British Airways & American Airlines merger goes invisible!

Enter: Bob Ayling? The chief executive of British Airways, who’s arse is sweating buckets that his BA & AA merger may be left at the departure lounge if John Major’s Tory government don’t get their finger out and leave the T’s & C’s of the European Commission to sling a no fly zone over Heathrow. So Ayling bags himself a few slimey politicians off the street and swear them to secrecy with a back door deal to conspire away from the prying eyes of the public and any other body or institution that may not see eye to eye with their agenda.

So, does Bob’s airline have inside information that the Tory’s are on their way out ‘four months’ before the May election? Or are they lobbying both sides on a safe bet? Or is it that they have it on good authority that the leader of the opposition ‘Tony Blair’ has had the old boy’s wink and is going to win the premiership and is already chomping at the bit to sigh the bastard no sooner he gets the keys to number 10?
Queue:  Michael Heseltine ‘deputy prime minister’ and Neil Kinnock ‘European commissioner’ (and they don’t come any slimier than these pair of runny shits).
A Labour git helping a Tory chump? Who’d of thunk it! But it’s all in the common cause of Moollah, Folding money. £128 million ‘A DAY’ worth of cash to be exact. There is nothing more that travels the cross party trough faster than a slight whiff of a big wedge of spending stuff! Pigs only run in one direction when the farmer rattles the feed bucket!
The problem stems from these pesky ‘landing slots’ that can’t be swapped, changed or given away due to ‘fair competition rules’ set out by the European Commission. Their value is only credited as part of planning procedure to get aircraft in and out of Heathrow. So our man Kinnock comes up with the idea of changing the context of the landing slots and give it a monetary value instead? So the slots become a valuable monetary asset which can go onto BA’s balance sheet, ‘and can be sold or bought for profit’!
So if it’s a secret, there is no disclosure? If there is no disclosure then it must be unlawful?

Source:  Heseltine in secret talks with BA over US tie-up
             Randeep Ramesh Transport Correspondent - The Independent
             Friday 28 February 1997