FlightGlobal.com
Home
Premium
Archive
Video
Images
Forum
Atlas
Blogs
Jobs
Shop
RSS
Email Newsletters
You are in:
Home
Aviation History
1966
1966 - 0998.PDF
THURSDAY 14 APRIL l»o« Number 2979 Volume 89 Editor-in-Chief MAURICE A. SMITH DFC Editor J. M. RAMSDEN Assistant Editor KENNETH OWEN BSe DCAo AFRAeS Air Transport Editor H. A. TAYLOR Production Editor ROY CASEY Managing Director H. N. PRIAULX MBE In this Issue World News 5 7 6 Management 5 7 8 Air Transport 5 7 9 Airports Authority in Business 5 8 4 Development of the RB.I62 5 8 6 Sport and Business 5 8 8 Letters 5 9 0 Special Feature: World Airline Survey 5 9 2 Industry International 6 4 I Spaceflight 6 4 2 Defence 6 4 8 Straight and Level 6 5 0 Htefe? Plications Ltd, DorsetteSSf' Suul£ord Street, London SE1; ?ifPhone Waterloo 3333 (STDOI)Telegrams/Telex: Flight Iliffepres 25137 threeT f?r one year- £>2 f°rd8,.aiul USA S18 for CL M»iii3,^ •?)r three ye*"- SecondYork NY pnviJe8es authorised at New >**K NY6; Ltd illustra- Official Organ of the Royal Aero Club First Aeronautical Weekly in the World Founded In 1909 First Things First due A STATE share in Britain's two big airframe companies wasadvocated by the Labour Party in the General Election campaign, although Mr Mulley did not mention it in his replies to our pr,e- Election questions. It was recommended by the Plowden committee, and Labour was returned with a majority of 97. What clearer mandate could the new Government want? We do not believe that State participation, or the merger of the two main airframe companies that would probably accompany it, will produce a more efficient aircraft industry. Even today, six years after the big Hawker Siddeley and BAC mergers, the human and organisational problems involved are still being felt. The dislocations and personality problems of a BAC-Hawker Siddeley merger and a State shareholding would be even more serious and prolonged. Perhaps, it might be asked, such disruptions would be worthwhile in the end? After all, Sir George Edwards of BAC has said that a State shareholding might be no bad thing; and there are officials in the Ministry of Aviation who are convinced that it is the only way to restore confidence in the way public money is spent on aviation. There are some industries which serve the people better when the State has a share in the running of them. Only the completely doctrinaire would say that State participation is always bad. Each industry has to be treated on its merits. The first essential in the aircraft industry is for the Government to be a better customer. Nonsenses like 104 people at a project meeting are more likely to be perpetuated than eliminated by State participation. The danger is that nationalisa- tion, or semi-nationalisation, will merely give the impression of better financial control, and nothing is more calculated to run away with somebody else's money than the impression that somebody else is caring for it. "It is not Policy" Ask the Ministry of Aviation to give a breakdown of the £200,000,000 of public money that Britain is spending on the Concorde, or a breakdown of the £200,000 on the Islander (the principle is the same). The answer is a negative. Why? Because it is not policy. Why Js it not policy? Because publication of such information would not be in the commercial interests of the industry. Anyone with the time to press the matter further is told to ask the Treasury, which declines to com- ment. State participation will of course aggravate the secrecy habit. As long as the industry is spending public money the accountability rules must surely be different. Parliament and public are entitled to be fully informed within the limits of genuine national security. How refreshing it was to hear the president of the SBAC, Lord Caldecote, say in the Lords that R&D cost estimates should be disclosed. It is the first time that anyone of his status in the industry has said that. There will never be control of public money while the industry claims the right to complete privacy as to how it spends that money and while the Ministry of Aviation actively and vigorously defends that privacy. The Government's job is to look after the interests of Parlia- ment and the taxpayer, not the commercial interests of its suppliers. The most immaculately accomplished merger and State share- holding will achieve nothing if these attitudes are not changed. A tougher Government customer and a shorter gear-train between it and the suppliers are more relevant than mergers and State ownership.
Sign up to
Flight Digital Magazine
Flight Print Magazine
Airline Business Magazine
E-newsletters
RSS
Events
