<<They were absolutely astounded at what had happened and commented they would be on a disciplinary hearing for doing that!! >>
UK ATCOs are impartial without a doubt but during my years in London ATC, during my spells as a Superviso, I fielded a good number of phone calls from pilots whingeing and moaning that "You let British Midland in first", or "Why did BA get take-off before us".... always from UK pilots and never from their foreign counterparts. I never heard anything about "disciplinary hearings" and am certain that they do not exist. Many, many times, aircraft are apparently given priority, both on the ground and in the air, to achieve the maximum landing rate. Day after day aircraft will be brought off the holding patterns apparently "out of turn" for this reason. Unfortunately some people working up front in their own little world can't take that on board.... but nobody in ATC gets disclipined.