Speaking of incompetents getting themselves into top jobs....
Dame Deirdre Hutton was appointed to the CAA Board as a Non-Executive Board Member in April 2009 and took up the position of Chair of the CAA in August 2009. Dame Deirdre was previously Chair of the Food Standards Agency, Honorary Vice-President of the Institute of Food Science and Technology, Honorary Vice-President of the Trading Standards Institute, and serves as a Non-Executive member of the HM Treasury Board. She has been Vice-Chair of the European Food Safety Authority Management Board, Deputy Chair of the Financial Services Authority, Chair of the National Consumer Council, Chair of the Scottish Consumer Council, and a member of the Better Regulation Task Force.
Source: CAA Website.
She actually boasted that she knows nothing about aviation; pretty obvious, isn't it, looking at her CV. But she "knows people", doesn't she, who can fix up a succession of sinecures for her.
Known in the UK as QUANGO QUEENS, these people move blithely from disaster to disaster with ever-increasing salaries, pointing out that they cannot be held responsible when things inevitably go wrong, since they know nothing about the organisations of which they are "The Chair".