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Speedpig
12th Jul 2005, 16:52
Lord King has passed away today aged 87

JW411
12th Jul 2005, 16:53
Fred Laker and I are totally devastated!

Farrell
12th Jul 2005, 16:58
JW411 has finally revealed himself to be...... Richard Branson!

JW411
12th Jul 2005, 17:18
Farrell:

No squire, I had my very happy career in Laker ended by the scurrilous behaviour of Lord King and his fox-hunting colleagues in BA, PanAm, SABENA, KLM etc etc.

I really don't want to start things all over again but Lord King spoiled me for BALPA, BA and all things decent and left me very much out of work.

For those of you in BA who can be bothered to read this thread, I lost all of my pension but BALPA couldn't have give a damn.

In fact, they were quite pleased that Laker had been put out of business by BA.

I suppose the nice thing is that King has now gone, Adam Thompson (who told MDC that BCAL would never order another DC-10 as long as they supported Fred) went years ago with Altzheimers.

At least Fred is still running aeroplanes at the age of 82.

We have a reunion at LGW in September.

Bmused55
12th Jul 2005, 18:13
At least Fred is still running aeroplanes at the age of 82.

That'll be the pair of silver 727s with LAKER on the side of them and the Bahamian flag on the tail I saw sitting near a maintenance facility in Fort Lauderdale in September then?

Dash-7 lover
12th Jul 2005, 18:51
Farrell - that's an insult to Sir Dickie ... see JW411's other posts!

JW411
12th Jul 2005, 19:00
Dash 7 - lover:

You are becoming a pain in the arse. I was a DC-10 captain with Fred when Lord King and his gang decided to put Fred out of business.

Now then, you see this as a bit of fun on the pprune website but I was out of a job for the best part of 2 years and had to re-mortgage my house.

I ran pubs and worked in TESCOS stacking shelves so don't tell me what being out of work is like.

I came out the other side but don't ever tell me what a nice man Lord King was.

He was a t***er and he got got caught out and had to pay Fred $13.5 million out of court.

Bmused55
12th Jul 2005, 19:06
here here JW411!

I never had any involvment with Laker, far too young, but as a fan of the industry, I do admire Freddie Laker... and anything negative that befalls the persons who forced laker out of the UK is well deserved.

P.S. I sympathise with you on boting the rather demoralising jobless situation back then.
I'm currently in such a position and it stinks.

Dash-7 lover
12th Jul 2005, 19:08
JW411 ........... why the personal attack?. I've also stacked shelves (Sainsbury's) and NEVER been unemployed...... you've lost the plot matey......read the threads...some of them serious.


Read Branson's biography and was impressed and ashamed at what airlines are prepared to do to see off the competition....Lord King's input and the shocking lack of dignity/respect shown and then the corruption with the slot allocations for the inaugural VS flights out of LHR. Still, an extraordinary man.

def worth a read.

Flightrider
12th Jul 2005, 19:12
Chaps

Someone has passed away today. Whatever you thought of his business ethics, a death inevitably means upset and sorrow from those close to the deceased. Is it too difficult to maintain a level of decorum?

Rgds
Flightrider

Wycombe
12th Jul 2005, 20:41
Never met the man, but got very used to the sight of him and his Beech 200 runabout at Wycombe back in his days at the head of BA.

Made it sound like a proper airport when you heard "Speedbird 1000" on the R/T

Unwell_Raptor
12th Jul 2005, 20:56
Who was it who said 'de mortuis nil nisi bunkum'?

Dash-7 lover
12th Jul 2005, 21:00
Flightrider ..... I agree and apologise.

BEagle
12th Jul 2005, 21:27
King, Marshall and similar reptiles are the reason why I will NEVER fly ba unless there is no feasible alternative.

So it's Lufthansa again tomorrow.

Flybywyre
12th Jul 2005, 21:35
Is it too difficult to maintain a level of decorum?

Actually flightrider, I think that when you feel someone has done you an injustice then the answer to your question is a resounding yes.
After all Hitler and Stalin had people close to them, do you feel that they should be granted the same courteousy of said decorum ? Before anyone accuses me of comparing those two with King, I would like to state categorically that this is not the case.
The point I am seeking to make is that it is quite natural, rightly or wrongly, to feel somewhat indifferent at the passing away of someone who you feel has done you harm or an injustice.
This is not intended as any form of judgement or disrespect to the late Lord King and my sympathy's are extended to his friends and family.
Regards
FBW

stormin norman
12th Jul 2005, 21:35
Freddie did get a large payout in the aftermath, (about £6 million) but i didn't see him pay any of his ex staff with it.Could someone expalin why ?

Speedpig
12th Jul 2005, 22:31
Thought the news might stir a few emotive comments.
I met the man several times and he even managed to read my name badge once and addressed me by name. I didn't like him, but his passing ends an era of aviation history. A very clever man and very, very inventive accountant. A master stroke to revalue the BA fleet to turn loss into profit overnight.
He will go down in history as an aviation pioneer, but will be best remembered for the Laker episode as well as the "dirty tricks" Can anybody categorically say that BA was the only company ever to carry out such atrocities? They got caught, is all.:ouch:

Speedpig
13th Jul 2005, 00:53
RT, you're right.
My original post was intended as an obituary.

Loose rivets
13th Jul 2005, 04:05
The soil raked over a grave, is one small patch of a new and level playing field.

Old King Coal
13th Jul 2005, 07:06
When ever I hear John / Sir / Lord King's name, a phrase that immediately then comes to mind is 'unethical business practices' !

It shouldn't be forgotten that King was at BA's helm during the era of the "dirty tricks" campaign(s).

This was something which subsequently ended with Richard Branson sueing King and BA for libel (in 1992).
BA countersued and the case went to trial (in 1993) whereupon the court found in favour of Branson & Virgin, and King & BA were ordered to pay damages of £500,000 to Branson and £110,000 to Virgin.
BA also had to cough up legal fees up about £3m........ needless to say, King retired soon after.

Aside - The UK arm of Air Europe would probably also have sued wrt 'Dirty Tricks' but they'd already been put out of business (anybody else remember the AE Boardroom & HG's car being bugged; so who did that then ?) - and much the same could probably be said for Laker, BCal, and DanAir.

See also: Dirty Tricks: British Airways' Secret War Against Virgin Atlantic (http://www.limotransportation.info/books-plain/0753504588.html)

HZ123
13th Jul 2005, 07:33
LK loved KRUG, fine cigars and personality girls and BA have a lot to thank him for. With regard to dirty tricks then he was years ahead of his time.

Ennie
13th Jul 2005, 07:36
I often wonder what goes through the minds of people when they write posts on this website.

When somebody writes something serious, why do people feel the need to take the piss or have a go??

Gets me every time.

Old King Coal
13th Jul 2005, 07:56
HZ123 - I think what you meant to say is "BA's shareholders have a lot to thank him for".

And, wrt "LK loved KRUG, fine cigars and personality girls".... well how delightful for him that he could afford such luxuries !

And, wrt "With regard to dirty tricks then he was years ahead of his time" - one hopes that you're not suggesting that this is acceptable practice ?!

Do remember that BA's 'dirty tricks' had the potential to, and did indeed, lead to substantial losses by a great many people (people who, for the most part, could least afford the loss).

It's reported that LK died on his 2,000-acre Wartnaby estate (alright for some !)..... maybe his widow would like to donate some of it to the poor buggers who were effected by her late husbands antics. :mad:

M.Mouse
13th Jul 2005, 11:12
This thread and the comments therein disgust me.

Why not start another thread entitled 'Somewhere I can post my hatred and personal predjudices whatever the facts'?

I prefer to remember him for his considerable achievements in life not least the amazingly good things he achieved with BEA/BOAC/BA. He was a hard act to follow.

frostbite
13th Jul 2005, 12:01
Is my memory playing me tricks or was LK not given (foc) a large fleet of aircraft from which to make a profit?

As a very lowly (Aviation Traders, Southend) ex-employee of Sir Freddie I would have loved to see him make more of his business, without the 'help' from LK.

Helen49
13th Jul 2005, 12:42
The caustic comments made on pprune by those describing their location as the 'pointy end' do make me question their fitness to hold such positions!
H49

Old King Coal
13th Jul 2005, 13:16
Helen49 - why, in your humble opinion, should expressing what you describe as caustic comment effect ones fitness (as you put it) to hold a position in the pointy end ?!

The fact of the matter is, and whether you like it or not, that LK + BA was found guilty in the UK courts of having libelled Richard Branson & Virgin Atlantic, in respect of the 'dirty tricks' – all of which occurred under LK's tenure; or are you disputing this as fact ?!

Ok, so how about this version of a homily to the man.... ? (albeit perhaps somewhat in the same vein as Private Eye’s homily to the late Lady Di)IN recent weeks (not to mention the last twenty years) we at the Daily Gnome, in common with many others, may have inadvertently conveyed the impression that the late Lord King was in some way a manipulative troublemaker whom was not averse to conducting underhand campaigns with the intent of discrediting rival businesses and their owners . We now realise as of Tuesday that Lord King was in fact the most saintly man who has ever lived, who, with his charitable activities, brought hope and succour to hundreds and millions of people all over the world. We would like to express our sincere and deepest hypocrisy to all our customers during these tragic days and hope and pray that they will carry on flying with British Airways notwithstanding. :E

Farrell
13th Jul 2005, 13:21
JW411......

I am sorry to have opened old wounds which must be fragile at the best of times.

This apology would have come sooner only I have not visited the site since I made that comment.

Sincere regards

Farrell

Dylsexlic
13th Jul 2005, 13:28
"King, Marshall and similar reptiles are the reason why I will NEVER fly ba unless there is no feasible alternative"

S'funny. I fly whichever airline gets me to where I want to go at the time I need to be there. Am I the only one who can't afford to be choosy? In spite of all the airlines out there, there are not many who can fly to a European destination and back in one day, with a resonable amount of time on the ground for a meeting.

Lord King did a job at BA. I don't suppose for a minute that any casualties of his reign were picked out personally by him from long parchment scrolls of names.

You're either a victim in this life or a winner. Whichever you are, this guy has died.

Respect.

Old King Coal
13th Jul 2005, 13:42
Dylsexlic - wrt 'I don't suppose for a minute that any casualties of his reign were picked out personally by him from long parchment scrolls of names'.... err, isn't that akin to the defence that many at the top have used when they've been called to task, and / or coupled with that lovely phrase "Ve vere only following ze orders" ?! :rolleyes:

GJB
13th Jul 2005, 16:44
I admire Lord King for what he achieved at BA, may he rest in peace.

Hussar 54
13th Jul 2005, 17:36
A person, not a something, has died and before he's even cold we're slagging him on a public forum - so apologies to his family if they happen to read this and it causes them even more upset than they no doubt are suffering at this moment.

Stalin once said ' if one person dies it's a tragedy, but if a million die it's just a statistic ' I think we should feel a little bit the same here for the sake of his family.

But I'm afraid I'm a little bit with OKC and others on this.

I'm German, lived down here for a couple of decades after a few years training and being based in the UK, still have relatives who are more or less British in the UK, never worked for BA, and had a reasonably profitable flying career until getting the elbow from the beancounters. So although perhaps I should keep out of this one, it's difficult not to join in.

Whether he was a good and likeable man in person, in business or in private, or whether he was a complete and utter sh*t I have no idea and will never know.....but to me he will always remain as one of the symbols of Thatcherism and all that was wrong with it. One of the chosen few of her friends and business cronies who made vast fortunes out of the suffering of the millions they threw on the scrapheap with their ' f*ck tomorrow' short-termism and ' on yer bike' economics and mentality....dogma....disrespect....and a basic lack of sympathy and decency to people whose lives were overturned in the name profit.....profit...... profit......

In retrospect, these people were the prototypes for what we have seen in the CIS the past decade and it would be interesting to draw up a list ( maybe it already exists ? ) of the millions and millions accumulated by these cronies as they were parachuted into these privatisations on a regular basis - I actually live close by three of them down here....all complete hoorays whose main asset appears to have been to have the 'front' to pay themselves increasingly huge bonuses for adding thousands to the unemployement lists.

OK, it seems the UK has been going forward whilst the rest of us here in Europe have been going backwards the past few years, and no doubt someone will reply ( welcomed ) that it's all based on what the Dictator-ess accomplished during those years, but in this particular case, was BA a better airline after their antics ?

Depends on whether you were lucky enough to have had enough spare social security to have become a shareholder when the company, like so many others, was sold for peanuts, or whether you were unlucky enough to have been one of those selected for the short walk with a wave of the finger, whether at BA, at Laker due to this man's ( lack of ) business ethics, at Dan-Air, at Air Europe et al, in the name of profit.....profit.....profit......

3REDS
14th Jul 2005, 13:04
I couldn't have put it any better myself. Right on the money HUSSAR:ok:

Andy_S
14th Jul 2005, 13:54
One of the chosen few.....friends and business cronies
these cronies as they were parachuted in.....on a regular basis
whose main asset appears to have been to have the 'front' to pay themselves increasingly huge bonuses

All of which makes me wonder - what has really changed, other than the fact that todays cronies feed from a public (taxpayer funded) rather than private sector trough.

what the Dictator-ess accomplished during those years

I find that deeply offensive. Whether you approved of Thatcher and her ideology or not, to call her a dictator is an insult to, and trivialises the suffering of those, who even today live under genuine dictatorships. Ever heard of Burma? Please grow up.

but in this particular case, was BA a better airline after their antics ?

For the passenger and the taxpayer, indisputably yes. But maybe they don't count......

stagn8
15th Jul 2005, 06:18
Rather than sound off at a peer of the realm who was doing a job, woudn't it be fairer to (a) congratulate said gentleman on the efficacy with which he executed his task, and (b) question the intent of those who set his objectives ?? Now those would be interesting reading...

mach79
15th Jul 2005, 13:02
Yes , I think its bad taste to speak of someone just departed in such terms.

I actually met him once in the passing,and had no doubt he was a hard nosed, but effective businessman who saw the need for change in the industry.

Skylion
15th Jul 2005, 18:57
Interestingly if my memory serves me correctly, BA lost the libel cases, but there was never a verdict on the alleged dirty tricks themselves. BA people who were close to the alleged events didnt recognise them as real and were astonished that the airline did not contest them , particularly when it was admitted that some of the filming was " reconstruction" rather than live. The actuality seems to be that King and Marshall, followed by Ayling had no stomach for continuing the fight as it was expensive, time consuming and debilitating in PR terms and distracted BA people from the task of running the business. Like them or not, BAs track record worldwide for British aviation, both pre and post privatisation has been remarkable and it is unlikely that any alternative could have done better...... and no, they did not receive free aircraft on privatisation.

Sean Dell
17th Jul 2005, 09:43
"King, Marshall and similar reptiles are the reason why I will NEVER fly ba unless there is no feasible alternative."

Beagle - excellent reasoning! Well thought out - must have taken hours!

Actually, due to the behaviour of Adolf Hitler and his mates I never travel Lufthansa or eat Sausages.

Just how long does the bridge have to be for the water to have flowed under it?

Looking forward to your next contribution......not

:(

Captain Airclues
17th Jul 2005, 11:38
I met Lord King several times and found him to be charming and charismatic. However he didn´t suffer fools, and could be very hard on anyone who showed any sign of weakness or lack of ability. He and Marshall cut out most of the dead wood from BA and made it into a lean , efficient airline, a process that Ayling reversed.
Newcomers into the airline business always extoll the virtues of competition but then complain when the established carriers fight back. Laker went to the wall because, having borrowed money in dollars, the dollar rose against the pound when most of his revenue was in sterling. The settlement with a group of airlines was, in US terms, for peanuts and was considerably cheaper than going to court. I wonder how much of this money found it´s way to the Laker employees. The cases that actually went to court in Miami were lost. I doubt whether many Laker staff would have lost any sleep if King had failed and the BA staff had been stacking shelves.
Although Branson won the libel case, he lost all of the ´Dirty Tricks´cases that came to court. I believe that he had to pay BA´s costs but my memory of this is from `BA News´at the time so am willing to be corrected. However the ´Dirty Tricks´saga, whether true or not (please don´t quote the various works of fiction to me), was probably the best PR coup that RB could have dreamed of. To have people refusing to fly BA, although childish behaviour so long after the event, proves what a brilliant PR event it was for Virgin. RB and Virgin don´t seem to have done too badly in the last few years.
Lord King was a brilliant businessman who took no prisoners. It is only natual that those who have been burned will be bitter, but that does not detract from what he achieved with BA.

Airclues
(I have my hard hat on so fire away :) )

Lou Scannon
17th Jul 2005, 19:49
For Stormin Normin's benefit:

All the Laker pilots were paid six months salary by BA in an out of court settlement.

...and it took me many years before I could go near a BA aircraft!

Private jet
17th Jul 2005, 21:14
John King was only a small part in Lakers downfall. There was a combination of factors.
Firstly, it was a cartel of several airlines that undercut Freddie not just BA
Secondly Freddie borrowed money in US$ from banks or thru lease deals with the manufacturer. The airlines principle income was in £sterling. During the late 70's-early 80's the value of the £ collapsed against the $, therefore sending his loan repayments thru the roof, and the airline rapidly became insolvent.
Too many bitter people here blaming one man for their personal misfortune. JK was a man doing a job he was employed for, simple as that.