Given that Mr George is one of only three executive directors on

Given that Mr George is one of only three executive directors on the BA board and has a portfolio covering an immense amount of ground, from sales, marketing and public relations to cargo, revenue management, cabin crew and the website, this is a remarkable state of affairs. On the one hand, its fuel surcharges have miraculously matched BA’s, step for step. On the other, Virgin seems to have escaped regulatory sanction by turning Queen’s evidence on BA, and in so doing trashing the name of its old adversary. BA has responded by taking the unprecedented and peculiar step of putting two of its executives on enforced leave of absence, as if they had already been judged guilty before the trial has even begun.

Although the other carriers – Virgin Atlantic, United Airlines and American Airlines – have all confirmed that they are co-operating with the Office of Fair Trading and the US Department of Justice, the two US airlines say they are “not a target of the investigation” while Virgin says that, far from joining in the cartel, it was the one that shopped BA to the competition authorities.If so, then it looks like a case of Virgin having its cake and eating it. Before BA first began levying a fuel surcharge two years ago, there was a long debate within the airline’s management about whether to incorporate it within the ticket price or identify it separately. In the end, BA chose the latter course, even though it knew that each time the surcharge went up, it would be accompanied by a barrage of negative headlines.
The investigation centres on air routes between Heathrow and the US, which only BA and three other airlines are permitted to fly. But in order to conspire, you have to have others with whom to collude. As for secrecy, far from attempting to impose fuel surcharges by stealth, BA could hardly have been more upfront about them. The other defining characteristic of cartels is that they operate in secret.

Neither, on the face of it, seems to be the case with the great British Airways price-fixing scandal which erupted this week. As far as it is possible to ascertain, the only airline which is under civil and criminal investigation for fixing the level of fuel surcharges is BA. Even if it admits defeat, Macquarie and its two fellow investors, Canada Pension Plan Investment Board and Australia’s Industry Funds Management, will make a profit from the bid battle. At 910p, Britannia will net £4.7m from the sale of its 5.2 million shares which were bought for 820p, helping it to cover advisory and financing costs.. Unless I am missing something, in order for a cartel to exist it has to involve more than one party. In addition, Britannia would probably have to offer shareholders extra to compensate for the fact that its bid would probably take longer to close This could add another 8p or 9p to its costs.