Mayor Behaving Badly

Silverjet, the transatlantic ‘business class only’ airline has apparently banned London Mayor Ken Livingstone from its flights. The airline's chief executive, Lawrence Hunt, claims the mayor, formerly known as Red, has "undermined" the London-based airline - which has invested £50m and created 300 jobs in the capital.

Last May, the Red Menace went to a conference on climate change in New York when his Silverjet flight from Luton was delayed for two hours when an air traffic control computer failed. When London's finest finally got to New York he said, "It was the worst flight of my life". Having been asked to explain the circumstances of his delay by Silverjet the mayor failed to do any such thing. Then just this week Livingstone tried to mend the broken fences by saying his remarks referred only to severe air turbulence above Newark going on to praise Silverjet for its "excellent" service.

Lawrence Hunt came back saying "To come up with this explanation nine months later just isn't good enough. I can't stop him booking with me but if I find he's on one of our flights, I'm going to cancel it." Now this may not be the smartest piece of marketing ever, it smacks of Gerald Ratner, in that passengers will have to check in advance to see if the Mayor has a booking on their flight.