Missing frill

 

It was a 'No frills flight" with Flybe. While I am content to miss out on the free champagne and complimentary pair of socks - having no plane is a problem. Yesterday I was booked to fly from Bristol to the Isle of Man. Everything was going well. With a former Secretary of State I was  booked in, went through the meaningless rituals of security and settled down waiting for our flight to be called.

A cheerful voice announced that our flight had been cancelled because of a 'technical fault.' Alternatives would be offered by Flybe. Instead of flight from Bristol at 2,30 Flybe gave me a £7 voucher and a free bus to Gatwick for a 7.30 flight.  It was five hours of boredom and futility. This morning I received this message from the ever cheerful Flybe

 

Dear Paul Flynn

We hope that you enjoyed your recent flight from Bristol.

Here at Flybe your feedback is important to us and we would love to hear your views on your recent flight experience. From booking on Flybe.com, to the service you received during your journey your comments will help us make improvements to provide that 'extra' quality service in the future. 

 

I hope they find my reply stimulating and instructive

 

 Big Pharma judges Big Pharma

 

The German health expert,  former MP and chairman of the Subcommittee for Health in the Council of Europe Dr. Wolfgang Wodarg accuses WHO of continuing  their unwise close cooperation with specialists from pharmaceutical industry. 

Dr Wodarg says;

"On October 15th 2010 the World Health Organisation (WHO) announced a scientific evaluation of its "pandemic" strategy. Prof. Jonathan Van Tam and his Institute at the University of Nottingham (UK) were designated as WHO partners for this delicate mission. 

WHO does not seem to be irritated, that the evaluator, Prof. Van Tam has worked for ROCHE (Tamiflu),  Aventis Pasteur MSD (Sanofi Aventis) and SmithKline Beecham (GSK) as Head of Medical Affairs and has been a Key Opinion Leader (KOL) in the multi-billion dollar business of threatening the world about birds- and swineflu "pandemics".

Although those pandemic threats soon turned out to be science-fiction or marketing ideas of some well paid pharma-experts, people like Van Tam were extremely successful for their sponsors.  They managed to shape the flu strategies of WHO and of all countries listening to them.

Now in his position as a public health expert at Nottingham University, WHO has asked him again, to "evaluate how preparedness activities aided the response to pandemic (H1N1) 2009, identifying good practices for the future and areas where continued or additional WHO support is still needed." Prof VanTam has announced, that he plans to present his report at the end of 2010.

The Council of Europe had examined WHO's "faked" pandemics and the British Labour MP Paul Flynn has presented a well recognized report last June, which blamed WHO for hiding important facts and opening the door for interests of the industry while sacrificing its independence and its important role as a standard-setter for global health.

Ignoring the European Parliamentarians who were insisting on more transparency, WHO continues its dangerous relations with industry-financed experts and seems to be immune against public protest.

We have experienced, that in spite of aggressive advertising and ongoing media-campaigns only few doctors and patients still follow the advice of a corrupted agency. 

But we should ask our governments, why they just observe and pay, while in the meantime the most important international health agency is misused for greedy marketing by scrupulous pharmaceutical companies."

 

Here you find the WHO announcement: http://www.euro.who.int/en/what-we-do/health-topics/diseases-and-conditions/influenza/news2/news/2010/11/new-collaborating-centre-studies-pandemic-preparedness

 

Irish woe

The six-monthly meeting of the British-Irish Parliamentary  Assembly has turned into a wake.

For he first time ever, we are meeting in a Crown Dependancy - the Isle of Man. The word from the Fianna Fail TDs is that Government will go and a general election will be held in January. Some even suggest it will be 'before Christmas.' The mobile phones link between the Isle of Man and Ireland were throbbing with Fianna Fail anxiety about the demise of their party. They presently stand at only 17% in the polls.

Today's meeting had warm words for David Cameron for his apology on the Bloody Sunday report. Some asked for a similar inquiry into the Ballymurphy killings. It was reported that other very expensive inquiries had achieved little. There are dozens of unlawful killings that could qualify for new probes - but to little purpose.

 

 

Comments

[James Wood]

P.S. It is known as Flymaybe as it is so unreliable------forever cancelled and security is deplorable. We take a 4 hour ferry journey followed by an hour by road to get to Inverness if there is no urgency rather than a 40 minute flight from Stornoway Airport.

[James Wood]

You folks have evidently not gone through Stornoway airport. Appalling! Bristol sounds great.
We have no option as flybe has Stornoway all to itself and leases out to the antedeluvian Loganair.

[Paul Flynn]

There is widespread cynicism from my fellow travellers on the cause of cancellation. Some even believe that it is better value for Flybe to ferried passengers on to other flights. I would not be so cynical, but i will ask.

[Ron Combo]

Tom, I'm with you on Bristol Airport security. Even by the UK's unparalleled standard of jobsworths, the charming boys and girls at Bristol stand head and shoulders above all their national colleagues for pettiness and heavy-handedness.

[LondonStatto]

Richard, did you actually read the whole post or did you just see "cancelled because of a 'technical fault.' and, if you'll forgive the phrase, switch onto auto-pilot?

It's fairly clear that Mr. Flynn's complaint is that the automatically-generated message he received was utterly inappropriate for the circumstances.

[Richard]

So, would you rather be flown on an unsafe aeroplane? Of course any sensible pilot would not fly that 'plane, so you would have a pair of fools on the flight deck too.

There are plenty of criticisms to make of the no-frills airlines (Flybe are as bad as BMI Baby who just charged me £12 for a debit card payment they paid 30p or less to clear, for example) but as a commercial pilot who has had to land an aircraft full of nervous passengers due to a serious technical fault it does exasperate me when people complain about unavoidable cancellations. Technical problems and weather can lead to serious hazards, hazards which can usually be avoided by careful and well-trained crew.

Better to be on the ground wishing you were in the air than in the air wishing you were on the ground, as every pilot will tell you.

[Tom]

Ah, the joys of travelling Flybe, that website is a doozy - auto-ticking you some hold baggage three times out of four passes through the booking process and other add-ons popping magically onto your bill - so that you have to go around again to swat them - "technical probems" again no doubt.

Bristol Airport security, winners of my last week's in your face officious confiscators prize from the bowels of my laptop bag of a tube of toothpaste (v.small) and a 50cm length of black insulating tape which I could have restrained someone with.

The adventure and glamor of air travel eh?

Security screening is getting worse - understaffed with low wagers (kids + pensioners) and jobsworth nitpickers in management are resulting in long waits and high levels of frustration from travellers.

Israelify seems to be worth a try....