The BBC’s love of the EU is blind and knows no bounds. Here, Richard Black – showing crass ignorance of the laws of supply and demand – bellyaches that the nasty Chinks (his spitefulness makes Diane Abbott look tame, but this is a greenie item, so no holds are barred) are daring to complain about Brussels’ puntive new aviation tax. His breathtakingly naive argument is that Chinky airlines make obscene, nasty capitalist profits so why worry – and in any case it only amounts to a few dollars a ticket – so who gives a stuff? Actually Mr Black, US airlines – never mind China for a second – say it will cost them billions of dollars. But in Mr Black’s lavish never-never land of cash-from-the licence fee will buy my air ticket to Durban or wherever I please, such trifles clearly do not matter.
In the real world of competition and tight margins,a dollar remains a dollar – no matter how devalued it has become under Obama – and this new tax is a pointless, nasty piece of legislation that is one more nail in the coffin of European competitiveness. The BBC should be highlighting its likely negative impact rather than offering such repression an unqualified puff.