Business Opinion: It is the year 2010. The place is the boardroom of Aer Lingus, the national airline of the People's Socialist Republic of Bertistan.

A board meeting is just about to start...

Chairman Begg: Right, let's get started..

Worker Director: If I can just stop you there Mr Chairman. I think I speak on behalf of the other 15 worker directors when I say that before we do anything we should send our salutations to Beloved Leader Ahern on his recent unanimous election as President for Life of the People's Socialist Republic of Bertistan.

Chairman Begg: Yes of course. Mr Secretary will you take care of that?

Secretary Coady: Consider it done.

Chairman Begg: Right. First item on the agenda. Acquisition of new planes. Perhaps the chief executive would take us through this.

Chief executive Halpenny: It would be my pleasure Mr Chairman. Now, ladies and gentlemen, the proposal before you today is that we purchase a combination of Tupolov 104 medium range jets and some Yak 42 short-haul aircraft. These planes are ideally suited to our current requirements and strategic plan.

In addition, I am confident that we will be able to acquire them at favourable rates from our sister airlines in the Absurdworld Alliance. Both North Korean Airlines and the Air Service of the Socialist Peoples Republic of Drumcondrania have surplus planes at present. Now, any questions?

Independent Director: Aren't these planes rather old? They date from the Cold War after all.

Chief executive Halpenny: Yes, its a stroke of luck. They are just what we need to meet the objectives of the Aer Lingus five-year plan, or the Great Leap Backwards as we like to call it.

Independent Director: But what about the 11 Airbus A330s we borrowed €1 billion to buy for the long-haul market.

Chief executive Halpenny: Don't need them anymore. ...

Independent Director: What?

Chief executive Halpenny: Sorry, I meant to tell you that. We are going to withdraw from the transatlantic routes.

Independent Director: What?

Chief executive Halpenny: Yes, it's true. We simply cannot compete with Walshair. We have tried everything. You name it we have tried it. Bigger shamrocks on the tail fins, everything.

I really thought that our "More Irish than the most Irish thing you can think of" advertising campaign would turn things around but it hasn't.

Who would have believed people would rather pay €140 for a one-way ticket to New York on Walshair when they could be paying €400 for the same trip in I Can't Believe It's So Irish class on Aer Lingus?

Secretary Coady: Damn Willie Walsh. Damn him and his few-frills model. Damn his commercial freedom and his equity investors.

Damn his flexibility and correct debt to equity mix. It's just not fair.

Chairman Begg: Pull yourself together man. It's not hopeless.

Independent Director: Exactly. Can't we cut our prices. Aren't we a low-cost airline after all.

Chief executive Halpenny: We haven't been one of those in years, what with the cost of servicing the debts we ran up buying all those planes and the new employment quotas.

Chairman Begg: How is that going by the way?

Chief executive Halpenny: Very well, I am pleased to say. With all the extra staff we will have to recruit to keep the Tupulovs and Yaks flying we should have employment back up at 1993 levels by the year end in line with the primary objective of the Great Leap Backwards.

Chairman Begg: Excellent.

Independent Director: Hang on, we are getting off the point. There is no way we will be able to fly these old Russian jets into Heathrow. They are far too noisy and dirty.

Chief executive Halpenny: Heathrow?

Independent Director: Yes, you know, big airport outside London.

Chief executive Halpenny: I know what it is, but what does it have to do with us.

We haven't flown there in years. Not since we sold the landing slots.

Independent Director: Sold the slots?

Chief executive Halpenny: Come on, you must have heard about that. We sold them when we bought British Airways out of bankruptcy, after Ryanair was finished with them.

Secretary Coady: Do we have to bring that up again?

Chief executive Halpenny: Look. It seemed like a good idea at the time. It was national carrier after all. It even had British in its name and the Union Jack on the tail fin of its planes.

I though we had a good chance of turning it around by applying our people-will-pay-over-the-odds-to-fly-on-their-national-airline model. It's not my fault everybody still wanted to fly Ryanair.

Chairman Begg: No point crying over spilled milk. Let's move on. What's next on on the agenda.

Secretary Coady. Item two. Increasing staff holiday allowance from 10 weeks a year to 12 weeks...