Some years ago, I watched an interview with former US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright. She was asked how she dealt with the challenges of interacting with leaders and government ministers in parts of the world where women were not routinely in positions of authority or expected to be talking on equal terms with men. Smiling wryly, she replied “Well, it helped that I usually arrived on a very large aeroplane with United States of America painted on the side.”
I was reminded of this during the course of the past week, when a row broke out about the rebranding of the RAF Voyager that is jointly used as a tanker and as a transport for the government and Royal family members on visits abroad from military grey to a livery with the Union flag. As it turns out, the argument was more or less after the fact, as the aircraft was pictured this morning in its new livery.
Part of the argument stemmed from the purported cost of the repaint – reported as being £900K. This seemed excessively steep, as the reported cost of repainting a long range aircraft is normally of the order of £150K – however it seems that the £900K is actually for a scheduled D check for the aircraft which would have included a repaint following structural inspection in any case.
Then as the first pictures of the resprayed aircraft emerged, memes began to circulate about whether the Union flag (or Jack? I know it’s a jack on a ship and a flag on buildings but not so sure on the etiquette regarding aeroplanes….) was in fact backwards, signalling distress – which seemed about right for the current situation in the UK. Disappointingly for satirists, a somewhat exasperated article from the UK Defence Journal explained that it’s a correct rendering based upon a convention to display the flag as if it were being flown from a pole at the nose of the aircraft. Whilst it might be the established rendering, the question around flag sign convention does come up from time to time, with the Bloodhound SSC fin paint scheme sparking a similar debate on Twitter last year.
In aesthetic terms, the problem the designers had was that British Airways have already established a beautiful and iconic livery using a stylised version of the Union flag – which looks good on every aircraft from the majestic A380, to the elegant A350-1000, to the honestly pretty weird Dornier 328 Jet. To be honest, to me the Voyager livery looks more like the old British Aerospace arrow logo or one of those fictional airlines that appear in Hollywood movies (remember Windsor Airlines from Die Hard 2?).
Ultimately, the question at heart is whether it’s a reasonable expense for the British government to keep a dedicated aircraft for government and Royal travel. The debate has been ongoing for many years in the UK. It was first raised whilst Tony Blair was prime minister and widely criticised as being evidence of his attempts to make the office of prime minister seem more presiedential. However before any purchases were completed the idea was then abandoned under Gordon Brown in the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis. It was then raised again by David Cameron. Eventually, the compromise agreed was that an A330 MRTT would be fitted with a passenger cabin that could be used by government ministers and the Royal family, with it’s primary role still being air-to-air refuelling for the RAF. This is managed by a PFI. By the time the refitted aircraft entered service, Cameron only used it once to fly to a NATO summit before stepping down as prime minister. Ironically, Theresa May then flew it on many occasions without attracting much comment – possibly because she never had a reputation for being ostentatious or having presidential aspirations.
In terms of whether its a reasonable expense – it probably makes sense to compare the UK to nations of a similar size and type.
Some commentators were quick to share images of the Dassault 7X that Emmanuel Macron used to visit London the same week as the Voyager argument was taking place. However, for longer trips with a larger entourage, the French president uses an A330-200
The German chancellor and ministers for many years used an A310 and two A340-300s. One named Konrad Adenauer hit the headlines in 2018 when a radio failure forced it to land at Cologne whilst enroute to the G20 in Buenos Aires. Angela Merkel subsequently ended up having to take a commercial flight and arrived late to the summit and after the official photograph for the leaders.
The same aircraft had previously suffered from rodents in the avionics bay. This, alongwith the fleet’s age, led to the German government ordering three A350-900s.
The Buenos Aires incident shows what advantage there can be to having a reliable, dedicated aircraft. Whilst there might be some solidarity in world leaders having to experience the treadmill of commercial flights for business travel the way the rest of us do – it probably isn’t the ideal way for them to arrive at major summits. Also, by the time you’ve factored in security details, assistants, media representatives and advisers, you’re up to a hefty airfare bill.
Essentially there are two elements to the current row. Part of it is an argument between government departments which has gone public. Number 10 has essentially commandeered the aircraft away from its official job by rebranding it without footing the bill for operating the aircraft. The MOD have a tanker that’s far too conspicuous but are paying for it nonetheless. That’s an argument for them to sort out amongst themselves.
On balance, I think having a dedicated aircraft for official travel is a reasonable expense for the UK government and isn’t disproportional compared to similar nations. The timing and the communication makes the rebranding tone deaf – it appears a big and unnecessary expense at a time of national crisis. Also, the quite literal flag waving is divisive. Maybe the Royal Coat of Arms, already a symbol of the UK travelling abroad from its presence on British passports – might have worked better to mark out the aircraft as being a symbol of the UK government rather than the current prime minister.
Perhaps a good way to decide on it’s cost effectiveness would be to follow it on Flight Radar – the aircraft is registered as ZZ336 and known as Vespina.