The Irish Rover

For the sensitive minds, skip this blog article NOW. Do not play this video.

Do not pass go. Do not collect $200.

The video from is a German press interview with Micheal O'Leary, Chief Executive of Ryanair. For those of you who may not know, Ryanair are a successful budget airline in Europe, based in Ireland. Mr. O'Leary has a uhm, very interesting take on Business class benefits versus economy.


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O'Leary is infamous in European airline circles. To quote from Wikepedia

O'Leary has a somewhat fiery reputation among both his competitors in the airline industry and regulators. He has been described in many press articles as arrogant and has on numerous occasions stooped to gratuitous rudeness and foul language in his public statements. His no-nonsense management style, extreme cost-cutting and meanness towards staff, provocative advertising, and his deliberate targeting and scathing criticisms of competitors, airport authorities, governments, and unions have become a hallmark. He has been reported to have been aggressive and hostile in dealings with a woman who was awarded free flights for life in 1988 and abusive and prone to outbursts when dealing with staff and former Taoiseach Bertie Ahern. Recently he was forced to retract a claim that Ryanair had cut emissions of carbon dioxide by half over the past five years. O'Leary has been reported to have impersonated a journalist in an attempt to find out what information an airport authority had passed on to a newspaper following a safety incident on a Ryanair flight.

In 2004 he purchased a hackney plate for his Mercedes-Benz to enable it to be classified as a taxi so that he could legally make use of Dublin's bus lanes to speed his car journeys around the city. A press report suggested that he was stopped driving his own taxi. In 2005 the transport minister of the Republic of Ireland expressed concern at this abuse by O'Leary and others.

Wow. Can you imagine this colorful behaviour from a CEO in US ? Nope, too polished, too busy backdating options and sweet dealing Congress.

Time to rewrite that old Irish classic song: "When Irish eyes are smiling, Sure, 'tis like flying business class in Spring...."

Phileas Fogg,
Houston, Texas.
28th June 2008.