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By Jonathan Hinkles, 30-year UK airline executive
“So what do you think about this whole Global Airlines thing?” is a question that comes up pretty often. It’s something I’ve been steering clear of until now, but with much fanfare around its purported launch in recent weeks I thought I’d take a closer look. First, there’s been much derision that Global isn’t really an airline, as the Airbus A380 that carries its livery flies on the licences of Hi Fly Malta. It’s a fair point, but I think we should remember that, back in 1995, easyJet started out flying on the licences of GB Airways and Air Foyle before it obtained its own approvals sometime later.
This didn’t exactly hold easyJet back, but there is an inherent problem with this approach for Global: it means that it is effectively a Malta-based airline rather than a British one. If it remains a Maltese airline, it won’t have access to international rights to fly from the UK to the US, Canada, India or wherever. That’s not exactly ‘global’. To fix this, it will need a UK licence or to shift its aspirations to the continent.