I do worry about British Airways. It’s one of those institutions that one is desperate to see succeed. I want it to be the world’s favourite airline. It’s a matter of national pride. Having watched its planes rend the sky at 5 PM each day for most of my teenage and adult life as it approached Heathrow from New York, Concorde’s passing saddened me. I wish I’d flown on it and now pray I’ll be able to get airborne in a Spitfire before the last one goes nose down into the grass.

If ever you’re going to be caught in a tight spot at forty thousand, feet I’d rather have one of the cool, implacable Nigels – as BA pilots are known – get me out of it than one of the jokers who once flew me on Indian Airlines and welcomed me aboard in his shorts and flip flops before showing me his shrine above the dashboard. After the worst mid-air scrape a Nigel would never require a voidance apron (see Martin Amis’s The Information for elucidation). A recent Indian aviation sensation has revealed that a woman had been flying 737s all over the country for several years with no more than a school ten lengths certificate as her qualification.

But… thrice in the last year I’ve flown Club Class with BA – not at our reader’s expense I might add – and I’ve been dismayed by the quality. On my last trip back from New Delhi two of the lavatories in business class were broken. Coming back from Nairobi the food was revolting – worse than 1970s skool dinners.

But it’s not just the bogs and the grub. You can hit the red and watch Raging Bull until you drop off in your air socks. The problem is more deep-seated. It’s the attitude of the staff that causes one dismay. It’s that bolshie, resentful, you-can’t-take-away-my-perks-or-I’ll-get-the-shop-steward-onto-you attitude that grates. They’ve just emerged from one of the most bruising industrial disputes of our time and don’t we all know it. It’s time to get over that. Haven’t they heard about competition? Don’t they know Michael O’Leary – who has kids queuing up in Riga willing to don that grim blue stewardess dress for peanuts – will bury them and dance on their gold-plated pension grave? Have they seen the bar on the A380?

One blousy matron – and I’m trying hard to be neither ageist nor sexist here – came up to me with a, ‘Well, what have you been doing here, then? What a complete mess. We’ll have to tidy all this up before we take-off.’ All I’d done was take my shoes off and put the FT on the floor. I was made to feel like a wretched four year old who had just pooed his pants, rather than someone whose return ticket with the outfit had cost getting on for four-and-a-half grand.

They badly need to remember that the customer is a king who these days has many choices: Emirates, Singapore Airlines, Cathay, Virgin. Virgin’s seat configuration in Upper Class is clever, the food pretty good and their new lounge at Terminal 3 pretty space-aged and swish.

One dreads to think what a reputational state BA would be in were it not for Terminal 5. When it launched, in typical British fashion, the UK media was desperate to rubbish the place and gleefully recounted tales of Samsonites mangled by handling devices and general ineptitude. T5 has proved them wrong. The place is a triumph. I had without doubt the best meal I’ve ever consumed in an airport the other day in Carluccios there. (BA could learn something from the charming, friendly and attentive staff and outstanding food.)

I want to be optimistic here. I think BA’s problems are without doubt fixable. But they need to get some deep training going on which involves more than chucking their lifejacketed staff down a slide into a tank, tonging a hot towel and teaching them to remember ‘doors to manual.’