Posted on July 02, 2010 by Fiona Hilliard

With quips like: “Our strategy is like Wal-Mart: We pile it high and sell it cheap” and “If drink sales are falling off we get the pilots to engineer a bit of turbulence. That usually spikes up the drink sales”, it was only a matter of time before Michael O’ Leary got into stand-up. That’s right it just so happens that his latest cost-cutting proposal is one big joke. Well it has to be.

If you haven’t heard yet (in fairness it would be difficult not to) seeing as it’s grabbed headlines all over the world – Ryanair is currently looking into the possibility of offering standing room on its aircraft.

Mooting the plan several months back, the irreverent Mr. O’ Leary said: “I’d love to operate aircraft where we take out the back ten rows and put in hand rails.  We’d say if you want to stand, it’s five euros.  People say ‘Oh but the people standing may get killed if there’s a crash’.  Well, with respect, the people sitting down might get killed as well.”

Teeheehee. How we laughed. Little did we know that he was actually going to go through with the whole standing thing.

That’s if you believe anything that comes out of Michael O’ Leary’s gob these days. This week he convincingly created a media frenzy about his standing room brainwave, saying:

“We are aiming at starting safety testing in about 12 months with a view to going into service with the new arrangements in about 18 months to two years’ time.”

But it just so happens his latest announcement coincides with the introduction of Ryanair’s new baggage charges.  Anyone else smell a rat?

Oh those crazy guys at Ryanair…