British Caledonian in The 1970s - Spheres of Influence

Spheres of Influence

The then Trade Secretary Peter Shore conducted a review of the Government's aviation policy and in 1976 announced a new "spheres of influence" policy that ended dual designation for British airlines on all long-haul routes. As a result, BA and BCal were no longer permitted to run competing scheduled services on long-haul routes, and BCal had to withdraw from the East African routes inherited from BUA as well as from the London—New York and London—Los Angeles routes, leading to the suspension of BCal's Gatwick—JFK and Gatwick—Los Angeles licences. In return, BCal became the sole British flag carrier to the entire South American mainland by taking over the former BA routes to Colombia, Peru and Venezuela. The Government's new "spheres of influence" aviation policy confined BCal's long-haul scheduled operations to two continents — Africa and South America. The loss of BCal's East African routes enabled the airline to replace the one-stop scheduled service via Nairobi to Lusaka with non-stop flights.

During 1976, BCal's recovery continued, leading to the introduction of a new scheduled route to Algiers and the reinstatement of scheduled services to Tunis. It also led to BCal's decision to replace the two daily Gatwick—Manchester round-trips BIA had operated with its Herald turboprops since the route's launch in 1973 with a BCal One-Eleven service from the start of the 1976/77 winter timetable period. This equipment change was accompanied by the addition of a third daily frequency.

BCal ended its 1975/76 financial year with a healthy profit of £5.6 million.