Virgin Atlantic 'blew whistle to win race for immunity'

The financial value of immunity to Virgin "ran into the hundreds of millions of dollars, millions of pounds", she told Southwark Crown Court in central London.

Ms Montgomery, defending BA's one-time commercial director Martin George, said it was not even clear that Virgin had committed any offence, but the airline simply could not take that risk.

"It's a race," she said of the rush to inform the authorities four years ago.

"If you don't get to them and confess first, you can't get immunity."

The entire case began when William Boulter, Virgin's commercial director, made a "passing comment" to a lawyer that he knew the airline's director of corporate affairs Paul Moore had been discussing the fuel surcharges with someone from BA, she said.

In the United States, where both BA and Virgin operate, if you exchange any information about prices with a competitor, even if you do it honestly and innocently, you are committing an offence, she said. The UK authorities need to prove dishonesty first.

Ms Montgomery went on: "If you are at risk, you are in a race to get to the authorities first."

She asked the jury, who were told they were the first to try any defendants over such a charge, to consider whether the defendants made a "wicked attempt to fleece customers" or whether it was something else entirely.

The presence of calls between the two airlines did not prove there was a price-fixing arrangement between BA and Virgin, she said.

Instead, she said, the calls were prompted by Virgin's president Richard Branson and Moore using friendly journalists to discover BA's plans.

Branson phoned David Parsley, of the Sunday Express, "directly, saying that British Airways were going to increase their surcharge", she said.

Mr Parsley then called Iain Burns in BA's press office who revealed some of the details, which were later published in the newspaper.

"The reason why Burns was willing to give information to Moore (at Virgin) was that he had already given it to the Express," Ms Montgomery said.

Earlier, her client Moore and his co-defendant Andrew Crawley were branded liars after issuing "blanket denials" over price-fixing allegations.

The two most senior figures of the four BA executives allegedly involved in an illegal cartel with Virgin turned on their juniors when interviewed by the Office of Fair Trading (OfT), the court was told.

They criticised the professional approach of colleagues Iain Burns and Alan Burnett, with George even claiming they had a personal agenda against him.

Richard Latham QC, for the prosecution, told the jury of eight men and four women the four BA defendants split into pairs and offered "strikingly different" accounts when questioned by the OfT in 2007.

BA's former head of communications Burns, and Burnett, who led sales in the UK and Ireland, "in large part admitted the agreement" but denied it was made dishonestly, he said.

But BA's one-time commercial director George - who was responsible for 19,000 people, about half of BA's workforce, and a budget of £7bn (€8.1bn) - and sales and marketing director Crawley, issued "blanket denials" of any price-fixing, Mr Latham said.

He went on: "The two pairs of accounts will simply not stand side by side. One pair is lying.

"There is a complete divergence of accounts. They can't both be right. We suggest it's obvious who was lying. It's George and Crawley who were lying."

The four men all deny a cartel offence under the Enterprise Act 2002.

Millions of long-haul customers were forced to pay higher passenger fuel surcharges under the criminal cartel agreement than they would have done in a competitive market, Mr Latham said.

The collusion between BA and Virgin gave each airline the confidence to make their prices higher than they might otherwise have been, knowing that the other would simply follow suit.

The court was told the four defendants dishonestly agreed with Virgin executives Moore, Boulter and Steven Ridgway to fix the price of fuel surcharges between July 1, 2004, and April 20, 2006.

They arranged the cartel in secret telephone calls shortly before each price rise, telling each other: "This is a conversation we aren't going to have."

Mr Latham said they all entered into the "very informal" agreement where "little more than a nod or a wink" was required to fix the prices.

George (aged 47) from Wensleydale Road, Hampton, Middlesex; Crawley (aged 43) of Puers Lane, Jordans, Beaconsfield, Buckinghamshire; Burns (aged 51) of Upper Hale Road, Farnham, Surrey; and Burnett (aged 63) of St David's Drive, Englefield Green, Egham, Surrey, are all on bail.