Whatever happened to ‘the passenger’s always right’?

Until 1969 almost the only way to travel internationally was by passenger ship. True, air travel was available but it was expensive and used only by the very rich and those who needed to be somewhere in a hurry.

British, European and American shipping companies proliferated. A typical voyage from London to Sydney via the Suez Canal took 6 weeks. From 1960 onwards the Orient Line flagship ‘Oriana’ with her operating speed of 27 knots cut the voyage from Southampton to Fremantle to 21 days.

If you took the ‘Oriana’ from Naples to Fremantle, travelling to Naples and on to your eventual destination from Fremantle by rail or by air it was possible to complete a journey from London to a major city in Australia or New Zealand in 16 – 17 days.

The passenger base was mainly the immigrant trade to Australia and New Zealand with young Australians and New Zealanders on working holidays to Britain and Europe filling the berths on the return voyage. Other passengers included tea and rubber planters and their families on leave from India and the Far East, businessmen, civil servants, embassy and military personnel and some tourists. The England and Australian touring cricket teams were regular passengers as well as a sprinkling of aspiring pop stars, actors and sundry VIP’s.

A popular way for Australians to tour Europe was to travel by ship to Naples then overland visiting a number of European countries on a ‘whistle stop’ coach tour that finished in London 3 weeks later, just in time to rejoin their ship for the return voyage after her 2 week UK turn-around. That ‘trip of a lifetime’ could take 3 months to complete.

The Orient liners (t-b) Orontes, Oronsay and Orcades at Piermont, Sydney c. 1960

Americans toured in a similar way, using the fast trans-Atlantic liners to reach Europe. These tours were very popular and provided the storyline for the 1969 Hollywood movie – “If it’s Tuesday – then it must be Belgium”.

In the mid 1960’s the tourist trade expanded and ships began taking Australian and New Zealand passengers across the Pacific Ocean to Canada, the west coast of the USA and Acapulco calling in at Fiji and Hawaii on the way. An alternative route was north to Japan through French Caledonia, the Philippines, and Hong Kong. Occasionally a round-the-world voyage would be completed with a transit through the Panama Canal and a trans-Atlantic crossing.

Passengers, even those on £ 10 immigrant tickets, slept on comfortable beds in private cabins, could take a bath or shower whenever they wanted, enjoyed 3 good meals a day and had the opportunity to visit ashore in ports of call along the way. A full program of entertainment was provided including the latest movies and passengers had the use of various public rooms, a library, open decks and a swimming pool for recreation and relaxation.

The only occasional discomfort might be a rough transit through the Bay of Biscay or the Great Australian Bight and mid-summer passages through the Red Sea particularly on the older, non air-conditioned ships.

One mantra was drilled into all ‘passenger facing’ crew in the liners of the past – ‘the passenger’s ALWAYS right’ and even though they might not have been, you made damn sure that they thought they were.

That mantra was picked up and used for a song in Noel Coward’s 1961 Broadway musical ‘Sail Away’.

The service and hospitality, the comfort and facilities that ships passengers were used to then has, I’m sure, transcended to the huge holiday cruise ships of today.

Today’s airline passengers however – even those traveling First or Business Class – experience nowhere near the comfort and relaxation that an immigrant passenger enjoyed in a liner all those years ago.

The majority of airline staff strive to be courteous and accommodating and some airlines are much better at doing it than others. But when you are surrounded by 200-300 Economy Class passengers all tired, irritable, uncomfortable, cramped, sweaty, smelly and quite unable to do anything about those conditions for 11 hours or so on a long-haul flight then you can be forgiven for wondering whatever happened to ‘the passenger’s always right’.