Swan Hellenic Boss makes Smelly Remark

Lord Sterling, the multimillionaire boss of luxury cruise company Swan Hellenic, was criticized this week for saying that his passengers should be segregated from the lorry drivers at the ferry port in Portsmouth. He said that customers on his 5-star cruises shouldn’t have to mix with lorry drivers who have body odor, nor young people who loiter and wait around for cheaper crossings.

The former P&O chairman made these comments as his Voyages of Discovery, Swan Hellenic and Hebridean Island Cruises companies are getting ready to switch operations in the summer from Southampton to Portsmouth. He said that they want to create a certain atmosphere as soon as people get there, describing it as a 5-star setting.

However, he is concerned that their customers will be asked to mix with BO-suffering lorry drivers, who wear shorts and no shirts in the summer, as well as haven’t shaved in days, in some cases. This will upset some of their customers and won’t be their presented offering, he explained, so something has to be done about it.

Lord Sterling continued that young people will also be looking for cheap travel and loitering. They are young and behave themselves well, he noted, but if they lay around, their customers may trip over them. The 5-star atmosphere they wish to create for their passengers will be better if these customers and the cruise ship passengers are segregated, he added.

Lorry firms are angry with these comments. Haulage firm PSP managing director Frank Dixie says that Lord Sterling is very arrogant. It’s not clever to say something like that in such a prestigious port, he noted, and it sounds as though he wants to install a rigid class structure. Hopefully his chances of success are very slim, he added.