He was referring to the cave-in by BA to the so-called “dirty tricks” allegations by Virgin Atlantic in the early 1990s. As a result, he lost his job as chairman of BA and retired somewhat bitter and disillusioned by the whole affair.

Based on its reaction to the decision by Britain’s Office of Fair Trading (OFT) to investigate alleged price fixing, British Airways’ board appears to have learned little from the lessons of the past.

Last time round, under long and sustained pressure from Virgin, BA eventually admitted guilt and settled with Sir Richard Branson while not specifying what it had been guilty of. King’s instincts told him to fight on but this was opposed, he said, by a weak group of non-executive board members.

The dirty tricks affair cost BA dearly in reputation. King was eventually forced to step down as chairman – he became life president – and the affair also took down his loyal right-hand PR director David Burnside, who later became a Member of Parliament and is now a successful PR consultant running his own business in London.

Yet history appears to be repeating itself and blaming the PR man is hardly what one expects from the board of a leading British company.

Aggressive PR tactics take place every day in business – no more so than in contested takeover bids – and are not deemed a crime. Every executive in the country is well aware that collusion on prices – price fixing – is illegal and a very dangerous path to tread.

But like last time, BA’s response to the OFT investigation into alleged price fixing – again suggested to have been instigated by Virgin – has damaged BA’s standing in the world with customers, competitors, suppliers and staff. By immediately suspending two executives before the outcome of the OFT investigation was known, BA has played straight into the hands of Branson. The OFT might now reasonably ask BA that if there was no wrongdoing why then suspend two key executives. Or if BA had evidence of this, why were they not sacked?

To suspend your commercial director and director of PR suggests guilt. It also smacks of panic. And it is extremely cackhanded PR. The OFT case will take months to complete, yet BA’s reaction to it has created a feeding ground for rumours. One suggests that BA’s new chief executive Willie Walsh wanted rid of Martin George, the commercial director, and Iain Burns, head of communications. If that was the case there was a more honourable way of handling it than suspending them– sack them both. As chief executive Walsh has the power.

Another rumour – and that’s all it is at present – alleges that Burns held a conversation with a Virgin PR about fuel surcharge policy and the Virgin executive is alleged to have reported that back to Virgin. Branson, never one to miss a chance to kick BA in the cockpit, shopped BA to the OFT. Maybe he did. We don’t know.

But if such a topic – “what are you doing about fuel surcharges?” – was part of a casual conversation between two airline executives, I am at a loss to understand what BA, or the OFT, thought was so wrong about that. Rising fuel costs is a huge issue for all airlines. At Wimbledon or the Derby or at any business conference, executives of rival companies talk to each other all the time about the big problems facing their industries. Of course if the discussion came about as an authorised proposal by BA to “collude” on fuel charges that, of course, is another matter which will be dealt with by the OFT and by the courts in due course.

There must be much more to the OFT inquiry than is apparent at present. I suspect the inquiry is much wider ranging than just finding out if there was any suggestions of price collusion by BA with Virgin and that it involves many more airlines than we know about at present. Fuel surcharges, taxes and other charges now appear on airline tickets with the total often higher than the ticket price itself. This has infuriated passengers around the world who have no knowledge of how these charges are set, or whether they are fair or not in reflecting the cost to airlines of recent record oil prices. An inquiry into these “extras” is to be welcomed.

But by its snap reaction the BA board has piloted the airline into another PR disaster. As a result of the suspensions staff morale is said to have nosedived – it has never been very high since Lord King was shown the emergency exit – and investors have seen their shares nosedive.

I wish Willie Walsh well in his new job, but he needs to recognise that he, like Lord King all those years ago, is falling into a trap set by Branson who is a master of PR. Branson is right to defend rigorously his business against any practices he suspects may be unfair or illegal.

BA’s cumbersome board and management structure have proved again incapable of dealing with the clever Virgin publicity machine. And in failing to defend its senior executives during an ongoing investigation, Walsh has made a terrible PR error.