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I am one of many concerned taxpayer's and I call on the government to do the right thing.

I should make clear that I have nothing against Virgin Atlantic employees and I went on a Virgin holiday myself last year which was excellent. What I do have a problem with is a man worth £3.5 Billion asking the British government for a bailout package worth £500 Million. Richard Branson continues to reside outside of Britain with questionable tax arrangements. He still owns a 51% controlling stake in Virgin Atlantic and the other multi-billion shareholder is Delta Air Lines. Yet they have publicly said their only plan is state aid. Why is that?

This is even more outrageous when you consider that Virgin Care sued the NHS and that Virgin Atlantic is a loss-making airline that Branson refuses to put any more of his own money into. He clearly sees the state as a soft touch and I call on the government to firmly demonstrate that he is misguided in this view.

Therefore, the government must refuse to extend any financial support to Virgin Atlantic, a failing airline with multi-billion shareholders. One of the options floated is for the taxpayer to take a direct shareholding in the company, but I don't believe it is prudent for the government to invest any public money into an unprofitable airline at any time, but especially not now.

Instead, let them seek to raise sufficient private investment and ultimately, if they can't raise private capital, let them fail or restructure their business accordingly. All sensible British citizens will recognise that we can't bailout everyone and that it is unwise to risk sizable taxpayer loans which obviously won't be enough to prop up their business into the future.

There are fundamental problems with the Virgin Atlantic balance sheet and they would surely return to the table for more government funding at a later date. They have posted losses in five of the last seven years and local competitor British Airways out-performs multiple times over. It carries a lot of debt, rents many of its planes and funded its daily operations with cash from selling tickets in advance.

Even when times were good, they were not sufficient enough. Virgin’s low single-digit profit margins in the 2000s did not provide a return on capital. Virgin Atlantic have almost always been unprofitable and Branson is clearly unwilling to provide a loan of his own that he may not see repaid as times become even more uncertain.

I understand letters of support for a bailout have been submitted to the government but it is clear that no one forced Airbus and Rolls Royce to supply a loss-making airline; that was their choice. There will of course be other implications if Virgin Atlantic fail but I'm confident that the British people would be much more comfortable with a decision resulting in the extension of funds to Rolls Royce and/or Airbus to cover a reasonable proportion of the cost of certain lost contracts.

In the event of collapse, Virgin Atlantic employees should be redeployed to other airlines or helped into suitable alternative employment with the assistance of the unions and Virgin Atlantic themselves. Slots at London Heathrow and Sydney are full so if Virgin Atlantic and Virgin Australia go out of business, other airlines will step in, replacing flights and jobs.

Now is the time to be protecting taxpayers, not using the public purse to bailout failing airlines. It is the right and proper decision to make, in the public interest and for the benefit of every taxpayer in the land. Furthermore, the government plainly has more pressing matters to be dealing with and there are thousands of more deserving, profitable smaller businesses not run by multi-billionaires that would benefit considerably from the £500 million that Virgin Atlantic are requesting. 

Branson himself said of British Airways in 2009: "We should wait for its demise. Loss-making and inefficient airlines should be allowed to go to the wall. The government should not intervene to stop companies going bust" - Perhaps someone should remind him of this statement right about now?