KEY POINTS:
Economy-class passengers of all airlines unite! You have nothing to lose but your sore backs, sleep-reddened eyes and deep vein thromboses.
For too long the masses who fly steerage class have been treated like cattle, forced to endure misshapen chairs, squeezed on the sides by overweight neighbours and
in front by permanently lowered seat backs, fed a diet of B-grade films and second-rate food, with little prospect of improvement (that's a slight exaggeration, but you get the idea).
Meanwhile, the fat cats in first and business class - among whom, as a travel journalist, I am sometimes fortunate enough to be numbered - recline in luxurious comfort and every year have an even more comfortable seat or an even bigger personal television screen or an even finer choice of cuisine.
It is surely long past time for a manifesto to be issued on behalf of the oppressed economy-class that their suffering may no longer be ignored.
And sure enough, last month the general manager of Flight Centre, Rick Hamilton, issued a clarion call for airlines to drop their sights below business class and include economy class in the regular upgrading programmes.
"One of the biggest difficulties our clients face is the uncomfortable nature of long-haul travel," he said. "We'd like to see all the airlines flying long haul from New Zealand examining their seating configuration very carefully." Hear, hear.
Better still, it seems as though airlines are becoming aware of the discontented mumblings from the steerage compartments, and some are doing something about it.
Air New Zealand has created the premium economy class which provides a home for those who are willing to pay for a bit more comfort but can't afford the 100-150 per cent premium on business class fares.
Singapore Airlines has announced its new economy class seats will have "greater comfort . . . even more personal space and legroom . . . [and] a larger 10.6-inch monitor to access . . . the new entertainment system."
And Cathay Pacific - with Singapore, Malaysia and Qatar the only airlines to get 5 stars from the Skytrax airline rating system - is introducing new economy class seats which provide more room and have fixed seat backs like the ones in business class.
That's fantastic news, of course, but it begs the question why these improvements to economy class are starting to happen now? Have the airlines suddenly become aware of how uncomfortable it is to be stuck in an economy class seat for 12 hours?
Not really, says Cathay Pacific's product manager Sarah Blomfield, the person in charge of the changes. Airline surveys of customers have long registered a discontent with economy class seating. "It's been a common complaint forever."
She says the problem was that "economy class is the bread and butter, and you don't want to be doing things like losing seats, which rather ties your hands".
The reason something is being done now is because of a fortuitous combination of recognition by Cathay "that economy class seating has not changed fundamentally in maybe the last 20 years" and the development of technologies and techniques which made it possible to come up with improvements.
"With Cathay seeing itself as a premium product we thought it was time we took a look to see if something could be done without altering the economics," says Blomfield.
"And once we did that we realised that, with the advances that have occurred in recent years, yes, there were one or two things we could do, so why not do them."
Cathay's innovation has done is to develop an economy class seat - " the first, we believe" - with a rigid back, so when it reclines it slides down, rather than folding back into the lap of the person behind.
Seats have been lifted and sculpted, and the magazine holder moved from the back of the seat in front to under the seat, to create more leg and knee room.
This will give economy class passengers more personal space and a little more privacy.
They will also get an upgraded entertainment system, bigger television screens - up from 6.5 inches to 9 inches - and new seat belts with diagonal shoulder straps as well as the traditional lapbelts.
But the big thing - "the radical change in the philosophy for economy class seating," as Blomfield puts it - is the new seats.
Before being unveiled they went through a rigorous development process over three years, with 10 stages of testing, including a final stage when the members of Cathay's board of directors were required to sleep the night in them.
And did they sleep well? "They did, actually," says Blomfield, "though a couple of bottles of champagne probably helped that along." That's a pretty good recommendation.
Naturally, Cathay hopes its improved seats will become a point of differentiation for passengers who, according to Blomfield, "are often more experienced and knowledgeable about air travel and more discerning about which airlines have a better this or a bigger that".
But the airline also recognises that if the new seats are successful then, like all worthwhile innovations, its competitors are likely to follow suit. "Once someone has done it, passenger expectations change and the industry has to follow."
That is what happened with flatbeds "which the industry resisted for the longest time - apart from in first class - and now they're everywhere".
Blomfield believes it will happen in the other area of hot debate in the industry - the use of mobile phones on planes - "which I think is inevitable . . . though it may be subject to controls about times or certain zones". And almost certainly it's what will happen, over time, with economy class seating.
So, economy class passengers, be patient a while longer. The revolution has begun. An end to your suffering is in sight.
