Westland Helicopters at Yeovil, Somerset, England. 1985 Westland Helicopters was a British aerospace company. Originally Westland Aircraft, the company focused on helicopters after the Second World War. It was amalgamated with several other British firms in 1960 and 1961. In 2000, it merged with Italian helicopter manufacturer Agusta to form AgustaWestland,[1] which in turn merged into Leonardo-Finmeccanica in 2016. The Westland affair in 1985–86 was an episode in which Margaret Thatcher, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, and her Secretary of State for Defence, Michael Heseltine, went publ
Westland Helicopters at Yeovil, Somerset, England. 1985 Westland Helicopters was a British aerospace company. Originally Westland Aircraft, the company focused on helicopters after the Second World War. It was amalgamated with several other British firms in 1960 and 1961. In 2000, it merged with Italian helicopter manufacturer Agusta to form AgustaWestland,[1] which in turn merged into Leonardo-Finmeccanica in 2016. The Westland affair in 1985–86 was an episode in which Margaret Thatcher, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, and her Secretary of State for Defence, Michael Heseltine, went public over a cabinet dispute with questions raised about whether the conventions of cabinet government were being observed and about the integrity of senior politicians. The argument was over the future of Westland Helicopters, Britain's last helicopter manufacturer, which was to be the subject of a rescue bid. While the Defence Secretary, Heseltine, favoured a European solution, integrating Westland with a consortium including British Aerospace (BAe), Italian (Agusta) and French companies, Thatcher and Trade and Industry Secretary Leon Brittan, while ostensibly maintaining a neutral stance, wanted to see Westland merge with Sikorsky, an American company
Size: 6185px × 4160px
Location: Yeovil Somerset
Photo credit: © BRIAN HARRIS / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
Keywords: 1985, affair, brian, factory, floor, harris, helicopters, heseltine, leonardo-finmeccanica, margaret, merged, michael, production, thatcher, westland, yeovil
