Michael O'Leary, chief executive of Ryanair, must have many talents to have reached his position in life, but I had not appreciated until last week that a flair for ironic cheek was one of them. Mr O'Leary appeared at a press conference to publicise his threat to sue the Government if it does not remove the recent restrictions on hand luggage by Thursday; a Union Jack was draped behind him and a Winston Churchill impersonator sat next to him. All of this was done in order to "keep Britain flying".

This was exceptionally audacious. Mr O'Leary and his company are not British, but Irish. When Churchill was leading Britain through its darkest hours, Ireland's stance was one of strict neutrality, although the decision by Eamonn de Valera, the Republic's Prime Minister, to sign the book of condolence at the German Embassy in Dublin after the death of Hitler might indicate his sentiments. Nor, I suspect, would Churchill have been impressed if the owners of the boats commandeered for the evacuation of Dunkirk had hired lawyers to sue him for their loss of earnings.

In many ways, Mr O'Leary is the worst possible individual to make this appeal on behalf of the airline industry. His commercial self-interest in this controversy is starkly obvious. Ryanair has a fortune invested in encouraging a shift to passengers carrying hand luggage on to its aircraft. It pioneered charging for stowing suitcases in the hold (unlike other companies, it has not suspended these charges since security arrangements changed), and not to spare us a wait at the end of the flight either. It is a regime that saves Mr O'Leary money on baggage staff and conveyor belts. It enables passengers to print off their own boarding passes and thus cut check-in costs. And, since most people who pack tight will also pack light, there are modest but useful savings to be squeezed on airline fuel expenditure as well. Mr O'Leary's moving slogan "keep Britain flying" can be translated to "maintain my margins".

Yet despite the temptation to shove a Churchillian cigar in Mr O'Leary's mouth, light it and tell him to try sucking it in one of those tiny glass boxes that pass as "smoking areas" in Britain's airports, it has to be conceded that he is on the right side of this dispute even if his motives are so profoundly suspect. The new hand luggage rules are inconsistent and incoherent in theory, and appallingly administered in practice. The Government should reverse them in days not weeks, otherwise, as Mr O'Leary says, al-Qaeda must be "rolling around the caves of Pakistan, laughing at us". Just as passengers are being asked, in effect, to act as Mr O'Leary's ground staff in airports, the airline industry is being ordered to serve as de facto agents of the security services.

It was not unreasonable for strict measures to be introduced immediately after the alleged terror plot emerged ten days ago. It was also not realistic to expect the British Airports Authority to conjure up hundreds of additional security staff at virtually no notice and at the height of the holiday season. What has been shocking, nonetheless, is the absence of any serious contingency planning, and the failure to communicate to passengers why certain items are being prohibited (I had always thought that banning books was supposed to be the preserve of the extremists), let alone why one small case is now deemed safe, but a slightly larger one is thought dubious. However much I might dislike the idea of Mr O'Leary dictating terms to the Department for Transport, the notion of Osama bin Laden doing the same is infinitely more objectionable.

And that surely is the crux of the matter. To Islamist fanatics, aircraft are especially attractive targets not only because of their vulnerability, but also because of their modernity. That is why we should strive to avoid air travel being inconvenienced in any way. One of the most depressing aspects of this affair has been the attitude of those self-designated environmentalists who, while condemning terrorism, have concluded that the meltdown in our airports is a "blessing in disguise" because it will make us ponder the "true cost of flying". Planet Earth has coped with meteorite strikes, earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, tsunamis and glam rock in the 1970s. It can endure the existence of Ryanair and easyJet. What we cannot afford to do is let al-Qaeda call the tune in running our lives.

A better strategy for tackling this warped version of crime is one rooted in law and order. John Reid, the Home Secretary, may well ask Parliament to allow terrorist suspects to be confined without charge for much longer than the current 28-day maximum. There is a powerful body of evidence in favour of that proposition. There are sound reasons to allow information obtained by telephone tapping to be disclosed in closed court sessions, even if this is only considered desirable in a handful of instances. It would also be wise for ministers and airlines to reach an agreement in advance as to what restrictions at airports would occur, and what resources would be deployed to assist the staff, if and when the security level is raised from "severe" to "critical".

We have to "keep on flying". We should no more treat every aircraft as a death trap, than we would the buses, trains and the Underground. It is the objective of those "rolling around in the caves of Pakistan" to reduce the rest of us to similar Stone Age conditions. I intend to be one of Mr O'Leary's customers from Stansted to Rome next weekend. Unless, that is, staff at that airport decide that the proper Churchillian reaction to events, as they insist today, is to conduct a pathetic strike over pay and conditions.