Virgin signs up Lisa Leeson

Lisa Leeson, the wife of the disgraced former Barings trader Nick Leeson, has landed a job as a stewardess with Richard Branson's Virgin Atlantic airline.

Mrs Leeson, 27, who lives with her parents at West Kingsdown in Kent, is due to begin her training as a junior flight attendant next month.

Announcing its new appointment yesterday, Virgin Atlantic said that Mrs Leeson's successful application was "based on her own merits, personality and skills".

It said that initially, she will fly on trans-Atlantic routes and, "as with all new Virgin Atlantic Airways cabin crew, needs to complete six months service before qualifying for concessionary Virgin Atlantic flights and one year before receiving discounts on other carriers".

At the time of her application it was believed Mrs Leeson wanted to become a stewardess so as to be able to make more regular and cheaper trips to Singapore to visit her husband.

Speaking at the Elizabeth Tea Rooms in Maidstone, Kent, where she has worked as a part-time waitress since returning to England a year ago, Mrs Leeson said she has yet to inform her husband, who is in prison in Singapore, about her new job. "He knows that I have applied for a job but I only found out yesterday myself so I've yet to tell him.

"I will be sorry to leave here and I'm sure there'll be tears when I leave," she joked. "I don't know anything about a leaving do, but I'm sure we'll be having a leaving cuppa."