42. An excellent guess, sir! Air France was indeed operating flights between London City and Paris Charles de Gaulle back in the fall of 1996.....and these flights were actually operated by Air Inter Europe (IT) on a code sharing basis with five round trip BAe 146 flights on weekdays, some of which offered two class business and coach (C/Y) service with others offering an all-business class cabin.
So we are looking for an independent air carrier that was using its own two letter code on its all-business class service operated twice a day on weekdays in competition with Air France/Air Inter Europe between LCY and CDG at this time.
Was this when Air Jet had a short-lived go at LCY to Paris with one of their convertible BAe146, which also did overnight mail runs in France ?
I realise my previous guess at an Air France Fokker F.28 was wrong, as no Spey-engine aircraft has ever been allowed in there; I was recalling the Air France F.70 that used to come through.