BA cabin crew vote for strike.

I do think people ought to avail themselves of the facts. BA is NOT proposing a pay cut. In addition 2 of the 4 main areas that have caused this action were agreed by that self same union that now wants to change them (new crew rates and absence management policy) surely having agreed to terms and conditions you cannot go back on them otherwsie it makes the whole thing a farce?

Apologies, Agent K… I have a tendency to refer to changes of T&C, as a “pay cut” as that’s generally how they work out in the long term. Been to too many union meetings myself lately…

Well, they’ve come to some agreement, strikes are all off.

I dont want to but I think this can be related to the “Big Brother Scandal”!

With Big Brother we have been force fed (by endemol producers) their “version of events” and (as i have come to learn within the past 3 months having increasily being involved with a production company) this is therefore what the greater public make their opinions up from.

With the BA issue we have been fed a few things mainly by the Media but I do not doubt BA PR department being involved as well. This made some misconceptions within the greater public that this is about pay which once you dig down a few layers it isnt. I admit I was sucked in too until I read some unbiased articles showing both sides.

I think, as an employer also, that BA should really adopt policies across the board as it would seem from what I have learnt, correct me if i am wrong oneleft, but there are differences between LHR and other base crews?

If BA are trying to change T&C (still unclear as to if they are trying to change or trying to enforce something staff were unaware of) then I agree that this is not something that should be done without consent of staff.

If BA are trying to enforce something in T&C staff were unaware of then I think staff should have paid ALOT more attention to their contracts. Even I have and will continue to change staffs T&C to reflect the current economic/working climate (sometimes in their favour sometimes in mine) but I do not hide changes from staff. If BA hide a change without making sure every staff member was alerted to any T&C change – even if it was just to tell them to check for change – then I fully side with the striking staff.

If I have read it wrong and this strike is about not listening to the staff rather than the actual change then I am probably in the managements side of the fence because i am an employer too. I have staff who do resist any change and are just childish/stubborn (see also NI peace process 😀 lol) and they can make it very hard for me to do anything in anyones interest.

Have the BA cabin crew stepped back to look at the Managements perspective and indeed has the opposite happened?

Sorry for the rant!

Then again, it could be your meal.

too intimidated to report sick under his new scheme and stay at home until they had recovered.

Well, if they hadn’t played the system and taken an average of 22 days leave per annum, then they wouldn’t have this problem. Ever heard of the boy that cried wolf? Even 12 days average across such a large number of people is alarming.

So Willie Walsh now joins the list of past and present BA directors who have to take their own sandwiches on board their own aircraft for fear of being poisoned by their own cabin crew.

At least his predecessors had the comfort of knowing any poisoning would have been deliberate. Willie would not know if he had been deliberately fed something unpalatable or whether his food handlers were suffering from something they picked up on a previous trip but were too intimidated to report sick under his new scheme and stay at home until they had recovered.

Duplicated – sorry.

2 of the 4 main areas that have caused this action were agreed by that self same union that now wants to change them (new crew rates and absence management policy)

New crew rates were enforced by the company. That was the whole reason for the 1997 strike.
The Absence management policy was agreed with the inclusion of an appendix applying specifically to cabin crew which the company have ignored from day 1, and the head of IFS admitted no knowledge of 6 months after taking up his position.

surely having agreed to terms and conditions you cannot go back on them otherwsie it makes the whole thing a farce?

Exactly our arguement where the company is concerned as it tries to dilute out terms and conditions.

Anyway they said that BA crew start on £22k

number of days worked each year…. BA 150 shift days/year, easyjet 220

Don’t believe everything you see in the media. BA starting salary is just over £9,000 (more than FR, less than EZY). I’m only just on more than the £22k quoted after nearly 14 years. I have 10 days off a month (9 in Feb as short month) and have 30 days leave a year, that leaves 216 duty days per year (comparable to EZY).

Its possible to spin all this information to suit a message you wish to make. BA are definitely ahead in the propaganda war

It is, they do and they are.

1L.

Was also highlighted in many news programmes yesterday, that the deputy leader of the T&G? said he had never been in talks which such an agressive employer… i guess Willie Walsh (former shop steward himself) and his team are playing hardball, and not willing to roll over and have there collective bellies tickled by the unions.

But Walsh is unusually qualified to face down BA’s enemy within: the trade unions – led by the T&G at Heathrow – which make it so tough for BA to keep its cost-base competitive. Walsh is a classic poacher-turned-gamekeeper: a former shop steward turned formidable union-basher. In his previous job at Aer Lingus – almost bankrupt when he took charge in 2001 – Walsh fired 2,000 people and sold the art collection for good measure. He turned the airline’s fortunes around but was hated by SIPTU, the largest Irish union, and fell out with prime minister Bertie Ahern over a buy-out plan which would have made Walsh a fortune of his own.

Yet Walsh’s corporate biography – cadet pilot at 17, into management at 27 – omits the most interesting fact about him: that in his flying days he was also chief negotiator for the Irish Airline Pilots Association. Like another former pilots’ union official, the arch-Thatcherite former minister Norman Tebbit, he took an early decision to move to the other side of the table. Knowing your opponents’ mind is a key advantage in any confrontation. Willie Walsh is a man to watch

It is all very interesting but I have been watching BASSA / T&G and this is basically an attempted mugging that they now realise has gone t**ts up and are desparate to find a way out of. They were asking for guarantees on discounted incidences of sickness – i.e. irrespective of an individual’s sickness record. Presumably a negotiating line but one they must have been confident would end up working in the favour opf the most frequent who are taking liberties. Despite WW accepting their most recent wording they have backtracked since Dromey was made to sound stupid on BBC R4 “Today” Programme. It is not a question of disputing whether or not someone is fit to fly (or do any other work for that matter) if they say they are not. What is more to the point is challenging why some people have greater incidences of illnesses (especially discountable ones) than colleagues or similar folk in similar jobs in the industry. What is it about their lifestyle or physiology that makes this happen – can that be changed / improved or (in the final analysis) is this the sort of work they should be doing?

I suppose the pilots will enjoy an extra day off?

Apparently not, many planes still have to fly, especially LH types, in order that they’re in the right location when the strike finishes to resume schedules the best they can.

DARRENbe, I agree completely, there are various ways of interpreting it, and I have various disclaimers throughout what I’ve said as I’m not sure I believe all of it.

I also agree with you regarding the way you interpret what constitutes a working day or shift. But it appears BA staff do well on any account, as I saw pointed out on this (or another) forum during these debates, charter cabin crew do not get a 75 minute break on a (5-hour) flight to Egypt, unlike BA staff.

I suppose the pilots will enjoy an extra day off?

The danger with comparing salaries, is the lack of background information.

For example what constitutes the 22K quoted as the ‘starting’ salary at BA, as I suspect the basic salary is more likely to be around £15K, if not lower.

What constitue the ‘shift’ days as quoted by BA? Does the 150 days per year include training and standby duties etc etc.

For UK aircrew, which includes pilots and cabin crew, their average availability is circa 220 days per annum, regardless of the operator and is based on CAP371 and the EU Working Time Directive. 150 days flying per annum would not be a million miles away from a typical UK based airline.

Its possible to spin all this information to suit a message you wish to make. BA are definitely ahead in the propaganda war.

REN, I wasn’t aware that BA were proposing any pay cuts? Perhaps they want staff to work more hours, but on a salary that isn’t a pay cut, especially when you consider the points below (i.e. how inefficient the rate of pay is compared to days worked).

I’m going to apologise in advance, as I know two people on here that will be upset by my comments, they’re not aimed directly at anyone.

I saw some stats on the BBC news last night (hence not gospel, but maybe not a million miles away, they claimed it came from the airlines). Anyway they said that BA crew start on £22k (which is MUCH higher than I thought), whilst Ryanair are at £16k and easyjet somewhere between (I think about £20k). Although I think they have made a mistake, and these are infact top end rates(??) especially as the BBC news website talks about starting rates of £10k.

However, the stat that really suprised me, was the comparison between easyjet and BA on number of days worked each year…. BA 150 shift days/year, easyjet 220 (Ryanair no figure, probably 355!!;) ). So, on the basis that the average number of sick days a year is 12 per member of cabin crew (down from 22) then I’m not suprised BA are upset, this amounts to 8% of the working year lost for each member of staff (I wouldn’t mind an extra 8% of time off). I think the Easyjet figure was around 6 days (so just under 3%).

The general consensus in my office is that there is a growing dis-sympathy with the staff, they have it rather good for the current aviation world we live in, and that they are living in an era that finished 15 years ago. Do they realise how much harm they’re about to do??

I also wonder about propaganda fed from the unions to the staff, such as the view on here the other day that BA has been the most profitable airline in the world for the last 5 years, when actually it was really struggling not that long ago, where does this view come from, are the staff really so disengaged from the business, or is it a view fed to them from above?

I’m sure the cabin crew will be delighted to take a pay cut, just as long as the mortgage, gas, electricity, water, education, local goverment etc, etc providers will do too to match the general “down sizing” of earnings and standard of living that the customer demands these days…:rolleyes:

I do think people ought to avail themselves of the facts. BA is NOT proposing a pay cut. In addition 2 of the 4 main areas that have caused this action were agreed by that self same union that now wants to change them (new crew rates and absence management policy) surely having agreed to terms and conditions you cannot go back on them otherwsie it makes the whole thing a farce?

Here we go again, BA staff taking a knife to their nose because it’ll spite the face!!!!!!! I wonder sometimes if they’re living in the modern aviation world, or just dreaming of a by-gone era?? OK, so BA is back among the world’s most profitables, but they won’t stay there if the staff hold it back too much. I’m sure for the staff there are some unacceptable conditions, and I understand that to give too much would encourage WW to want more, but strike action…come on people, make yourselves synonymous with unreliability and you won’t have many passengers to serve before long, so then you’ll have an easy working life!!

I’m sure the cabin crew will be delighted to take a pay cut, just as long as the mortgage, gas, electricity, water, education, local goverment etc, etc providers will do too to match the general “down sizing” of earnings and standard of living that the customer demands these days…:rolleyes:

I say sack the lot of them, we get this irresponsible behaviour every year and its the customers who always suffer.

Lets face it, Willie Walsh might be a hard man, but look at Aer Lingus now, he is trying hard to make B.A. profitable.

Lets assume B.A. lose millions from this strike and sometime soon in the future, staff cuts are required, could Mr Walsh then blame the cabin crew for helping to lose their jobs ?

Unions ! who needs them

Are you Norman Tebbit in disguise ?:D

Why not sack them all and put some chimpanzees in instead ? Or is it Ryanair that get’s monkeys ? All in the pursuit of shareholder profits and cheap ticket appeal.

I’m afraid people like you probably won’t be happy until you get the same kind of onboard standards and apathy as you currently receive from your average Burger King employee…

“A ticket to LHR please and hold the mayo…”;) :diablo:

re B.A Cabin crew strike

I say sack the lot of them, we get this irresponsible behaviour every year and its the customers who always suffer.

Lets face it, Willie Walsh might be a hard man, but look at Aer Lingus now, he is trying hard to make B.A. profitable.

Lets assume B.A. lose millions from this strike and sometime soon in the future, staff cuts are required, could Mr Walsh then blame the cabin crew for helping to lose their jobs ?

Unions ! who needs them

BA are not taking any more bookings for any flights around the strike dates. Is this temporary or is it just while there deciding what to do?

I think travellers will be glad the uncertainty of dates has ended and they can plan around. Good its not next week so they can plan!