Albert,
I agree, TUPE is very complex and under certain scenarios it may stick but in this case I think it will be unlikely. The staff didn't qualify for furlough payments and yet in theory, they fell within the qualifying period. EY claimed it would be outside their remit and they could be breaking the law if they entertained it. If TUPE could be made to stick then that could open up a whole pension legal minefield with two more regulators sticking their noses in. I think all parties will be doing their best to tip toe around that scenario. I agree, it is a long shot for the un-secured creditors to recover much more but the slot thing is very complex and I am not sure whether a Charge will entirely capture something as legally vague as a slot. Any new start will need a big injection of cash and that person is going to understandably ensure that it is all arms length from any historical claims.
I would be delighted if out of this mess Flybe's former competitors (Loganair etc) picked up much of the generally domestic work but it would be somewhat frustrating if the likes of say KLM managed to gorge themselves on Flybe's 16 or so slots into AMS and likewise for AF in CDG. It would be a shame if Mk 2 truly intended to take those routes back on and yet the CAA just put legalistic barriers in the way and allowed companies enjoying huge state bailouts moved in instead.
Similarly for the LHR slots. The reason they were labelled remedy was presumably as a remedy against BA's stranglehold on LHR. Surely the point is that it is healthy if someone manages to wrestle them out of BA's paws and preferably into the hands of a UK business so that they can provide that competition. Virgin trid once with Little Red and then tried again with Connect but sadly that was blow out of the water by Covid. The way the CAA seem to deal with things is it is more likely they will fall into a Maltese Reg operator with HQ in the Cayman Islands using mainly wet leased aircraft from China with Australian contract crews. OK, very cynical but this is aviation and there are huge number of unemployed UK aviation workers who need a little help right now.