Originally Posted by
Seosan
Can't really march out that sob story when it's what the UK pop voted for. If you think about it logically the reason they're advertising for non-UK only on the Boeing is that I imagine many Boeing rated bods came from FR, who are all on EASA licences and, since Brexit, a large portion on EU passports. This recruitment opens the door to a large pool of rated pilots who up until a few years ago would've had the right to apply anyway. It's only EU nationals, it's not like the supply line has grown outside of the realm that it was before COVID. The UK CAA also made it considerably easier for pilots to make the conversion between EASA than they did on the continent. Looking forward to your picket at Aviation House regarding that one.
You can't improve T&Cs without having enough bodies to cover the schedule in the way that you want (more heavy crewed trips, more days off etc). It's a negotiation, you have to give to get. It's BALPA who dropped the ball letting this happen in the first place.
Isn't the irony in this that if the company hired non-UK citizens on a different pension scheme, with no private healthcare etc, that you'd be up in arms about how the T&Cs were diminishing? I take on board that the UAE was not the perfect example, what with govt owned and run airline, no union etc.
...to be brutally honest, I don't think the Virgin management have opened this avenue up for EU pilots in order to improve terms and conditions at Virgin in the future! Lets not politik this situation when there is no need!
The fact is, in my very humble opinion, that VAA is very definately not the employer of choice that it once was. It can't attract UK pilots because of this, and is so forced to look elsewhere. It really is as simple as that.
I feel fairly qualified to state the above as a long serving ex-VAA Captain who was unceremoniously made redundant out of seniority during their "shake up" of terms and conditions to retrograde permanent new ones that are quoted above in this thread. There are a significant number of us (most with decades of service dutifully done to get that LH command at the "best gig in UK") that are taking them to court for all sorts of unsavoury discriminative reasons. The six week hearing starts in February.
Even their "star" instagram sensation TRE is off to the High Court shortly to allegedly face accusations of some pretty nasty career-ending defamations made to bosses of colleagues.
They made their bed with a very oportunistic response to Covid that was also very much an outlier compared to other airlines at the time.
....it is certainly worth thinking if you want to lie in that particular bed?
As for working out your time to command etc - well, just factor in that it counts for NOTHING at Virgin when the axe falls. Our stories are true testament to that.