Sad times ....
This is sadly death by a thousand cuts, and I fear the long term consequences will not be good for the industry, the company nor ultimately for the pilots, engineers and staff.
How many pilots really want to go and work for one of the other operators - Some I'm sure, but I would still choose Bristow if I had to make that choice. Bristow has always been well respected operator. The pay is good - Perhaps not the best, but it is up there with their peers. The roster pattern is excellent. The training is superb. The engineering is first rate.
We have seen many examples of operators bidding the lowest price to win work and then failing to make money. I'm sure there are operators willing to give their staff whatever they demand, but that path will fail in the long term. You can give the clients whatever they want, but again, will inevitably lose money. We see this time and again. Here we have a company that tends to follow a 'middle of the road' path - Maintaining good clients, solid contracts but not at any cost. They pay their staff a fair wage - Perhaps not the industry best, but in line with the others and typically one of the better payers. I can't pretend to know where Bristow sits in the rankings now, but just as an average over the past.
This is supposed to be a negotiation - It feels like blackmail. The union blame the management. The management blame the union - As was ever the way. But as a workforce, everyone wants more pay, more pension, more inflation proofing, better terms and conditions. There has to be some 'give' if we are wanting to take. You can't get everything. Are pilots ever willing to relinquish pay to get improved T's & C's or vice versa? I'm not sure what the workforce are expecting, but I'm very worried by this course of action. Government Departments are involved - O&G clients will be looking at the outcome and making future plans that I feel will be disastrous for Bristow, and likely have a knock on effect to all operators.
I would have accepted the pay offer. It seemed about as good as one could have expected. The union go in with an unrealistic demand. The company reply with an equally unfair proposal and then they negotiate and meet somewhere in the middle - That's how it works. But this hardline demand for more and more, against contracts that were agreed years ago and cannot be amended, is just holding a gun to the company's head. I don't think this would have happened 10 years ago, but now they have the SAR contract, the union and staff feel that the company will 'fold' that bit sooner.
Sorry to break with the positive 'solidarity brothers' jingoistic theme of this thread, but this knife attack on a company that has offered the largest pay offer I would imagine in the last 20 years, will quite possibly kill off what has been the most constantly 'reasonable' operator of the lot, and that can't be good for any of us.