Sorry to see young Tim get this bad press - when we used to fly together about 15 yrs ago he was a great guy - with a fantastic collection of the best jokes I ever heard. Blokes dont change that much so what's happened?
I hope that you chaps get what you want & a ballot is a good place to start. This can focus the attention of management.
Please don't get personal though, remember, it's managements job to keep costs to an absolute minimum - if you have to be shafted on the way so be it. It's Balpa's job to get all of you pulling together to stop them - and then get stuck in with a good claim to improve your lot. If management lose their bonuses / jobs because of this then so be it, they shouldn't take it personally either. So good luck to you all.
I haven't read all the contributions to this thread but is it so that mainline guys can fly your a/c but you are not on their seniority list? If so it seems a bit odd - why did your cc allow this one through?