Fred4000
I'm not sure you can really say that an airline taking a cadet from the CTC scheme is really doing any shafting and I would take a look at the major differences in business models between LCC and charter carriers before you make any sweeping statements about whether or not they can be compared (which would be useful if you are to go through the CTC interviews - I don't know at what stage you are currently).
3 Points I would like to make are this:
1) Unless you are going to be a banker gratuate salaries in London can actually be significantly less that 17.5k and it is the large 36K starting salaries of banks that skew the averages.
2) Think about an airlines cash flow and consider that they are stumping up a huge chunk of cash at the start of your employment and then paying you a bond payment to cover the HSBC loan.
3) If you can stick out being an airline pilot for more than a couple of years (which I should hope you are) then I think the financial rewards will be worth a few years at a lower salary.
If you're looking to make lots of money go and be a banker, if you want to be a pilot surely that should be the important thing with the salary being an added benefit!
Rob