pulman,
1) Not working there yet, but from what I can gleam average Gross including flight pay for a year one FO short haul should come out at £54000, so I'd say £2900-3000 p.c.m. There is a payrise (to be backdated) about to go through too. Heres the breakdown :
Basic = £40,500
Flight pay (fully taxed) = ~ 750hrs * £8 = £6000
Time away from base (estimated 2500-3500) = 3000 * £2.58 = £7740 (Only taxed at about 7%)
Total Gross= £54,240
2) A long time. In past in has been very short, but now more than 10 years, but of course the tide comes in and goes out again every so often.