Mil Pilots who believe the airlines will ever again spend money on cadetships or any other form of ab-initio training had better get their head out of the clouds. We need to cut costs to the bone and we don't need officer material, bus drivers will do. There are loads more recruits in the pipeline than the forecast vacancies, despite the growth in air transport and don't forget much of that growth is in low-cost operations...
Most airline recruits start with a self funded PPL/CPL then learn their trade during years of under-paid bush piloting or air-taxi jobs. Many new airline F/O's accumulate debts of tens of thousands of pounds on their way to the right hand seat of a commercial airliner, yet they count themselves fortunate. There's no end to the stream of hopefuls, so there's no need for us airlines to go soft and start paying for ab-initio training as far as I can see into the future...