I actually left BALPA when I came to easyJet for various reasons. Whatever the rights and wrongs of BALPA you have to say that if you opt out, as I have, then you have no right whatsoever to moan about the way things are. I have lost that right and accept it, but am increasingly tempted to rejoin.
All this talk about '10% of the company's pilot's voted for 5/2-5/4' and so on is like saying only 25% of the electorate voted to elect Bush, Blair or Chirac in their respective countries. The fact is that every single pilot at easyjet, regardless of experience or nationality had the right to join BALPA and thereby could have voted in this election. If you choose not to join then you have to live with the consequences (and I do!).
Before I was in easyJet the company bent over backwards to maintain the old Pilot's Council (is that what it was called?) and just about begged all the pilots to vote against BALPA representation. Despite that they were not listened to and BALPA recognition came about by a transparent, democratic and legal process. Quite rightly, having lost the vote, the company have elected to deal with BALPA directly as the vote against their wishes mandated. The management are not therefore responsible for the place of BALPA in the lives of easyJet pilots.
Nobody should now complain they did not have a say in the process - if you pay the dues then you get to choose!
Last edited by Norman Stanley Fletcher; 24th February 2005 at 16:45.