As a new boy to pprune I have been reading the whingeing pilots section with interest and would like to offer my tuppence-worth.
I am generally content with life. However, I cannot say that my salary is that brilliant as a co-pilot. I have a wife and child to support with all the usual takers of money (mortgage, loans, etc). Last year my company did not have a pay rise. Therefore I have in effect had a pay cut as my salary has not matched inflation and will continue to do so as there are no more increments left until promotion.
I would agree that management are only looking after themselves and not their staff. The redundancies showed that by taking all the experienced staff away. After all, two young sprog co-pilots are financially better than one "expensive" captain with loads of experience under his belt in the eyes of an accountant who has no knowledge of aviation, only pound/dollar signs!
I also saw the note about how useful, or not, BALPA are in the North Sea. Seeing that BALPA was only recognised by one company (BIH), it's understandable that they could not be much help. In my company a large majority of pilots are in BALPA but for what reason? Most purely for the legal backup in the case they are involved in an accident! Many of the new pilots are not going to rock the boat by not flying for a morning because they see themselves as having a good salary at such a young age. Most are not even contemplating staying in the company for more than a few years, anyway, as they are doing their plank-wing exams and are using the company just to get some experience. Therefore they are not even that bothered about future career prospects. They arrived just before a major redundancy and they can see that the North Sea is no place to make a career.
Although the majority of pilots are in BALPA, the company has only just recognised the union. However, when you look at who is still in management, they are not used to working with unions. After all, they had to go on a course on how to deal with them. Most of that probably went over their heads as they are not really prepared to deal with the situation. They have no experience and are not bothered about gaining any as they are retiring in a few years with major pensions.
In another company, to be in BALPA was to be in the underground. Mention that dirty word and you would be in trouble.
How are BALPA going to get anything done in either of those environments? With recognition, it is going to take time for trust to be built up by both sides and it will take a lot of hard work and time by the company councils. It was never going to work immediately despite all our hopes. After all, my company is now trying to bring in new rosters without any consultation with the union.
To correct 212man, he has obviously been out of UK for a while. The co-pilot he refers to is probably on that salary but she is on a different pay scale to those that have joined since 1995. The most a SFO can hope to earn (before allowances) is approximately £34400. The other companies are about the same plus or minus a thousand or so. These figues were sent out in a BALPA newsletter not so long ago.
Just my opinions.