Indeed you're right. I hope to be out by then. The only glitch is that what they say is not completely wrong: Virgin is 10 times smaller than BA and can't absorbe that many BA piltos. Plus the only guys who would leave would typically have the following profile: 2500h+ hours DEPs who did not have enough to get on the 777. They have the **** airbus lifestyle and enough hours to get to Virgin. The low hours self sponsored will stay at BA because they don't have a choice. So BA will lose a few experienced airbus copilots and that's all.
Because BA is still attractive, they'll have no problem replacing us with the present T&Cs, so why would they bother. In fact, I think the only thing they'll do about it is to put a 4 year bond in place for newcomers. That should sort it out from their perspective. You're right, our conditions are unlikely to improve.
Putting things in perspective, again, BA is not that bad and as said above, there are some things like the quality of our trainers that I praise BA for. With a few more years seniority, my lifestyle will improve, and when longhaul comes along, I'll be able to just sit back and see less and less of LHR. Plus the fleet renewals will mean interesting opportunities and T5 will also be interesting from the shorthaul perspective...