Low Life has dragged up the history of those who are ill-informed (not suggesting he is by the way, quite the opposite) on the matter and BALPA may well be or may have been. This pilot back lash of the past is based on the change to FAA joint responsibility- I don't think we will ever go that way in Europe. But he has hit the nail on the head with respect to the way this issue was approached some years ago. We've moved on from this way of thinking, at least I hope we have and I have some hope that EASA and many European airlines.
As a former member of UKOMA, I do not recall us ever discussing the issue of salaries being a major factor in any of this- sure there will be some, but UKOMA's focus has, since the 80's, been on training ;to the extent we set up our own courses, which many of you will have been on.
UK airlines have paid and are paying for the training of their operations officers; they have given some of them FAA tickets or sent them to AVTECH and the likes for the want of a European standard. These people continue to work for the airline and minimal or no extra salary burden. The requirement for a European regulated FOO/Dispatcher accreditation is not going to open the salary floodgates and have every operations officer demanding 50K plus, many dispatchers in the States don't make anyway near that.
If you make a simple comparison between say, a nurse in the UK. Consider the years of training they go through and their salaries compared to ops officer in many UK airlines. Many of ops officer are paid similar or more without any qualifications in their field whatsoever. No, this is about the recognition that operations’ officers/flight dispatcher must be adequately training for their role as part of an airline operational safety system and that the requirement does exist, but it is without teeth (CAA take note) demonstrably I would argue, the UK CAA cannot leave this in the hands of the airlines, training for ops/dispatcher requires a standard syllabus, approved schools and a license/Accreditation.