Should seniority be scrapped in airlines?

[Barrack Room Lawyer]

An interesting thread that seems to me to be throwing up some very entrenched views.

There appears to be very little appreciation of the fact that the new legislation, the Age Discrimination Act, which was introduced into the UK last year, significantly changes the way all companies (not just aviation) should operate in order to avoid or reduce the risk of a discrimination claim by an employee or group of employees. The new legislation allows companies to reward and promote their most talented employees and conversely gifted employees can expect to be rewarded for their capability regardless of a seniority based structure.

All unions, including Balpa, tend to ignore new legislation when it doesn’t suit and remain devoted to current and former practices until they are forced to change. As individuals we are very much of the same mould.

From where I sit it appears that airlines operate basically 3 systems for selection; seniority (BA), meritocracy (easyJet) or a combination of seniority and meritocracy (some of the smaller airlines and a few of the charters).

By seniority I think most will accept that date of joining is the key and not some hybrid system dreamed up and implemented by individuals in powerful positions of being either union reps or management or a combination of both. I would therefore be very surprised if any of the new management teams in either FCA/TFly or TCX/MYT would agree to implement and operate a seniority system that does not conform to strict date of joining based on when an individual joined. By implementing any other scheme it would leave both the union and the company wide open to litigation.

However, it should be also understood by all that Section 32 of the new Act allows companies, including airlines, to use a combination of length of service and performance when selecting individuals for promotion. Indeed, most employment lawyers take the view that the most robust system a company should use is one that can be objectively justified. This is understood to be a combination of length of service and performance and this would provide a company with the strongest defence against a claim. It is also the view that a pure seniority system is discriminatory in that it discriminates against the more talented and better performing individual (direct discrimination) or individuals (indirect discrimination) regardless of age (you don’t have to be old to be discriminated against).

It is naive to think that companies do not know who their best people are; after all there is no airline that uses seniority for the selection of their training captains or training F/Os. What is needed is a robust selection procedure that is open, honest, transparent and fair. A selection board chosen from colleagues within a workforce could achieve this. Pure seniority based methods of selection have been abused when management, with no input from anywhere else, have bypassed the next in line in order to promote an individual of their choosing.

So, in a nutshell, no system is perfect or ever will be, but seniority is, in my view, discriminatory, both when used in a company and as a restraint of trade between companies. There is no doubt in my mind that the seniority system in use today by airlines has been a factor in holding down terms and conditions, as well as restricting the employment prospects of individuals.

Surely, the time has come for an individual or group of individuals (F/Os?), with the help of Section 32 of the Age Discrimination Act, to challenge, in the courts, a pure seniority based selection system.

You never know, some companies, who want to change to a system of length of service and performance, may not put up a strong defence and hide behind the fact that the Act allows companies 5 years to demonstrate convergence to the legislation.