President Bush (how nice of you to join us!),
I have to question your interpretation of the law on this one. You are right in saying that striking is a breach of contract, which means the company can take actions including withholding pay, but the law protects strikers from dismissal *during* the strike if the only reason they give is because the employee is on strike. If you are pulled up for some other reason, then that would be dealt with through the normal disciplinary procedures.
My understanding is that the company must wait a minimum of 12 weeks, and they must show that they have made reasonable efforts to negotiate with employees, and then if they want to dismiss strikers then they cannot discriminate and must dismiss *all* strikers (none of whom can be re-employed for a minimum of 3 months).
Now, there's some wiggle room in the interpretation of 'reasonable efforts to negotiate', since as Virgin have put multiple offers on the table and met with the union throughout the process, they could claim they have lived up to that side of the bargain. Whether they would pull the trigger and fire all strikers following the 12 week minimum period remains to be seen.
Virgin won't make it easy for strikers, but they will have to abide by employment law!