Originally Posted by Bullshot
it is also about BA Pilots also exercising their muscle to the disadvantage of other non-BA Pilots. It appears that they want the work for themselves to the exclusion of others in the same way as was done in GSS and BACON with F/O's from BA parachuted in as Captains with no consideration for the F/O's already in those Airlines.
GSS
only fly cargo from BA. Their
only customer is BA. They fly using BA callsigns. Their pilots deadhead on BA flights using BA duty travel tickets. Without BA they do not exist. The inclusion of BA pilots on the Captains list at GSS was the price BA agreed to pay to be allowed to outsource up to 4 aircrafts worth of work.
BACON. The only BA secondees in BACON were on the RJ100 fleet. They flew aircraft that had been handed over from mainline, they flew them from BA bases and they flew them on BA routes. The BACX pilots at the time wanted the whole lot for themselves. The BAR pilots were adamant that their bases, routes and commands were not going to be handed over to a subsidiary airline. Nobody was going to get everything they wanted. BACX had the chance to take 12 aircraft, two bases and lots of routes and jobs at a time that they were contracting and their FO's looked very likely to be looking for new jobs. Secondees or not, they got a lifeline out of that deal and to say that BALPA screwed them is disingenuous at best. If the BACC had been minded to fight it BACX would have got nothing. As an aside, most of the secondees were either existing BAR Captains or BAR FOs who were due a command in the regions that year. Very few came up from London for a secondment.
As Monsieur Bullshot I might reasonably object to being excluded from flying my own countrymen to/from my own country under the highly dubious argument that it is 'BA Pilots work'. Similar for Herr Bullshot.
Could McBullshot reasonably object that he was excluded from flying GLA-JFK because he'd have to be employed by a London based airline to do it? If not, why should Monsieur or Herr Bullshot be treated differently?
Neither is it likely that they would be using BA Aircraft. The 757 is an obsolete aircraft. BA would be disposing of some of them to Openskies - in the same way that they disposed of 757s to DHL for example. I don't remember BA pilots demanding that they fly all of DHL's night freight, so why should that argument hold up with Openskies?
The 757s were sold to DHL, which when I last checked was outside the BA group. They were not transferred within the BA group to an independent group of pilots. This has rather more in common with the RJ100 transfer than the 757 sale.
The Management of Opensies might come from BA, but you can be sure they will be employed by Openskies, not BA.
Perhaps you are not familiar with the way BA work. The managers will all be seconded from BA on BA contracts. Just the way it was when BA managers ran BACX. If Open Skies fails then they'll be straight back to Waterworld.
Someone previously mentioned that IT systems will be BA's - this is really scraping the barrel for excuses
Don't forget to mention that the tickets will be sold through BA's website and call centres too. Strikes me as strange for an airline that BA management claim must be independent of BA mainline (unless it's a sales, IT or management function).
I am therefore, still quite perplexed as to why there is an IFALPA ban on employment. How did you BA guys twist that one?
Twist? I believe an IFALPA recruitment can be applied whenever a union is in dispute with an employer. No twisting required.
I can't help feeling that you Chaps might be fighting the right war, but you have chosen the wrong battlefield.
Well thanks for your support but there has to be a battle eventually and I'd rather do it now before Opes Skies gets off the ground than in two years time when BA decide to hand over a load of 787s to them. Perhaps BALPA should have fought the battle earlier, over GSS, or over the RJ handover, but at least the new leadership have learned from the mistakes of the old and don't intend to repeat them.