Some history.
We used to have the option of doing only 700hrs per year. Unfortunately these hours did not include leave, reserve, sims, office duties and were not factored up for 2/3man crewing. Long haul was factored down by 2hrs per sector.
So to take a typical roster of 3 ULR patterns, the total block hours could be around 78 but then you reduce that by 12hrs (6 x 2) to 66. Each trip was usually 5 days (now 4 days) so we could only do three or so ULRs a month as the 5-4-3 days off rule meant each trip and recovery was 10 days.
For short haul it was just straight hours. If you flew 700hrs then it equates to 798hrs today.
So whether shorthaul or long haul you would end up flying around 798-820hours in todays system, not counting leave, sims, reserve, office days or ground duties. If you count in all the non flying extras it equates to over 100 hours. That gives an annual target in the 900s which is not far off the current 84credit hour system.
So the 700 might look appealing but it is not far from what we have now.
Onto the 'negotiating' part. What WMD will the AOA have to force CX to compromise on something so important? It would be in CX's interests just to let the RPs lapse and go back to rostering to the AFTLS.