Guv,
I agree that to seek to change a contract in mid-stream is "welching", but my observation is that contracts expire, sometimes by years, and it is in the negotiation of a new contract that drags on for months and months that frustration sets in and pilots become erratic.
It is often the case that the company will attempt to reinterpret many areas of the agreement during it's currency, notably in work rules. Is this acceptable?
When you sign a contract for three years there is no expectation or obligation that it will be renewed without change on expiry.
Surely once one joins an outfit one is not expected to work until you drop under the same terms and conditions that may have been agreed twenty or thirty years ago.
What about the "give-backs" of a few years ago, the unions thought that they would have some say on how this capital was deployed, but found out that the same mistakes that had caused the losses were allowed to continue.
When profits came back, there was no noticeable rush to share with those who had sacrificed.
You seem to think that pilots should be willing to work cheap so that air travellers can travel cheaply, but I don't see many doctors who work for peanuts so that all patients,rich or poor, can have access to first class medical care. The rich get firstclass medical care, the poor get what's left.
I don't know many lawyers who are willing to work for peanuts so that the downtrodden can have a fair shake in the courts. The quality of justice available to the impecunious is well known.
So are pilots to be held to a different standard of philanthropy?
Over the years the cost of air travel in real terms has constantly declined. It is now much cheaper to fly than thirty years ago, all and sundry swan off to exotic corners of the world, their standard of living has obviously increased, but you grudge pilots the same facility.
Shame on you , you rich capitalist oppressor Guvnor!!
