Are all you people for real?
I don't know why but I still keep reading this forum. It is quite obvious that the majority of posters are not professional pilots. Many of the posts are childish many are provocative. Very few indicate an understanding of the problems in this airline. Please remember that an intransigent management sacked 49 people to try and frighten the rest of the pilot workforce into submission. Soon after this happened management held a press conference to tell the world that the CX pilot dispute was over. Clearly they thought it was, we all knew that it was not.
Whether you agree with the recruitment ban or not, and I must declare here that I do not, you must recognise why it is there. It is effectively the only industrial weapon available to the HKAOA to force management back to the negotiating table. I don't agree with it for the simple reason that not everyone will abide by it. In a perfect world the ban would work, nobody would join and management would have a very urgent need to negotiate. I don't pretend to have an alternative, all I can do is hope that the people who run the company will eventually come to their senses. I guess the HKAOA don't have an alternative either at the moment, except hoping the ban works and talks start. Why are management refusing to negotiate pilot contracts? Quite simply because they think they can get away with imposing them. Remember this is Hong Kong and every CX pilot is on a three month rolling contract.
Why no upgrade ban? I cannot believe that anybody who knows the history of this dispute, and the labour laws in Hong Kong, can seriously ask this question. No fewer than 49 people were fired to make a political statement. Forty nine lives and careers were ruined, 49 families devastated and for what? To win an industrial dispute that is for what. Also, of course, because they thought they could legally do it in this jurisdiction. Now the HKAOA is supporting 49 families, isn't that 49 too many? After the first upgrade candidate declined his/her upgrade it would be 50 and before word got around that number could have grown to 69 or 79. This is why there is no upgrade ban. So why not strike I hear you say. Are you serious? Strike in Hong Kong? Let us say 70% did strike we are now left with 30% of the pilots still employed on the CX payroll. The company have already spent millions on wet leases so they won't mind spending a few million more. Now we have 1,049 instead of just 49. Come on guys get real and stop posting cr-p.
I think it is incredibly sad that it has got to this. If every potential new recruit declined it would be over very soon. However, some will continue to join and the dispute will go on and on and on. I do not agree with the ban because I know some very good people will say no and be disadvantaged career wise yet some total w-nk-rs may end up in our ranks.
Why don't wiz and alpha and every body else who so eloquently (or otherwise) grace this forum try and come up with solutions instead of the usual negative cr-p.