Isn't the definition of a scab a person (or more accurately, a spinless bit of scum) who takes another mans (or womans) job while that other person is either locked out or on strike?
Are the Cathay pilots on strike? No.
Are they locked out? No.
How then can people who join Cathay now be regarded as scabs? They are not taking the jobs of locked out or striking workers.
The hiring ban is doing little to deter people from joining Cathay and those that it does deter are the kind of people that the Union needs on its side, while the less scrupulous will join anyway.
I sympathise with the sacked Cathay pilots, but I think the fact that other Cathay pilots have accepted upgrades to fill the slots has now made the sacked pilots' fight to get their jobs back next to impossible. Good luck.