I know it look slike common sense but a 205 across the board cut is hardly equitable. I remember a very senior manager in an airline business explaining straightened times post 9/11 and how he was also limiting his pay rise to 5%.
This meant that his PA who was probably on £35k would get £1750 per annum pay rise and he would getting at least £10k. If you reverse this and make a 20% cut across the board the same manager would see his salary fall significantly by £40k, he can absord that impact whereas his PA would lose £7k which he/she may not be able to deal with.
Of course it is easy for well paid managers to promote such a radical moves but the impact on the less well remunerated is disproportionate. Equally, it should be apparent that for each senior manager you can offload you can employ 4 or 5 other staff.
During the Ayling era BA cut management quite drastically but, numbers crept back up. I do not know what the present management population is at BA but I would be interested to know what the ratio is between managerial staff and flying staff.