Whilst I believe Willie Walsh is thinking outside the box I believe he needs to go further.
The revenue shortfall just like General Motors problem is immense. At least 10%. I believe BA is burning cash, circa stg 3M per day, so reading Doug Brown's e-mail to all pilots little time is left before bankruptcy.
Staff costs are about 20% of BA's annual costs so 1 months salary cuts by ALL staff would only improve revenue viz expenditure by 1.1/2% in this financial year.
Not enough.
The only thing that would improve things dramatically, is to close the NAPS pension scheme to all staff. BA currently pay 25% of salary to cover staff in this scheme, the majority. so this action could save about 5% of BA's costs.
Even this action is only about of 50% of the current revenue shortfall.
Whilst this is a bitter pill for staff to accept it must be better than losing ones current income. The scheme rules allow closure with 6 months notice.
If BA do go bankrupt, a real possibility according to Chief Pilot Doug Brown, then of course the government Pension protection scheme kicks in, to protect the NAPS shortfall.
However with debts of approaching stg 3B there is a real possibility that this will totally absorb the Pension protection schemes resources, leading to more problems for the Gordon Brown government.