As to the vote organised with a reputable agency.
The vote was not as straight forward as some may imagine.
BALPA supplied the e-mails of all their members to the agency, whilst it was left to the remaining third or the pilots to find their own method of contacting the agency.
Flyers were circulated in the Leipzig crew room, but nothing was available in East Midlands.
The time frame was less than two weeks from inception to the vote.
Not all pilots passed through Lej and some were on holiday during this period.
Every pilot has a company e-mail address which could have been used to contact them with details on how to approach the agency.
The tactic was to rush through the vote, and slant the result towards the BALPA view.
Little was known of the IPF prior to the company announcing its agreement, and nothing has been heard from them subsequently.
Offers have been made by the IPF to BALPA and I understand that they were rejected.
The IPF has offered to represent all the pilots regardless of their union affiliation, and do not require IPF membership.
There are several non BALPA members, who are either Unite, IPF or who have no union affiliation.
The first reaction upon hearing the news that voluntary recognition had been awarded to the IPF (In negotiation since 2006) a member of DHL Air urged the BALPA members to flood the IPF chairman with e-mails and telephone calls. This could be easily taken as harassment as several pilots took it upon themselves to make their voices heard.
Whilst we try to live in a democracy, and take note of a majority the management decided to go down the route of the minority union, which they state was the only union prepared to represent all the pilots.
Those in the know will understand that more is on offer from voluntary recognition than through obtaining statutory status.
Many of you will say that the vote showed that the required 50% +1 were in favour of BALPA, this is perfectly true if the vote had been for statutory recognition, but the IPF had a signed agreement with the company in late July before the vote.
There are two sides to every argument good and bad on both. In this case BALPA is trying to bully the IPF into withdrawing from a perfectly legal agreement (David V Goliath).
The real losers in this are the pilots themselves, who could have had exactly what they wanted all along, voluntary recognition.
That actions of BALPA and its members in this dispute has been confrontational.
Whilst the silence from the IPF has not helped their cause one iota.
I do not support any organisation who will not include all bargaining units (Unionised or not) with a right vote in its deliberations.
Please now leave this as an internal matter and await developments without further comment pro or con.