I, as a regular BA customer am a little confused, I thought I knew what the industrial problem between BA & Cabin Crew Union is through reading in the media and on this forum.
However, a BA steward visited a nieghbour and was introduced to me, I asked him what the strike was about and secondly what the court case on 1 st Feb is about.
He was very vague but said there are two vastly different issues that are not connected in any way. He said the strike was about management refusing to allow his union to negotiate (I apologised as I though it was the other way around)
His partner, also a cabin crew member came to collect him and said exactly the same that Bassa were denied any opportunity to negotiate and that is the reason for the strike ballot, they were both 100% confident a strike will happen, they will win the court case and a new CEO will soon be replacing the current one.
They said the court they was because the number of cabin crew on an aircraft is clearly contractual and cannot be changed, they said the lawyer confirmed that. I asked what happens when BA buys a new type of aircraft, smaller or larger than the type it replaces which must happen from time to time that need more/less crew, do they change everyone's contract who works on the new aircraft to reflext the number of crew needed? They were unable to answer that question but started almost shouting that the number of crew is contractual.
I mentioned I fly from LGW and noticed they have less crew than they used to have, do they not have contracts, they said they knew nothing about the LGW crew as they are LHR based.
Can anyone clarify exactly what the two issues are about?
I perhaps mistakenly thought the strike ballot and the court case were about the same thing.