Clarified, I'll re read your post in greater detail later, as far as I remember an integrated fleet was on the table during negiotations in the summer.
BASSA did not accept it or try to tweak it (such as swap 9 days off for fixed links).
If forced back to the table again are you saying BASSA would accept it this time?
I would have thought BASSA should have done a bit of polling to find out what crew do/do not want.
It does look like a bit of a personal agenda from senior old contract CSD's.
Just a point of note of saying you can't get much more work out of crew, maybe not on longhaul but certainly on shorthaul.
Many full time shorthaul cc do in the region of 500 hours, made up of lots of single sector days and standovers.
I don't think they will be too chuffed if BASSA agreed to fixed links ending up with mainly two day, six sector / three day eight sector trips and 750 hours pa.
It would mean then that shorthaul would bear most of the pain, although that would probably suit the longhaul CDS's quit well.
The article above seems informative.