Bill Francis in today's BA news:
In This week’s BA News, head of IFCE Bill Francis addresses some of the top issues about cost savings in IFCE. since the Unite strike ballot opened, Bill and his team have telephoned more than 10,000 cabin crew and met up with many of them to make sure they have the facts before they vote.
And, as the ballot approaches its final week, Bill explains why he thinks Unite should lift its strike threat and resume talks on the issues facing cabin crew. Still talking: Bill Francis and his team have called more than 10,000 cabin crew to tell them about the airline’s package
Why are we trying to make cost savings in IFCE?
I’m really proud of the cabin crew we have. They do a fantastic job for our airline and our customers. But BA made a record loss last year, and analysts forecast we’re heading for losses again, of up to £800m this year.
Everywhere in BA, costs have to be reduced if we’re to stand any chance of achieving the profitability that is essential to securing our long-term future.
IFCE must play its part in this process.
Why is Unite balloting for a strike?
Unite doesn’t say on its ballot form why it is asking cabin crew to strike. I believe there’s no justification for Unite to create such uncertainty for our cabin crew and to threaten our customers in this way. Let me explain why:
1. Unite asked for a court hearing in February, but is threatening a strike now. We introduced our new crew complements from November after nine months’ consultation with Unite. We believe the changes don’t alter individual terms and conditions. We couldn’t wait any longer to make the cost savings and it meant I could offer 3,000 part-time contracts and 1,000 cabin crew the voluntary redundancy they had asked for. Most of those people have now left BA. Unite thinks the changes are contractual and need formal agreement. It started legal proceedings and when the High Court didn’t grant it an injunction to stop the changes going ahead, Unite asked for a full court hearing. Having chosen the legal route, why is Unite threatening a strike now, before the court hearing in February can consider the arguments?
2. We’re not taking pay or allowances away. There’s a two-year basic pay freeze in my plan, but even so, there will be incremental pay rises of between two and seven per cent this year, and again in 2010, for the 75 per cent of crew who are eligible. I’ve also offered to protect average variable pay for Heathrow crew by replacing it with a new fixed monthly travel payment. That’s an offer to Unite and we need it to agree if we are going to introduce it for all our Heathrow cabin crew.
3. There’s no dispute on new fleet. In a letter to Willie Walsh dated November 19, Unite wrote: “While we have clear concerns about your proposals in respect to ‘new fleet’, we are of course not in dispute over ‘new fleet’.” Despite this, Willie accepted a request from Unite when he met it in October to consider alternative ideas it might have, although we haven’t had any yet.
Why won’t you negotiate with the union?
I want to negotiate and reach an agreement with Unite on the rest of my plan, including changes to the worldwide disruption agreement and the offer of a new monthly travel payment. I cannot implement changes to contractual pay, hours or leave arrangements without agreement, and I don’t want to. As I’ve already said, crew complements were introduced after nine months of consultation, and that’s now in the hands of the court.
So why haven’t you met with Unite since June?
We have. We went to Acas in July, but those talks didn’t go smoothly.
On July 23, Unite registered a failure to agree because it insisted that talks could only continue if they were solely based on its own proposal and were nothing to do with our proposal. This resulted in the talks being escalated to Willie and the Unite general secretaries on August 27. We tried to meet again at Acas at the end of September, but by this time the two branches of
Unite would not sit in the same room together. The resumption of talks is not dependent on the ballot outcome. Talks can restart at any time. Despite lots of invitations since then, Unite still hasn’t agreed a date when it will meet us again.
Are you forcing new contracts on current crew?
No. My plan protects the pay and conditions for our current crew. We can’t afford the same contracts for future crew, which is why we’re planning to recruit them on different terms and conditions. That’s not unique. Our Gatwick crew are on different contracts to Heathrow, with Unite’s
agreement, and they do a great job looking after our customers and their safety.
But surely the threat of a strike will force the company to rethink its plans?
A strike would cost the company millions of pounds and this would make the savings and changes we need to make in IFCE much bigger.With the package that is on the table, that doesn’t need to happen. There is absolutely no reason for a strike. For the sake of our customers and our crew, I urge Unite to withdraw the threat and work with us.