There is much talk of BA returning to the table and negotiating with BASSA. However what I urge BASSA to get their heads around is that their position is not seen to be in any way reasonable by almost everyone looking in from the outside. That is a clue. The culture within BA CC is clearly heavily unionsed and they support each others beliefs that this is all the fault of WW and bad management.
It's not. The world of Lord King and Colin Marshall is gone. The world of Concorde and The World's Favourite Airline is gone. The world of BA operating in the UK outside of London is also gone. This is the world of better looking, younger and fitter cabin crew who don not sound like throwbacks from the 1970s. This is the world of Emirates and Qatar.
This is a world of Air France / KLM as part of a powerful SkyTeam.
This is a world of Lufthansa overtaking you in size years ago and partnered under the (soon to be) newest Terminal at your home base. This is the world where STAR have the newest and most modern facilities at Heathrow.
This is the world of Swiss back on GVA-LHR.
This is the world of SN Brussels back on BRU-LHR.
This is the world where both of the above are survivors on market rates and flexible business models, born out of the ashes of dead flag carriers.
Other people came along and did it for less, and in many cases they are doing it better. So you can hold onto your pampered salaries and fly those old Jumbos until they life expire because by God you will never make enough money to replace them with that pension deficit.
BA continues to get smaller every year. Gatwick's next for the chop. No way is WW going to replace those clapped out B737s. Once they're ready to go, Gatwick will go to, easyJet just moves in route by route with new A319s and a simpler more dynamic cost structure. The only place BA ever made money worth mentioning is Heathrow, and right now, your competitors are on the phone to all your Executive Club customers, mail shooting the travel departments and scmoozing the boardrooms.
This militant crap is destined to drag on through to February. Why in the name of God would anyone risk their summer holidays in such risky times by booking with BASSA Airways?
Time to dust off the BA Citiflyer AOC and do a Crossair.
Hint : Google Swissair post 9/11