The true cost of the cabin crew strike
“British Airways is facing severe financial trading conditions”; this fact is often stated by BA cabin crew who have voted to strike. However, they are for the most part, totally unable to grasp the true meaning of this state of affairs. In so doing they have acted irresponsibly and risk the very existence of BA. It is no accident that BA cabin crew are the highest paid in Britain, it is a direct result of strong union action. Whilst this situation has long been highly undesirable for the airline, its shareholders and the customers who pay their inflated salaries, it is no longer tenable. BA is fighting for its very survival and the mostly poorly educated cabin crew, are being lead by a politically motivated union inexorably towards the dole queue. Insulated within this privatized state company from the real economy outside, these featherbedded low skilled employees will soon find their true worth in the job market. Many will be forced to take up minimum wage employment; others will never work again, living on state handouts and the remains of their once mighty pension scheme, now reduced to offering legal minimum payouts. All this loss in order to protect the unwarranted low work load, inflated pay and ludicrously titled Cabin Service Directors, who are simply stewards and stewardesses and should rightly be serving meals like the rest of the cabin crew. It is patently clear that the public holds no sympathy for the BA cabin crew and moreover the airline’s customers are now questioning their desperately poor performance when compared to those of BA’s competitors. In contrast to BA’s often-surly cabin crew, Virgin’s staff shine brightly and they work for half the pay.