Having just read
Investor Day May 21 2010 presentation, I find it notable that so much in the early pages is dedicated to what appears to be a case against cabin crew.
There are numbers quoted apparently extracted from AR 1998 and AR 2009.
However total headcount, and percentages of same, can be skewed by, inter alia, outsourcing, aircraft size(=crew complement ) and fleet size.
But it is said that those who do not learn from history are condemned to repeat it.
From BA AR1997/98
The cabin crew dispute resulted in a one-off cost of £125 million but we did secure the £42 million a year savings which was required from the cabin crew budget.
The savings in operating costs have enabled us to plan the investment of
£6 billion over three years on new services, products, aircraft and training.
and
Agreement was reached during the year on a new deal with the unions which
had to include pay freezes, new lower starter rates of pay, new rostering agreements, voluntary severance and early retirement for many. But now we have stability until the end of the century.
From BA AR 1998/99
Business efficiency programme
The Business Efficiency Programme was announced three years ago with a target to identify and deliver £1 billion of annual efficiency savings by March 2000.
The programme is well on track, delivering annual efficiencies of £610 million in this year’s results, £110 million ahead of original plans.
Initiatives put in place prior to March 1998 have contributed significantly towards this year’s result.
These include:
· Changes to working practices and pay rates in the Heathrow and Gatwick operations, British Airways World Cargo and British Airways Regional.
· New agreements with cabin crew.
· Successful outsourcing of a number of activities including in-flight catering and the management and maintenance of ground vehicles at Heathrow and Gatwick.
· Business restructuring in fleet engineering operations, including the sale of specialist units and the outsourcing of IT.
· Restructured travel agents’ commission and incentive reward systems in the UK, USA, Canada and Africa.
· Centralisation of accounting operations in the UK.
From BA AR 2008/09
The average number of employees in the Group, measured in MPE, fell by 0.7 per cent to 42,094.
However, productivity (measured in ATKs per MPE) weakened by 1.9 per cent due to the additional manpower that was retained in the first half of the year to handle our move to Terminal 5.
I am astonished that such effort and resources are being directed to squashing the cc into submission. How much saving will be generated to justify all the confusion?