Major Saville - Delighted and impressed as I am at your longevity in the airline industry, you have to win the argument rather than assume your position give you greater insight than the rest of us. I am highly amused to be called a socialist - many an insult has been levelled at me in my life but never that one! Just out of interest, were I to be a Mancunian or Liverpudlian socialist, would my views be more acceptable than those of a Glaswegian socialist? The slight difficulty with some of the posts on here is that they are essentially personal insults, and largely devoid of any cogent or reasoned discussion points. By all means see me as self-serving - that is for others who know me to judge the truth of, and I would not seek to rob you of your assured position. For what it is worth, I personally have nothing whatsoever to gain from seniority at easyJet. My sole interest is that the pilots already working here are spared the inevitable abuses of position that occur when no protections are in place to prevent them.
Like so much that passes for reasonableness in life, through the croodile tears and feigned shock, all I really hear are the voices of vested interests couched in terms of genuine concern. Would not life be so much easier if all those nasty young First Officers at easyJet were swept aside to make way for real pilots with proper experience? They can do their time like the rest of us - get them to the back of the queue where they belong. As the good Major has observed, the changes in the airline industry of recent years has made way for companies like ours to flourish, and like many others at easyJet I am a net beneficiary. Why on earth should the pilots at easyJet roll over to let in the Billy Bunters of the airline industry who have suddenly seen a dripping roast pass by in front of them? Join the queue chaps.
Back to the main topic, there are interesting times ahead at easyJet. The signs are that we yet empty our command pool in the next year or so. The very short-sighted position of only employing 200-hour pilots instead of those with signficant experience to smooth the experience demographics of the company, may yet come to bite us in a big way. I have always held that we need to recruit in a balanced manner, but as many will recognise, we have not done so. That is not to denigrate our excellent CTC pilots. The problem is they have low hours and will not be available for promotion in the next 2 years - either through lack of hours or because most will have left to join BA! That could yet open the door to a radical change of employment practices within easyJet - few things concentrate the mind more than aircraft sat on the ground with no one to command them. I am much criticised for being too positive about easyJet, and I unashamedly enjoy working here. I want to see a company where effort of the pilots inside the company is rewarded, rather than those outside coming in to take the best deals. I am not anti-DECs per se - but as long as there are suitably qualified FOs here to promote, they have to get first bite of the cherry. Self-serving? Maybe. Concerned for our own guys first? I hope so.