Betty Girl
From what I have read about this dispute and previous ones, this is not the first time that BA management have removed staff travel from people going on strike. The big difference is that on the previous occasion it was returned fairly quickly as the dispute was settled shortly afterwards. This time around the stakes were raised, with BA saying that anyone who went on strike would lose staff travel forever. Harsh ? Maybe, but it was a very clear warning given when the strike ballot was set in motion. Having given that warning, BA management had to follow through or been seen as weak. Maybe the error was in issuing the warning in the first place, but what alternative was there ? BASSA were threatening to bring the airline to a standstill. If you hold a gun to someone's head you have to accept that they may hit back just as hard.
As far as not returning staff travel goes, there are many outside of cabin crew who are frankly livid at how one group of workers have been seen to undermine all the sacrifices that 30,000 others have made. I'm not sure whether cabin crew are quite aware of the level of cuts that other departments have gone through. My department shed staff and we have seen no pay award for the past two years. Other areas of BA have made staff reapply for their jobs, only there aren't as many of them now. A scale staff have also had a pay freeze. In real terms that means we've seen take the buying power of our home pay drop by 6% . We all made managed to reduce employee costs in real terms. The best that the cabin crew unions could come up with was a loan and that was after months of prevarication. BASSA and CC89 have done cabin crew a huge disservice.
I do have admiration for those who did not go on strike and left the union. It is a pity that BA management are unable to make any gesture of appreciation as that would be immediately snapped up by Unite as discriminatory.