LB,
Absolutely, BA would love, regardless of the loyalty of any crew who went to work, to have all their crew as "white goods" in essence. 5 years, disposable and on to the next one. It's the hardest truth for many of the crew who went to work that, despite their choice to side with the airline (or whichever particular reason and motivation they exercised) that there's no loyalty in business particularly. On that ground, I still support the concept of collective representation if only to keep the corporate wolf from the door for as long as is possible. In fact, as I think about it, that's probably one of the issues at the very heart of all this. Do you keep that wolf at bay by saying no and threatening IA or do you do it through concerted negotiation? I'm not advocating one position or another, merely observing the relative success or otherwise of the two approaches.
MrB