TCM,
I attended the BALPA conference over the weekend and am a Cabair modular graduate. I spoke to a couple of airline reps who attended and whilst one of them appeared to prefer integrated course graduates, when I pushed him on the subject, he said providing I had been to an "approved school" they would consider me WITHOUT the 1000 hours!
By "approved school" I think he was referring to the likes of Oxford, Cabair and Jerez who possess a proven track record of training both sponsored and self-sponsored cadets. If this is the case, it is an unfair and narrow construction of the words "approved school". I would be interested to hear what others have to say.