Good to see everyone coming out of the post-Christmas blocks in fighting form. Trying to prove to everyone that you should have filled-in the uSay questionnaire is like to trying to prove to the NRA in the States that there is relationship between gun crime and gun availability. It is not a direct relationship, but the relationship exists nonetheless for anyone who wants to take a rational view of it. The problem is that the NRA cannot cede ground for fear of losing everything, and they therefore end up arguing black is white. It is totally self-evident that guns being around mean more people get shot - but not to people who have much to lose by admitting the truth that everyone else sees. That is what it is like trying to get those who vote with their feet see the practical outworking of their actions.
Whilst still on the subject of the US, arguably the world's greatest democracy, typically less than 55% of eligible voters ever vote in presidential elections. Does anyone care what the other 45% thought? Not one bit, sadly. Put simply, you have to be in it to win it - no one cares what a non-voter thinks as they have no influence of any kind. People who do not vote sometimes do it out of apathy and sometime as a statement - however well-intentioned they may have been, they just leave the field of play and take no further part in proceedings. Nearer home, many people are happy to let everyone else be in BALPA so they can pay the subs, but are disgruntled when BALPA is not as effective as they wanted and therefore cite that as a reason for not joining BALPA. What gives a Union power is the percentage support among its members. Yet there are numerous people openly saying they will support BALPA when it becomes more powerful - they may be waiting a very long time.
That brings us to the issue of uSay, and the proud list of non-participants on display here. It is totally self-evident that if your opinion is asked, and you decline to give it, then your opinion no longer counts. The root of the ill-feeling here lies in the fact that under a previous CEO, positive uSay results (called Pulse then), were used to adversely affect the outcome of subsequent pay talks. I fully accept that such a crass move by management was a terrible tactical blunder that opened the door to the mistrust that exists today. Nonetheless, we have to be bigger than that, and recognise that to decline to give an opinion is interpreted as not having one. Hence the tragedy that our senior management believe that the only people who care about flexicrew (trust me - this is absolutely the case), are the Trainers because they are the main ones making a fuss about it. In visits round crewrooms, the flexicrew stay quiet or just grovel in front of key people, the line crews often do not get involved because 'nothing ever changes anyway', and then hardly any pilots fill-in uSay. They see that as a protest - the Company see it as a lack of interest. A painful truth, but a truth nonetheless.