I think the issue is the fact that BA have potentially recruited for jobs that, if this thread is correct, don't exist.
Sadly I don't think there was any such think as a guaranteed job in aviation, let alone guarantees of promised positions, at any airline.. there's a limited number posts and there's the prickly issue that an increasing number of current BA employees have got the seniority for those "jobs"...
FWIW:
Up until recently as we all know there was a need for a
lot of recruitment at BA, as we know most entrants went onto the A320. No problem there.
As far as filling Long Haul seats that was a bit unusual (in terms of numbers). Because of type freezes for those recruited to Short Haul at the front end of the current recruiting bulge, and the company's reluctance to release individuals early from their freeze periods (on the grounds of lack of training capacity) the company could "legitimately" deny internal transfers from those wanting to leave Short Haul and recruit DEPs direct to LH without busting agreements. Obviously some feathers were indeed ruffled (as witnessed in a previous post) and I have to say I can sympathise with the POV of those who suffered as a result.
Fast forward twelve months and even more BA P2s have exited their freeze periods and have entirely legitimate expectations of being slotted into the established process for conversion to a Long Haul type. There's a lull in deliveries - the A380 Fleet is now (I think) fully established, the only new Long Haul hull due in the year is a single 787 ...chuck the newly revealed business plan into the mix and suddenly it appears that there aren't going to be anything like as many vacant Long Haul RHS next year as there were this year. As a result it's going to be very hard for management to justify large numbers of DEPs leap frogging onto Long Haul ahead of existing time served/freeze served BA P2s. In conclusion I'd expect the vast vast majority of LH slots next year will go to existing BA P2s..there's no shortage of internal bidders. That doesn't mean there's no possibility of DEPs direct to Long Haul...but IMHO if it happens it won't be offered in significant numbers.
Of course you can never say never, there might be a sudden change of fleet plan, the next run of the "system" might chuck up shortages...but at the moment this does look like being a
relatively slack year...