I think that it’s fair to say some unions have been their ( members) own worst enemy, the miners union is one and Southern rail through ASLEF & the RMT, these unions have been hijacked by people with a poltical agenda, BALPA seems far more pragmatic and reflects the difference between representing employees in the private sector ( where in the UK at least) government bailouts are rare.
Unions seek to improve the lot of employees, that tends to cost money and that is why MoL and his investors don’t want to go there.
Unions hard won deals to protect employees rights in redundancy probably killed of any chance of a rescue of Monarch and bmibaby before them, it’s just to complicated or rather it’s easier to start a fresh than merge seniority, t&c’s let alone pension liabilities
MoL has invested huge amounts of time and money to avoid union recognition, he has no problem with unions provided they’re his unions, why does he say he will only deal with unions that are represented by FR employees? it’s is implied that that he can then apply pressure on individuals and here you have to look at their track record.
I would recommend you keep an open mind, but keep your eyes even more so ditto your ears, it will like end in one of two ways
1) a pet union thrown a few cheap crumbs that cost Ryanair little, maybe even save a few bob given the creativity shown in the past ( remember the 50p wheelchair levy on all passengers)
2) individual base shut downs in the way that they dealt with union demands in CPH yet they continue to operate flight to/from there! oh I see you’re active on the union front off to Gdańsk or Marrakesh for you and congratulations on the birth of your new daughter BTW
Good luck with all this the industry supports you but we know your up against a nasty piece of work.