JBfly

R U serious. Of course Brian Boyd wont call one day strikes, he knows that Virgin can handle one day here and there.

He has already said to crew that he has been in contact with, that any strikes will be in blocks to stop the operation otherwise strike action will be a waste of time. We will see blocks of three days each week.

vs_lhr

Based on the above, 3 days is still coverable.

You sound as though the goal is to make Virgin fold, not bring about a better offer.

JBfly

No I dont want VS to fold, but I want them to take us seriously and they wont with a half hearted attempt of the odd day here and there. In fact unless we stand together we could come of much worse, if the company man flights with the office staff and carry on.

It terms of Virgin being able to cover the operation they cant fully crew flights presently with 4000 crew! You forget we have the worse mangment in the industry and maybe, just maybe SRB may decide to give us some decent directors after this mess is finally over

Tags

We must have more than 4000 C/C as we have 750 pilots that fly 750 hours a year with only a handful of part timers!

The numbers don't seem to add up to me! My guess is at least 5000.

vs_lhr

JBfly, assuming your vision of the future is correct, and the union calls multiple blocks of three-day action over a period of 2 or more weeks, I would expect the atmosphere, when you're back in work for the other 4 days, is going to be less than pleasant trying to work with crew who haven't been striking and covering your jobs to keep the airline running. The them-and-us mentality will make everyones working hours a nightmare.
I always thought the rallying call to vote yes to strike was to send a clear message to management and force a new offer (not that I think that would happen, by the way, but that's what I've read into pro-Yes vote posts). You, on the other hand, seem to be taking Schadenfreuden glee in the thought of disrupting the airline as much as possible.
At best this attitude will destroy working relationships with your colleagues. At worst you'll take the airline to the brink, and that 4.8% will be a percentage of zero when the redundancies kick in.
There's been some very reasoned and sensible advice from the flight crew on here who have already shown they know how to negotiate. At the moment the strike vote is too weak, the goals far too unclear and the union completely disorganised. It's time to retreat and reorganise for the next round of negotiations.

stansdead

We have 800 pilots, not 750.

Tags

I see 771 on the last seniority list, and it's 4 months old so I guess we must be close to 800.

Thinking about it again, my guess would be 4500 crew, I'm guessing most of the schedule will still run!

virgin mary

I have just got back from an east coast trip and a straw poll of the crew in the hotel, (so more than one crew) was about a 50/50 split. And an fsm who will vote yes what ever the offer as she just wants to strike??...And many of the crew will now be visiting this site!

Interestingly we met with an aer lingus crew who had a lot to say about our situation. Firstly they were amazed at our low pay, but they were also amazed at our disorganisation and that we had gone against the unions recomendations to accept the offer. After our little straw poll they were all of the opinion that we are moving like lambs to the slaughter! And were genuinly concerned for us. (Ahhh) During their little dispute a couple of years ago they all got a very nasty shock when the company (who were also pleeding poverty and claiming they were on the brink) locked them out and simply shut the airline down for a few days more, this apparently lessoned the costs incurred to the company and helped them weather the storm, and this extra time with no money coming in really started to hurt the crews pockets.
Does anyone think this could happen here?
They also had a number of crew sacked for a number of petty things, their union supported the claims for unfair dissmissal and even won a little compensation for some, but aer lingus just didn't seem to care about these claims of unfair sacking, they just did it anyhow! Could virgin do this??

vs_lhr

I wouldn't put it past them.

An office-based friend of mine was sacked last year because he was posting airline-related information on a website (ie, the specifics of which aircraft operated a particular route). Not withstanding the fact that much of this information is of public record, they treated it as discussing company confidential info. His feeling was that they used that as the excuse to get rid of him 'cos his manager didn't always see eye-to-eye with him. So I guess that means the Company will be ruthless when it needs to be; so strikers need to watch their back and ensure they're not caught doing anything at all which they could be pulled up on. Including posting company info on public websites. Ah... balls.

tin tin

Unfair dismissal

Lets suppose I am a really hardnosed airline owner/manager.

My crew are planning a strike that could cost me several million pounds per day??
As I’m a very, very hardnosed businessman I think I will take on the union and the law that supports them. Why? I don’t think I care about unfair dismissal claims when my business is being held to ransom by a divided and poorly organised minority who have an even poorer understanding of employment law.

What does the law say about unfair dismissal claims??

Statutory protection against unfair dismissal is given to employees with at least one year’s continuous employment. An Employment Tribunal has power to award compensation for unfair dismissal up to £56,800. Awards made by Employment Tribunals for the calculation of compensation are made up of the Basic award and the Compensatory Award.
Basic Award
For service below the age of 22 this is half a week’s pay for each year of service. For service between the ages of 22 and 40 inclusive one weeks pay for each year of service and for ages 41 to 65 one and a half week’s pay for each year of service. A week's pay is capped at £310 and the basic award is subject to a maximum of £9,300.
Compensatory Award
The maximum compensation is £60,600 except for discrimination cases where there is no maximum.
The Compensatory Award is intended to included compensation for:-
loss of earnings
employer’s pension contributions
loss of other benefits e.g. company car or any other perks.
An employee has a duty to mitigate his loss i.e. look for other work and failure to do so can result in a reduction of compensation. A Tribunal can also reduce the award to have regard to the employees contribution to his or her dismissal.

So, as my crew have backed me into a corner, If I just sack a group of the ringleaders or people who seem to be going sick regularly, have had a poor appraisal etc etc and I just accept that it will cost me nearly £1million or so, I will frighten the hell out of most of the strikers and make most of them come back to work pretty quickly, leaving an even smaller number of hardliners to be weeded out at my leisure, I will break the strike before it even started or at worst early into it and I have not incurred the cost of a fully established strike. Hmmm that will do for a start.

This is the real world!!!

If you don’t think this can’t happen….do your research, it can and it has.

scoobydooo

VS_LHR saying, "At the moment the strike vote is too weak", we really dont know what it is.

Regarding office based person sacked for posting info in the public domain, maybe they didn't have adequate union representation, I know I would challenge any such finding, especially if it could be proved the information was in the domain already (e.g. v-flyer), I would suggest said ex employee seeks legal advice.



tin tin, Interesting thoughts, in response;

If a number of union members were sacked for whatever reason the company made up (appraisals and performance monitoring would be hard unless someone had a poor history and I envisage they would no longer be with us anyway). It is more than likely it could be proved that these steps were taken against union members then it would be automatically unfair dismissal (less than 8 weeks) and clear discrimination against an employee for being a union member .


If discrimination was proved (wouldn't be hard mass culling of union represented employees) the claim for discrimination as your correctly stated is unlimited. Just as Balpa would I would imagine Unite (T&G and amicus) would go to town on them, the unions would make an example of any employer to show that an employer may not discriminate union workers (after all it would be attacking the very thing that both the unions are there to protect and it would also threaten their revenues i.e. what would be the point in being a member of a union if a company could do this), I imagine it would all be done on a very high profile basis too.


Damages awarded would not be limited and I imagine the mess would be far worse and detrimental to the company.


Furthermore if they did wield their axe in such a manner and aggressively unfairly dismiss any employee they could not selectively re-employee ANY of those individuals , all or nothing or automatically it would be further fodder for all individuals to claim unfair dismissal.


I imagine compensation would far exceed the value you have mentioned if such a blatant attack on UK employment laws rights was carried out and this paragraph which you failed to mention would be exercised propbably costing the company significantly source http://www.thompsons.law.co.uk/ltext/l1020001.htm

As to would they,who knows but a company that cant crew flights adequately now would be in trouble if they started culling more, reputation would soon turn to mud as services could not be carried out to the expected standard. and they would be sailing into very dangerous waters.
I'm no lawyer though.

vs_lhr

Scooby,

Without going into the full details of the case (not really my position to do so), the information posted was from the intranet; so by the same token, anyone quoting iFly on here, cc.com or v-flyer is revealing company confidential info publicly. There's nothing the union can do about it - it's a clear breach of contract and it can be used as a reason for dismissal.

Digitalis

I think Tin Tin's scenario is highly unlikely. Virgin might like to think of itself as hard-nosed in business, but it also likes to think of itself as a good and trustworthy employer. Right now, you might not feel the same way - but how much of your impression is fed by the actions of the Company, and how much by Galley FM? By all rational and demonstrable measures, Virgin is a fair employer with a good history of looking after its employees. Not perfect or flawless, but good. It won't be willing to lose that reputation for the sake of ridding itself of a few activists.

The straw-polls that others have posted here are backed up by my own research; around 50% or less back the idea of a strike (though far fewer have any idea what exactly a strike is intended to achieve). A small percentage of these genuinely want to bring the Company down and really don't care who they take with them. A larger percentage want to 'punish' the Company for some inept management over the last year or two, yet are happy to take the deal if it's still on the table after any strike. A large number of the potential strikers simply think 'it's the right thing to do', but are unable to explain their position any further.

A very significant number of those I spoke to say they would vote for a strike, but would work any good trips they had rostered during any strike action, and thought that that would be fine because they would have done their bit by voting for a strike! The overall impression I get is that, apart from a few hardliners - including those who want to sink the Company, any strike would be very poorly supported. The ramifications of that for the Union are very serious indeed; membership would significantly decline, and the Union's ability to influence future CC terms and conditions would be severely damaged. That would be a disaster for all employees in Virgin Atlantic.

Once again, I urge you to think very carefully about what you are about to do.

PS. On the subject of strike-breaking, teh company is able to mobilise a surprisingly large number of experienced ex-CC from other departments. Together with the non-union CC, and those who decided they simply couldn't afford to strike, it's likely that the Company could run the majority of its programme, albeit with reduced - but legal - crew numbers. Extra payments to work during the strike would probably not be necessary, but I believe they would be a legitimate tactic if the Company chose to use it - however, that's for the lawyers to argue over.

scoobydooo

Thanks for reply VS-LHR, my angle would be that as the information was already in the public domain as you mentioned. A case that the 'confidential information' he/she was alleged to have reproduced could of been reproduced form the public domain and not Ifly - hard to prove otherwise unless it was a a simple ifly cut n paste that's different.

e.g. v-flyer has most information any pax would want these days about routes, catering, a/c etc etc. As it's one of your friends might be worth mentioning to them.

Anyway moving on....

President Bush

Going on strike is a clear breach of contract and they can fire you for that,END OF. You would have no recourse. Oh,and going sick on a strike day will be considered as going on strike on a strike day,and therefore a sackable situation. The potential response to your action is unaffected by whether or not you hold union membership-VS have no idea which individuals are members and which are not.
You only have a legal right to strike,NOT a legal right to keep your job if-IF the company decide to fire you.Hasn't your union made that clear? If not,examine your legal position WITH THEM!

vs_lhr

President Bush (how nice of you to join us!),

I have to question your interpretation of the law on this one. You are right in saying that striking is a breach of contract, which means the company can take actions including withholding pay, but the law protects strikers from dismissal *during* the strike if the only reason they give is because the employee is on strike. If you are pulled up for some other reason, then that would be dealt with through the normal disciplinary procedures.

My understanding is that the company must wait a minimum of 12 weeks, and they must show that they have made reasonable efforts to negotiate with employees, and then if they want to dismiss strikers then they cannot discriminate and must dismiss *all* strikers (none of whom can be re-employed for a minimum of 3 months).

Now, there's some wiggle room in the interpretation of 'reasonable efforts to negotiate', since as Virgin have put multiple offers on the table and met with the union throughout the process, they could claim they have lived up to that side of the bargain. Whether they would pull the trigger and fire all strikers following the 12 week minimum period remains to be seen.

Virgin won't make it easy for strikers, but they will have to abide by employment law!

BlueTui

VS LHR is right



Bluetui
ex union rep

Digitalis

VS LHR is absolutely correct. For more information, see this BBC link and other pages linked to from it.

'President Bush' (interesting choice of name!) is being deliberately provocative and is intending to scare those of you unsure of your position. While I'm in no position to give any reassurances on behalf of the Company, it is extremely unlikely that the Company would attempt any retaliatory action against striking CC after or during the event, with the possible exception of those who agitate illegally against the Company or any individuals. All regular CC who simply follow a legal and mandated call for industrial action will be quite safe - though you will not be paid for any periods you are absent from work while striking (the Company has put out a clear guide to this). Your Union should give you the full guidance; I would be surprised if you haven't had it already - though, in this dispute, nothing your Union does (or doesn't do!) should surprise me!

If you are in any doubt, contact your Union directly. And don't take any notice of anonymous attempts at intimidation. It's ok to disagree, and it's ok to offer opinions and information, but intimidation is wrong. Ignore it.

vsgla

Why is everybody so annoyed with what the union has done. They only advise members on what they believe is the best decision. They don't force people to vote either way. Now that the majority have spoken they have to try to deliver what the majority want and at the moment that is a strike ballott.
In any industry i've worked in when the threat of strike came along i went out and did the research into what this means exactly, It wasn't upto the union to educate me, they had to assume that if i was happy to vote in favour of strike action then i must be aware of the consequenses. The union reps numbers are available to all members so if there is any confusion about what is happening then they are just a phone call away.

Also, the pilots are soon going to start negotiations for their own pay deal, does anyone know what they are likely to be looking for? Whatever it is if we don't see this through now they will get what extra we could have got. I'll bet the company find a nice pot of money when those guys come knocking if we don't stand firm.

vsgla

The problem we have here is that too many people are forgeting that our crew in the more senior ranks are vastly under payed how ever you look at it. Saying that, all of our crew are recieving much lower trip pay than most of our competators. I know that the company will argue that our business model is totally different to most of our competators but how long can we accept this arguement. Something has to change at some point and our crew have decided that that point is now. Whats wrong with that?
Our crew do the job to a high level with regard to safety and service hence the frequent awards, it's time the company stop relying on the good will of the staff they have and actually stump up for the commitment and loyalty shown by the crew over the past 22 years.
If it was my company i would have tried to get away with it for as long as possible too but i would also have had the foresight enough to realise that this was coming and maybe have had a contingency plan for this. How long would our pilots have put up with the conditions that put them way behind our comparators? They answered that in the last round of pay negotiations when they did what we are trying to do now so come on people, it's our crews turn to put themselves in a better position like you guys did. Back them up and we'll all be in a more satisfactory position.

As for where the money is going to come from. If it's not already in the company then it'll have to come from somewhere else around this vast empire, it seems all the other branches are using that resourse when needed. Well now it's needed in the cabin crew department. Take note Mr Branson