BA Strike - Your Thoughts & Questions II

[call100]

Originally Posted by JayPee28bpr

Very true. And perhaps worth adding why this is the case. The main reason why employers are so anti-porn is that somewhere around 90% of all malicious computer code/viruses etc is imported into commercial applications via porn-related access (either sites or links carried in emails). Staff sensitivity, and the potential costs therefrom, is actually less of the issue, though can have significant adverse reputational impact if not handled sensitively.

The use of porn, and the known impact it can have as noted above, is what moves this case from being "a bit silly" to "gross misconduct/bringing BA into disrepute". If all he'd done was put together a spoof site without the porn, I doubt he'd have been sacked.

I doubt BA are complaining though. They've now got rid of 2 senior reps, apparently 4 more are on "gross misconduct" disciplinaries, which means they are certainly in danger of dismissal, leaving just 3 senior reps. I'll bet that any of those on long term sick will soon be leaving too. In that case, BA will have achieved what Unite has been unwilling or unable to do, namely rein in its dysfunctional branch leadership.

I find it informative that "BASSA Admin" extrapolates the loss of such people with the demise of the Union. There are quotes elsewhere about "if this goes on then there will be no Union left" or some such wording, the clear implication being that the senior reps are the Union. In fact, even with a degree of leakage, BASSA still appears to have almost 10,000 members in BA, and will continue to exist in some form as and when most or all of the senior reps have been removed. The challenge for the 10,000, as well as for Unite I would suggest, is to find new reps who actually see Union representation as a bottom up process, ie research the members' views, collate, develop a consensual position for presentation to management, report back etc. The current crop see it as top down, with the membership there simply to provide "muscle" on behalf of the leadership. Not a very modern approach to representation I would suggest.

This is in fact how most reps work. There is far too much generalising by the unknowing on this thread. There are many companies out there, especially in Engineering, that are still existing because of close cooperation between union and employer.
Unite has become a vast Union representing millions across thousands of companies in hundreds of sectors. In the dark days ahead many are going to be glad they are around.
The BA situation has been largely manufactured by both sides as a test of strength. So much testosterone about that it had little chance of being settled amicably with a win win result.
Many reps looking on know that it could have been sorted long ago.......I've said it before and I'll say it again, both sides should grow up and have genuine talks....

[Litebulbs]

Originally Posted by MIDLGW

Litebulbs,
are you saying that unions are there to protect employees that don't behave in a professional manner, deliberately tries to ruin the reputation of their employer, thieving, bullying and/or a variety of other behaviours?

I did not say that at all. However, employees do get dismissed unfairly, but as has been pointed out in a few comments after yours, the employer is under no obligation to accept a reinstatement order. They would have to compensate however.

This is when a union would act, by possibly balloting for industrial action, where the cost of the action would be disproportionate to the cost of the dismissal and a business decision would be made. There would be no guarantees that a business would back down however. Then the individual members would base whether they would be prepared to loose money in support of the action, based on the evidence of the case in question.

This is different to what has happened at BA and the industrial action that has taken place, in my opinion. The business decision is that the short term cost is worth the long term saving.

[Ancient Observer]

3 points,
Dismissals
Diplome and snas are correct about dismissals. Like snas, I've held that sort of accountability. As an individual, I don't "enjoy" firing folk, but when you've got to, you just do it. ( it is commonly known as jfdi). BA appear far more tolerant of bad behaviour than other private sector Co.s. They should have behaved this way years ago - for example when dealing (or not in BA's case) with BA CC absence levels.
TU co-operation.
Unite and its constituent parts are perfectly capable of co-operating with employers. Go ask the majors in the Pharms sector, who have "lost" thousands of jobs represented by Unite in the last 3 years. Yup, thousands. All with complete TU co-operation.

The next strike - if there is one.

I have a vested interest here - I'm flying l/h with BA in late September. Would the strikers please ensure that they are on strike in late September? I have no desire to be on the same plane as the bassamentalists. Thank you.

[MCOflyer]

Ancient Observer

I agree with you completely. I am booked ATL-EDI on 11 August.

[Lou Scannon]

Sorry, but I need the BASSA "leaders" to be on strike when I fly BA at the end of August.

Come to think of it: that's probably wishful thinking. They seem to have avoided any such risk in the past and left it to the BASSA rabbits to take the action and the can.

[Colonel White]

The BA situation has been largely manufactured by both sides as a test of strength. So much testosterone about that it had little chance of being settled amicably with a win win result.

Sorry to have to disagree with you on this one. Unite represent over half the BA workforce. Oddly enough the only unionised group of workers who have failed to reach an agreement with BA management over headcount reductions andcost cutting have been cabin crew. GMB and Unite members covering the ground staff have been able to come to arrangements. BALPA have, Heavens Unite actually circumvented the BASSA and Amicus folk when they struck the deal on the pension proposals last year. That says to me that whilst it is a battle of wills, it is about who manages the cabin crew community, the union or BA management. The union people have been so used to BA management backing down that they can't work out what to do when the company says 'no'. This disoute ws never going to have a win/win conclusion because the union side couldn't agree amongst themselves what they wanted and gave a flat refusal to any suggestions. Negotiation requires dialogue, something BASSA seem incapable of.

[call100]

Originally Posted by Colonel White

Sorry to have to disagree with you on this one. Unite represent over half the BA workforce. Oddly enough the only unionised group of workers who have failed to reach an agreement with BA management over headcount reductions andcost cutting have been cabin crew. GMB and Unite members covering the ground staff have been able to come to arrangements. BALPA have, Heavens Unite actually circumvented the BASSA and Amicus folk when they struck the deal on the pension proposals last year. That says to me that whilst it is a battle of wills, it is about who manages the cabin crew community, the union or BA management. The union people have been so used to BA management backing down that they can't work out what to do when the company says 'no'. This disoute ws never going to have a win/win conclusion because the union side couldn't agree amongst themselves what they wanted and gave a flat refusal to any suggestions. Negotiation requires dialogue, something BASSA seem incapable of.

We will have to agree to disagree on your point...Both sides have behaved badly at the negotiating table. Once it moved from the negotiating table to the front pages of the daily rags it was doomed. The discussions became polarised with nothing on common ground to move with. Both sides have been incapable of dialogue. I do not consider BA's statements to be akin to dialogue any more than the statements of BASSA.

[Litebulbs]

Call100

Great post.

One question to the guests and investors of BA. What is more offensive, scab or bassamentalist? I ask the question because, just say, an employee said BAmentalist on facebook. Would that be bringing the company's into disrepute and therefore seen as a gross misconduct issue worthy of dismissal?

[Hotel Mode]

Litebulbs: not so much the devils advocate, more his entire legal team!

I don't believe BA would dismiss anyone for such a remark. A verbal warning maybe. The dismissed have all done far far worse that that. Bringing your employer into disrepute isn't exactly the same offence as bringing someone elses union into disrepute. BASSA could expel a member who used that terminology couldn't they?

[ChicoG]

Many reps looking on know that it could have been sorted long ago.......I've said it before and I'll say it again, both sides should grow up and have genuine talks....

I think BA have made every effort to engage in meaningful discussions, but they could not sit around and wait for BASSA to "grow up" as you put it. They were haemorrhaging cash and needed to make cost cuts.

If BASSA had played ball to start with, the current situation would not exist.

They want to return things to the way they were. BA do not want to, and they are correct.

The only people that need to group up here are the BASSA reps that have lead their staff so poorly.

If, as you say, there are reps who feel this could have been sorted out a long time ago, they should communicate that fact to their fellow members and try and oust the idiots that have made so many pathetic mistakes in their desperate attempts at clinging on to power (and, lest we forget, their share of the members' subscriptions).

[JayPee28bpr]

Litebulbs #649

What is more offensive, scab or bassamentalist?

I think you're missing the point. Nobody in the investment community cares. The point of making an investment is primarily to make money. Any activity by the company has to be viewed simply in terms of whether it adds to sustainable (ie long term) profitability. Name calling amongst the staff is irrelevant. It isn't going to have a material impact on profits long term. Those that insist on doing it will get managed out of the business one way or another eventually, though if it really is just one person calling someone a scab and another calling someone a BASSAmentalist, I suspect most outsiders would just tell both to grow up.

In terms of the current dispute, the real issue from an investment perspective is, and always has been, is BA a good enough long term risk to warrant financing their fleet renewal needs? What has been lost in all the minutiae of the last 12 months is that there is more to BA than the cabin crew bubble. BA has an old, gas guzzling fleet which, with oil now at $75-ish and rising, versus sub-$30 and steady a few years ago, is now a very painful problem that needs addressing. However, nobody is going to finance resolving that problem if BA has more expensive and less flexible crew (flight and cabin) than its competitors. Investors want comfort that sufficient cash flow will be derived in order to pay them back. Cutting flight operating costs via reductions in cabin crew staff numbers and more flexible use thereof is key to delivering better cash flow.

What your fellow reps in Unite/BASSA simply fail to comprehend is that there are many other stakeholders in BA's business who all believe they have a legitimate claim on the business. BA does not exist to meet the needs of just its staff. Staff are a key stakeholder (or holders if you want to break down by function). They are not the reason the business exists though. At some point the bulk of BASSA's members will realise this fact. Unfortunately it appears many will have unnecessarily paid a considerable price to be taught this lesson.

[fincastle84]

Hardly a ringing endorsement

67% of those who voted have rejected the pay offer but it looks as though the turn out was extremely low. 3,419 in favour of rejection, 1686 against. Hardly massive support for a strike ballot! I thought that they had nearly 10,000 members.

What now?

[Ruthanne]

Hopefully, 100% flight operation in any potential strike action as quoted by Mr Walsh recently, I took him at his word, and booked LH flights in October, please let him be right, couldnt stand the will we fly or won't we fly again!!

[Diplome]

As reported on the Cabin Crew thread:

3449 voted no to reject the offer
1686 voted to accept

circa 12600 cabin crew in total

Lots of different messages can be read into those results. Interesting.

[notlangley]

BBC says 3419 voted no
BBC says 11,000 of cabin crew are members of Unite

[Swissflyer]

Not being a labour lawyer, my assumption is that given only about 5200 of 12000 known CC are accounted for in the Unite vote, the remainder, or at least a majority of the remainder will have accepted the offer made to them as self-declared non-unionised employees by BA.

If this is the case, then surely they are contracted under the new terms and conditions and unlikely to support any strike action. Or... in this shifting sandbox, am I missing something?

[Jarvy]

So bassa spin will say 67% rejected the offer so will go ahead with strike ballot.

[Diplome]

Jarvy:

I'm not so sure that Unite will immediately go for a strike vote.

Those numbers (their weakest so far) will not sustain an effective industrial action. Observing BA's growing ability to increase operations during each of the previous IA's and their expectation to fly 100% of their long haul operation during any subsequent action I am not so sure that Unite is going to be anxious to ballot.

BASSA of course could very well be an example of "Fools rush in where Angels fear to tread".

[ExecClubPax]

As of today, BASSA's declared membership was 9757. So the vote suggests 65% of its members either voted for the offer or tacitly accepted it by abstaining.

Given there is something like 12000+ cabin crew, some 3000 of so were free to take BA's offer on an individual basis. Whereas I doubt BA will declare the numbers of non union crew accepting the offer, it's apparent some 9342 cabin crew are on the other end of the balance leaving only 3419 in BASSA's corner.

It says something for a Union that so many of its own members have failed to support it. I guess those who abstained can truthfully say to their militant colleagues "I didn't vote for the offer".

Oh, I've just seen the post from BASSA's duty apologist on the crew forum. It appears the reason for the low turnout was because members got their ballot papers to late to submit them. Oh, so that's another BASSA admin fiasco then.

[ninja-lewis]

I understand that BA couldn't be seen to be inducing union members to leave the union hence telling crew that only non-members were eligible. But could a union member sign and accept the offer anyway? In other words do BA only need to be seen to not to be offering an inducement or can union members not accept it at all (possibly because they've handed that responsibility to the union on their behalf)?