It does not take away the fact that the courts had to rule on a contractual point. They ruled in favour of BA, however.

I note that you made no comment about the content of the original post. So very British probably stems from colonial times.

Litebulbs - The court had to rule on the contract law issue because it was put forward by Unite! The High Court had no difficulty in (as expected) finding in favour of BA. Unite's appeal to the Court of Appeal on this issue is yet another complete waste of time and money. BASSA and Unite would do better to accept that they've learnt a hard lesson not to stonewall the company.

As someone who has been a manager involved in the removal of "perks" from employees in the past I'd like to make the following observation:

Perks are an employers method of demonstrating it's appreciation of "goodwill" from employees.

The employer reciprocates this "goodwill" by allowing easements or additions to the strict requirements of the working relationship.

The provision of these "perks" is not contractural and is subject to removal at the whim or choice or either party ....... for example, no-one is compelled to actually use staff travel concessions when flying !


I've been involved in the removal of some perks from some staff when they refused to flexibly work in a manner that was normally done but was beyond contractural requirements.

The perk was removed only for those staff who had refused to work flexibly and who made it clear they intended to continue with that approach.

They were informed that in doing so the company considered they were withdrawing their goodwill from the working relationship and so the company would not continue to allow them to benefit from the perks which were the return of that goodwill.


The employees and the union tried to claim that this action was breaking an unwritten contract and was also discrimination against those individuals.

They got nowhere on both of these claims.

It's my understanding that their legal advice was that:

"perks" are not contractural (sound familiar?)

if an individual or groups clearly act in a way which inconveniences or costs their employer then the employer is at liberty to withdraw it's goodwill (perks) from only those who have acted in such way.

It is not discrimination to continue offering perks to employees who continue to demonstrate their expression of goodwill towards the company.


In my case it was made clear to the group that the company would be prepared to return the perks, but only after a period of time when the company considered they had seen sufficient examples of goodwill being demonstrated.



To me it seems that BA have done the correct thing with staff travel, the strikers clearly have no intention/wish to give BA their "goodwill" ... the company should not (you could argue cannot!) reciprocate .....

Equally, once these staff return to work and have demonstrated their goodwill to the company then the perk gets returned.

Should they return to work but continue to "work to contract" then there would be no obligation for the company to return any perk as "goodwill" would clearly still not being demonstrated.

You may very well be right, but clearly there are questions being raised and answered about contractual obligations.

42psi
 

Looking at what you have said, it would appear that the people involved were carrying out unofficial action short of a strike, which could have all sorts of consequences, especially if flexible working was either an express or implied term of their contract.

Litebulbs

May I enquire as to whether you are are current BA staff?

No I am not.

This back and forth...and then back and forth discussion about staff travel can be interesting but there are a few absolutes in play.

Can BA remove Staff Travel from striking cabin crew members? Yes. The proof is in the fact that they have done so.

Was BASSA correct in telling their members that they would have Staff Travel back in "five minutes" if it was removed. No. My watch says they missed that call.

Will the removal of Staff Travel stand an examination of a Court hearing? No one knows because the only party that has an interest in such a hearing has failed and/or refused to bring an action forth on behalf of their members.

The fact that neither BASSA or Unite have done so should be of concern to those Cabin Crew who have lost staff travel due to their reliance upon their Unions' representations.

Any member deciding to participate in future IA should do so with the sure knowledge that BA can and will withdraw this perk and it will stay withdrawn for more than the "five minutes" BASSA represented.

Boxkite
 

This is a response from a Mod on the CC thread.

Diplome
 

Absolutely agree with all of your last post.

BA may receive notice of another strike ballot today.

Unite plans third holiday strike, blaming 'vindictive' British Airways | Business | The Guardian

I'm not sure that this is the best way of protecting their members as the issues are:

1. Use of Temporary Cabin Crew;

2. Disciplinary procedures against BASSA members;

3. Demand for return of full Staff Travel privileges.

Rather than demand that their members, following one lengthy round of strikes, undergo another with the associated loss of income, staff travel, etc., why isn't Unite/BASSA asking for a Court to rule regarding the use of temporary crew and staff travel?

Both issues could be heard on their merits without undue pain being felt by members.

As for the disciplinary procedures they have a built in appeals process that can be applied as needed.

It seems as if BASSA and Unite may have lost sight of the end goal, which is to GAIN THE BEST POSSIBLE RESULT FOR YOUR MEMBERSHIP AS A WHOLE. Rather than continuing to try to inflame the emotions of a militant minority with ancillary issues that can be solved in other arenas the priority for BASSA should be trying to gain back as much of the positives as possible that were contained in the initial offer of last year.

Diplome,

Rationally you are correct that BASSA should be looking after the best interest of all their members but that has not been the case for over a year now. What seems to be the driving motivation of this union is to maintain the power they have OVER their member's lives by maintaining their grip on the operational structure of BA IFCE.

Unfortunately since that lies at the heart of the dispute, I don't see any resolution is ever possible. You are completely correct that they are balloting over issues that should and could be litigated - except of course they would probably suffer the same defeats of previous court appearances.

Even a failed ballot won't resolve the issue because the union has vowed to wage guerilla war on the company.

TB

A very interesting post Baggersup and a point that has me baffled too. OK, so membership is decreasing and sits at 9811 today according to the BASSA website. But why is it decreasing so slowly? Why are these people hanging on in there and what do they honestly hope that BASSA could ever do for them in the future?

According to an article in the Guardian today, Unite will soon be balloting it's, "11,000 members." Am I correct in assuming then that the balance of 1189 are members of Cabin Crew 89?

If their members keep voting overwhelmingly in support of their ballots I think they would argue that they are doing just that.

Snas,

If BASSA had negotiated starting a year ago now, then the members would never had to vote on IA. That would have been looking out for their members.

TB

TrakBall
 

I’m not defending BASSA, far from it.

My point, perhaps clumsily expressed, is that it is the members that are equally responsible for dragging this lunacy out for they can put a stop to it at any time.

The above comments all, in my opinion, contain some very valid observations.

At the beginning of this saga I had significant sympathy for Cabin Crew regarding the conduct of their leadership. At this point I'm rather of the mind that at times "You get the leadership you deserve".

For all the rhetoric from BASSA regarding Mr. Walsh he is actually one of the few in a leadership position who has conducted himself appropriately. Disagreement may be had regarding his decisions, but he has made and enforced those decisions in a respectful and businesslike manner.

Unite and BASSA on the other hand have been a virtual cornucopia of missteps.

We have all observed the failure of the Unions to properly negotiate on their members' behalf, the botched ballot, Ms. Malone's inappropriate postings, pornographic websites, text messaging during meetings, use of the term "guerilla tactics", and a Public Relations approach that selected horrendous images and messages to be put out to the public.

Significant damage has been done to the Cabin Crew's reputation by their own advocates and it is met with silence by many of BASSA's members. If someone who had considerable control over my employment terms behaved in such a manner I would be livid...yet so many of them seem to accept it as a matter of course.

I know some may object to this observation but its almost as if there is a core "Chav" culture in BASSA where professionalism and results matter less than noise and talking rough. Fascinating.

BA should actually start requiring university graduation as an entry level qualification (Before you bite, I can think of at least one flag carrier that mandates this). We're always hearing, after all, that the job is more difficult than we think.

In the current climate, I'm sure they would find an ample supply of unemployed graduates gnashing at the bit for a job.

And people with a better education may be better placed to understand the external factors that affect the well-being of their employer.

...and as a timely example of how logic gets lost in the way of emotion Miss M posts this on the CC thread:



Reasoning like that used above is now why BASSA is forced to ballot over issues that ARE THE DIRECT RESULT OF THEIR OWN ACTIONS.