BA Cabin Crew Strike Threat

[Rainboe]

Because this is the old time Socialists of the TGWU who are fighting a far larger battle than people realise. It is for control of who really runs BA in the run-up to moving to Terminal 5. Quite simply they do not want 'a settlement'. Like Napoleon leading his army against the Brits at Waterloo, the TGWU is sending in early a regiment (BASSA) to try and blunt a front of Wellington's army (BA) in to soften it up before the real cavalry charge comes. That will be when the spiteful groundstaff battle commences, and really shuts down the airline later this, or next, year. The TGWU has no interest in settling this- it's really just part of a wider strategy of, and make no mistake on this, who controls BA. It's been the ground unions up to now. Meanwhile, shame about the troops in the first wave of the attack, they're going to get hammered, but that's the price you pay for war. There is still a lot of fighting to come by the heavies. BA will win this one, but the next ones won't be so easy.

[Flying Lawyer]

Entirely speculation but, since you ask -

It's possible that Bassa fears the consequences of having its demands, and arguments in support of those demands, exposed to close examination by an independent and experienced body such as ACAS.

The leaders may feel they'll achieve more by force (striking or threatening to strike) because that doesn't require having to justify demands as reasonable.

It may or may not be significant but, despite numerous requests in the course of almost 800 posts, even the most active and enthusiastic posters on the Bassa side have steadfastly declined to be drawn into a discussion of the specifics.

Rhetoric is all very well in this sort of debate and, of course, can be an extremely effective device to whip up large crowds, but arbitrators aren't influenced by rhetoric: They consider facts and reasoned arguments.

[SNasty]

Originally Posted by Rainboe

[snip]Meanwhile, shame about the troops in the first wave of the attack, they're going to get hammered, but that's the price you pay for war. There is still a lot of fighting to come by the heavies. BA will win this one, but the next ones won't be so easy.

They used to refer to the first wave as the Forlorne Hope.... Apt eh...

[Andy_S]

It's interesting that there's been no word yet on last nights talks. One would have thought that if they'd broken up without any progress being made that the finger pointing and mutual recrimination would have started pretty quickly.

If Tony Woodley feels obliged to consult with the BASSA reps before saying anything publicly, maybe he feels there's a face saving deal on offer?

[Ancient Observer]

Outcomes?

What is the current betting within BA about
1/ The future of lhr and lgw based S/H routes after a strike?
Basically, BA do not want many of them. When BMed fails, Bishop will have both BMed and BA S/H slots.

2/ The salary of the top BASSA official, which is rumoured to be the highest in the T&G?
The T & G want to "merge" BASSA in to the T&G

3/ The 2007 BA CC sickness rate coming down to the UK norm of 4 days? (The norm is 7 days only if you include all blue-collar jobs such as cleaners. For white collar jobs it is 4 days.)

Has anyone noticed the cash that BA is currently carrying in its balance sheet? Quite enough to take this series of strikes, and the planned series of strikes by ground staff in the fit for 5 campaign.

thanks
a (currently ex-) customer, or, nowadays, SLF.

[lord mash]

Well i am glad the BA CC are making a stand whether or not you think the issues they are striking over are minor your entitled to your opinions.

What i really want to see raised by the media is the even worse terms and conditions cabin crew from other airlines work under.
BA is considered to be among the very best T&C, the rest of us are under even more pressure.eg bullying over sick days, pressure to work even more sectors when tired out, lack of meals, nowhere to sit on a 12 hour shift and doing another 12 hour shift the following day for up to 6/7 days on etc etc and not talkng about long haul here either, cant afford to pay anything into a pension scheme. - Trouble is its all being presented in the media as another problem for BA please somebody reading this in the press take a look at how we have to do our jobs and the terms and conditions we do it under and please no smart replies about if you dont like it get out. We love working but why should we have to accept the worst T&C in order to do that? Tthis is 2007 i dont think we have progressed so much from the the 19 century sometimes. Wake up everyone in order to pay £50 to fly somewhere on holiday the cabin crew will be working for about £1.70ph in some cases for 6/7 days on and minimum rest and no control over their working week whatsoever. Forget the trolly dolly programmes on TV and Airline even animals get better treatment then some cabin crews. If BA crews get a result it should have a knock on effect down the industry line so dont giveup guys please!

[bosshogg]

lord mash.

How do you conclude that quote - You have to accept the worst T&C's.

Do you not accept that many people across the UK have to work under worse T&C's than your goodself?

Do you not accept that many people across the UK manage to carry out their employment without the need for such ridiculous sick leave levels?

I note a previous comment that tried to justify these sick leave figures by pointing out the number of people (Possibly sick) that CC come into contact with... come on please.. what would teachers, nurses, shop assistants, in fact anyone in a service/retail industry have to say about that?

I have no affiliation to BA whatsoever but I agree there are for more sinister undertones to this proposed strike and BA CC are not likely to get much sympathy from the paying public.

[CEJM]

@Lord Mash,

Originally Posted by lord mash

Wake up everyone in order to pay £50 to fly somewhere on holiday the cabin crew will be working for about £1.70ph in some cases for 6/7 days on and minimum rest and no control over their working week whatsoever. !

the minimum wage in the UK is £5.35ph so you can't excactly say that the crew are working for £1.70ph. If that would be the case you have a very strong case against your company when demanding a pay rise.

You don't want any smart comments. the following is not a smart comment but the thruth.

When you signed your eployment contract you knew what your payslip would look like. There is no point in complaining about it after you signed your contract. There is a way in solving this issue and that is that nobody accepts such a working practise. If the company's at the lower end can't get any staff because they don't pay enough they have to increase the pay. Because without staff no airline. But if you increase it to much and the airline is not competitive anymore than they won't need any staff because they have no passengers.

You say you love your job. Why don't you apply to BA? Work for a 'better' company and receive more pay.

[oojamaflip]

I have to say that I think BASSA is letting down it's membership by allowing itself to be taken apart by BA in the PR battle.

Figures like 22 sick days per year have become public (despite the fact that the figure is 12 days) and have not been robustly challenged. One point that has been raised is that maternity leave is included in the figures. Despite what was mentioned in an earlier post, not all pregnant cabin crew work in ground duties. Once crew know they are pregnant, they can no longer fly and if they live a certain distance away from LHR (think it's 50 miles - not sure), they are not liable for ground duties. A rough calculation of 180 days from announcing pregnancy to birth and knocking off the 6 days a lady may have been sick in that period, one person can add 174 days to the annual stats before a baby is even born. If BA at 12 days p.a. is 4 days over the industry average, one pregnancy can explain that discrepancy for over 40 people. BASSA should have figures like that at it's fingertips to counter what BA is putting out.

Considering how long this strike has been building, I can't believe they are so poorly prepared - BASSA look like rank amateurs, out of their depth and now just looking for a way to save face.

[Artificial Horizon]

what a complete load of absolute tosh!!!! Working for £1.70 per hour, ha ha ha ha. I suspect the £1.70 per hour being refered to is the duty pay, so they get a basic pay + duty pay + allowances + CAT payments (if any). That would be like me ignoring my good basic pay and say that I fly airliners for £2.10 per hour which is my duty pay, oh poor me, never knew I had it so bad!!!

BA cabin crew are masters of signing contracts and then complaining about them later on. 1997 payscale were agreed to, cc signed up to this and now that they are at the top of the payscale it is all of a sudden not good enough. Sickness policy was agreed by the union and each crew member was paid a good amount of money for agreeing to it and now that it is stopping crew taking the p*ss it is not good enough. The new pension deal was agreed with the company with the TGWU present at the meeting and now all of a sudden it is not good enough!!!

[PaulW]

No one has agreed to accept the pension deal. BA reported that four of the unions left the meeting recommending their member to accept the deal, which is entirely different.
At work the flight crew have gone very quiet and look very sheepish when you mention pensions, because they have got a great deal, which is different to the blanket deal to everyone else. Pilots put 15% percent of the total contributions into NAPS and remove 33%. It is typical that as soon as they are happy they start criticizing other departments who also wish to defend eroding terms and conditions. Good luck to the cabin crew, as with everything out their there is media battle going on, and there are a lot of misinformed people out there. Whats wrong with having the best terms and conditions in the industry? why are they the best? because they have defended them, whilst others havent whether they wanted to or not. I bet you wouldnt mind the same conditions too in your company if you could have them. Just imagine what the flight crew community in BAs terms and conditions would be if they weren't represented by BALPA....a lot worse.
What ever their dispute witht the company and whether you agree with it or not, they have the right to stand up for their position. If you work for BA in any department you will be aware of the BULLY BOY tactics from the managers who enforce poilicies without consultation of the workforce whether they work or not, and do not accept any feedback given.

[411A]

Does anyone really care...

...whether the big airways CC walk, or not?
Flights are cancelled, sensible folks have long since booked with another carrier, and the CC have decided to walk in the least busy season, which I expect they perhaps thought would be more painful, but clearly it will not.
BA management will, one way or the other, find a way to get what they want, and the CC will be on the short end, eventually.
BA reputation, as a reliable carrier and a market brand in general, will suffer, and this leaves the cometitors licking their chops at the prospect of slicing another layer off of BA's already tarnished hide.

Sir Freddie Laker would be laughing from his grave, and certainly Sir Richard B. will be laughing at this whole sorry circus from his club.
And, so he should.
BA have once again shot themselves in the foot.

It really is quite amusing, when you think about it.

[52049er]

PaulW - can I just ask where your figures of 15% in, 33% out come from?

The only reason I ask is because they are wrong. No group takes out more than it (+ the company's contributions) pays in. IIRC, flight crew pay in 28% and take out 27.6%.

Your figures are probably ignoring the company contribution, in which case using the same maths, engineers (which you are 1 I see) would also tske out twice what they put in.

Please dont just listen to your union. I've spent the last 3 trips explaining to CC where our £9m 'bribe' came from. To a man/woman they have all looked appalled at the lies their union has told them.

(For those that dont know, we added the money to the pot by passing up the offer of phasing in our 10 year increase to our retirement age. So the company saved £9m from FC, and £6m from CC and added it to the pot. Not quite what you have been told I expect.)

[Dave Gittins]

Am in general agreement, that this does nothing for BAs brand which has already been pretty diminished by a reputation for worse service than most, the last series of strikes, check in staff, ground staff, Gate Gourmet etc and by the lost luggage debacle and a few other things.

If I was in competition I would indeed be splitting my sides.

My only problem is that flying to Denver next month, (to see a new granddaughter) BA are the only people that do it direct from LHR without me having to languish for hours in NY, Chicago, Orlando or somewhere I don't want to be.

If my trip does get mucked up though ... it's something I shall be prepared to put up with next time !!!!

DGG

[M.Mouse]

No one has agreed to accept the pension deal. BA reported that four of the unions left the meeting recommending their member to accept the deal, which is entirely different.

BASSA deliberately avoided attending the 4th January final pension negotiation meeting despite being given notice of it on 22nd December. Nothing to do with the fact that they wanted to claim to have been excluded and that a pension solution was being imposed to bolster the chances of a resounding 'Yes' vote a few days before the end of their polling?

At work the flight crew have gone very quiet and look very sheepish when you mention pensions, because they have got a great deal, which is different to the blanket deal to everyone else. Pilots put 15% percent of the total contributions into NAPS and remove 33%. It is typical that as soon as they are happy they start criticizing other departments who also wish to defend eroding terms and conditions.

Amazed that a pilot would not put you straight when you mention pensions. The overwhelming majority of pilots took great care to understand and analyse the pensions issues and could therefore dispel your mischievous and incorrect claim that we 'put 15% percent [sic] of the total contributions into NAPS and remove 30%'. I would love to see your calculations for that piece of misinformation.

BASSA are not defending eroding Ts & Cs they are trying to gain improvements which would cost BA around £37m p.a. on the back of an ill - conceived and poorly timed ballot for strike action which was orchestrated by propogating blatant half-truths and, at times outright lies.

If anybody in BASSA truly believes that their leaders are diligently looking after crew's interests ask them how they plan to use the £6m lump sum allocated to CC after the 5 year transition period has elapsed.

[jumbojet]

"Whats wrong with having the best terms & conditions in the industry?"

NOTHING!

But understand this, the industry (& the world) has changed.

The low cost crocadile is smiling in the corner, while he negotiates Atlantic long haul.

As an ex BA employee, I warn you to grow up & face reality, before you face the music!

[Digitalis]

I am very much afraid that this dispute is ill-founded and has little hope of a successful conclusion for BASSA. The causes of the dispute and the aims of the resulting industrial action are ill-defined by BASSA and appear to be poorly understood by BASSA's membership. As a result, BASA has done an extremely poor job of preparing the public for this confrontation, and has made some grave PR and negotiation errors in its handling of the dispute.

The result is that public opinion - even inside the industry - is moving from unsympathetic to positively hostile towards BASSA. Unfortunately, the general public will not differentiate between BASSA and BA Cabin Crew in general, and the fallout is likely to last for some time. There are plenty of people out there who remember the 1997 action and still regard BA CC poorly from that occasion.

If BASSA is to salvage anything from this, it needs to redefine its points of dispute and its aims, and should agree to ACAS being brought in. It also needs to do a bloody sight better job than it has of explaining to the public the causes of the obvious bad feeling within the BA CC community, and it will need to explain why it feels that its confrontational approach to resolving these issues needs to be so different from the less combative approach of the other unions involved. However, I feel it may already be too late.

As others have suggested, I get the feeling that the defeat BASSA will suffer at the hands of Willie Walsh will be devastating for BASSA's standing with their CC, and that far from improving things for BA CC, the result will be an imposition of non-negotiable and less-favourable Ts&Cs - and a mass defection to CC89.

[overstress]

The low cost crocadile (sic) is smiling in the corner, while he negotiates Atlantic long haul.

Well let the crocodile try and make money at it - it won't work without premium traffic, IMHO

[Choxolate]

Originally Posted by overstress

Well let the crocodile try and make money at it - it won't work without premium traffic, IMHO

I seem to remember the same argument was used for short haul some years ago. Ignore the lo-cost boys at your peril.

[jethrobee]

This years strike is for me the straw that breaks the camels back, I always use BA much to the dislike of my companies accountant!!! My gold card will expire this year because I cant risk not getting to Kuwait during the strike. It annoyed me when they raised the points, but I have comfortably made it for the last 5 years. This year I am literally this one trip away, so im going to post it back to WW.
Ironically, I have had to write an legal letter to book with another airline since my contract states BA flights. Oh well, lets hope Kuwait Airways offers a nice Business Class Service.
I would just like to thank the BA CC who have looked after me in the past, I hope the issue gets resolved without bankrupting the airline.