IAG: BA restructuring may cost 12,000 jobs
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The law
We have age discrimination laws in all modern democracies, it cannot happen unless airlines are willing to pay billions of £ in compensation. They have no chance to succeed.
Law is introduced by legislators to control the action of decision makers and avoid abuse in the interest of the public.
JRS is a scheme introduced to avoid abuse e.g. no Company should try to restructure during this temporary crisis, it would be highly unethical to restructure during JRS which is a scheme funded by the tax payers to save jobs until the crisis is over. Full stop. This was the intention behind JRS and BA is clearly ignoring the law hence this is an illegal and unethical act. The damage on staff morale and engagement is immense, I predict that the existing Senior Leadership will be removed, either by the Government or the workforce. Probably the Government will have to introduce and then use special powers if the BA Leadership will continue to refuse to attend very important meetings with the Transport Committee re. JRS and BA restructuring.
Law is introduced by legislators to control the action of decision makers and avoid abuse in the interest of the public.
JRS is a scheme introduced to avoid abuse e.g. no Company should try to restructure during this temporary crisis, it would be highly unethical to restructure during JRS which is a scheme funded by the tax payers to save jobs until the crisis is over. Full stop. This was the intention behind JRS and BA is clearly ignoring the law hence this is an illegal and unethical act. The damage on staff morale and engagement is immense, I predict that the existing Senior Leadership will be removed, either by the Government or the workforce. Probably the Government will have to introduce and then use special powers if the BA Leadership will continue to refuse to attend very important meetings with the Transport Committee re. JRS and BA restructuring.
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In VA they conveniently forgot to raise the maximum age for a conversion course to a new type from 57 to 62 when the maximum retirement age was raised from 60 to 65...this gave them a 8 year window to tell all the older B744 pilots to go gardening.
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Try lodging an age discrimination grievance against your airline...punishment rosters eventually leading to some form of contrived disciplinary and possibly loss of job.
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can I ask your motive for posting this hypothesis?
Putting aside the moral, legal and reasonable arguments it would fall at the first pragmatic hurdle.
sack all your over 50s and there are v few captains left to sign the tech logs on the LH fleets. Train the SH capts to LH I hear you say but you’ve just sacked a large proportion of your TCs.
I would suggest any BA/IAG manager who voiced that idea should and probably would be for the “ chop” as you so endearingly put it.
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Many MPs have written to Alex Cruz and Willie Walsh for an explanation, MPs from all parties which is unprecedented.
At the present time no answer and no intention to meet Government reps or attend critical meetings by both leaders (e.g. the very important meeting, happening next week, with the Parliamentary Travel Committee, still ignored by BA).
During this crisis JRS must be applied and this will be extended as the Chancellor explained many times.
After the Crisis has ended will be a different story however Governments will still assist those sectors that will continue to struggle, e.g. aviation will very likely struggle for longer hence Governments' involvement will be unavoidable all across the world.
Due to the critical importance of a national carrier (in each country, not just the UK) I do not see any other solution rather than nationalization of BA in the long term. Even if BA will have to reduce in size one day, any restructuring, if handled by the UK government rather than millionaires CEOs, will be done in a much more gradual and fair way and only introduced once 100% proven by the data on air travel, data that must go beyond the short term forecasts which can be inaccurate anyway, a massive staff reduction plan is possibly avoidable if a long term perspective is adopted and only a government can adopt this "non greedy" approach.
At the present time no answer and no intention to meet Government reps or attend critical meetings by both leaders (e.g. the very important meeting, happening next week, with the Parliamentary Travel Committee, still ignored by BA).
During this crisis JRS must be applied and this will be extended as the Chancellor explained many times.
After the Crisis has ended will be a different story however Governments will still assist those sectors that will continue to struggle, e.g. aviation will very likely struggle for longer hence Governments' involvement will be unavoidable all across the world.
Due to the critical importance of a national carrier (in each country, not just the UK) I do not see any other solution rather than nationalization of BA in the long term. Even if BA will have to reduce in size one day, any restructuring, if handled by the UK government rather than millionaires CEOs, will be done in a much more gradual and fair way and only introduced once 100% proven by the data on air travel, data that must go beyond the short term forecasts which can be inaccurate anyway, a massive staff reduction plan is possibly avoidable if a long term perspective is adopted and only a government can adopt this "non greedy" approach.
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Spot on. The moment they put us at risk they invalidated our agreement with them. We should now be receiving full pay, I’d like an answer to this too.
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Illegal action
See below from somebody who started the petition, I strongly agree with him re. BA setting a very dangerous precedent for the entire nation:
"
PETITION UPDATE
Its just goes from bad to worse
I wanted to thank all of you for the love and support you have shown all the British Airways workers here in the UK. I am totally blown away by how this has been picked up by you all. You are all heroes to those preparing to go to war with these corporate tyrants.
On a more personal note, BA's actions to me have massive ramifications for all of us here in the UK especially at this time of uncertainty. In a statement this week the Unite union and BALPA pilots union have their suspicion that British Airways is using the Corona-crisis as an excuse to rehire workers on low-paid so-called ‘zero hour’ contracts with no formal employment rights. This is as they get rid of over 12,000 staff. Reading this truly sickens me to the pit of my stomach to think someone has actually sat down and thought this up just to make money.
I can also confirm that the options given to staff (in laymens terms) are to take the new employment contract or your employment will be terminated simple as that.
This is not just a BA situation, this is a massive problem for every worker here in the UK. Think about it, if BA succeeds in this despicable course of action, it means any organisation with the same lack of morals and common decency like BA can take our Taxpayers money to cover costs then twist the employment law in their favor to rob you of any benefits and hire or fire you at whim. I can't help but feel that others are watching this and thinking this is a great strategy to make money from a global tragedy.
So my ask is simple please share this petition as much as you can. As the UNITED KINGDOM we all have a duty to tell this conglomerate of mercenaries that even in the worst of times we are one country standing shoulder to shoulder with one voice and we all simply say NO THANKS.
Be safe everyone we will all get through this as one nation.
Steve
PS More to follow "
Original link:
https://www.change.org/p/boris-johns...act/u/26532231
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But BA pilots are not part of the job retention scheme/furloughed. Only cabin crew (et al) are on the job retention scheme. The two entities are being treated differently.
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Irrelevant that pilots have not been furloughed as BA is taking millions of pounds from the JRS to pay the rest of the company therefore their plan remains technically illegal during JRS and the Transport Committee will stop it.
The UK Government is taking this issue very seriously as BA action could trigger an extremely dangerous chain reaction across many other companies, BA will be stopped by the Government whatever it takes. Unions' existence is also at stake here so this is an historical moment for the future of the UK economy and its workforce.
If Willie Walsh and Alex Cruz genuinely believe that BA will be losing money after the COVID19 crisis will end, then they are very welcome to transfer ownership back to the UK Government which would be extremely happy to take over BA with its long term profitability.
Last edited by ILS27LEFT; 3rd May 2020 at 12:45.
Irrelevant that pilots have not been furloughed as BA is taking millions of pounds from the JRS to pay the rest of the company therefore their plan remains technically illegal during JRS and the Transport Committee will stop it.
The UK Government is taking this issue very seriously as BA action could trigger an extremely dangerous chain reaction across many other companies, BA will be stopped by the Government whatever it takes. Unions' existence is also at stake here so this is an historical moment for the future of the UK economy and its workforce.
If Willie Walsh and Alex Cruz genuinely believe that BA will be losing money after the COVID19 crisis will end, then they are very welcome to transfer ownership back to the UK Government which would extremely happy to take over BA with its long term profitability.
The UK Government is taking this issue very seriously as BA action could trigger an extremely dangerous chain reaction across many other companies, BA will be stopped by the Government whatever it takes. Unions' existence is also at stake here so this is an historical moment for the future of the UK economy and its workforce.
If Willie Walsh and Alex Cruz genuinely believe that BA will be losing money after the COVID19 crisis will end, then they are very welcome to transfer ownership back to the UK Government which would extremely happy to take over BA with its long term profitability.
Er, that is unsubstantiated gobbledegook.
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The UK Government is taking this issue very seriously as BA action could trigger an extremely dangerous chain reaction across many other companies, BA will be stopped by the Government whatever it takes. Unions' existence is also at stake here so this is an historical moment for the future of the UK economy and its workforce.
If Willie Walsh and Alex Cruz genuinely believe that BA will be losing money after the COVID19 crisis will end, then they are very welcome to transfer ownership back to the UK Government which would be extremely happy to take over BA with its long term profitability.
If Willie Walsh and Alex Cruz genuinely believe that BA will be losing money after the COVID19 crisis will end, then they are very welcome to transfer ownership back to the UK Government which would be extremely happy to take over BA with its long term profitability.
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A semi-outsider's perspective if I may...
It's clear even to the casual observer that BA's threats are an opportunistic attempt to dramatically worsen T's&C's across the board. They're banking on this working because:
1. The unions are pretty powerless in these circumstances - striking would be a minor inconvenience to BA at worst
2. The public, and politicians, are distracted and they won't face the strength of scrutiny that they might usually do if they attempted something like this
Frankly, there's little anyone can do about point 1 until there is a major recovery in air travel demand. In other words, the war (and I would take BA's letter as a declaration of war!) will be won or lost by the ability to get public and political support.
BA's one weakness here is that given a long enough downturn, they will require government support of some kind (above and beyond the furlough scheme). In fact, IAG have already blinked slightly and weakened their position by accepting the spanish government loan, highlighting their hypocrisy to the more observant MPs.
Government support will come with conditions, which may be the only route to protecting jobs and conditions, so it's crucial to have MPs advocating your side of the argument at that stage.
Direct appeals to MPs are definitely worthwhile - I'll be sending a letter myself in support - but in order to have any chance of a successful outcome, you'll need to win the support of the media and public in general. Pressure from the media in particular is probably the most powerful influence on today's politicians. Here's where you need to be very careful - pilots, BA pilots in particular, are not the easiest group for the 'man on the street' to sympathise with. Don't shoot me! IMO the responsibility and technical demands of the job justify the salary, not to mention the training costs and nasty hours. However, compared to many other careers which involve high levels of responsibility, academic ability and lengthy training (e.g. Engineering, Medicine, etc.), you have an objectively good deal. Again, that's not a criticism - well done for protecting it better than many industries - but it does mean that in order to appeal to the public sentiment, some humility is required. I'm not sure the whole 'home counties' soliloquy is quite going to hit the right notes!
I'd suggest the following might be constructive:
1. A very public offer from the unions of dramatically reduced salary (50%+?) & part time arrangements for perhaps 6 months in return for no forced redundancy. If BA's real motivation was to reduce staff costs to get through the crisis (it's obviously not!!), this would solve their problem. OTOH, their refusal of this offer would confirm beyond any doubt their nefarious motives. A big price to pay on the off chance they did accept but nothing compared to the job losses & T&C decimation suggested
2. Unity within the BA pilot community - bickering about who is being more selfish by keeping their job isn't going to help anyone - you're all getting rodgered at this rate!
3. Working with other departments - don't forget that CC, Engineering and others are going through the same as you at this point. I know the relationship has been a little acrimonious at times, but you're in this together, and will only be able to get out of it together. CC in particular may be a useful ally - their plight might be an easier sell to the tabloids.
4. Work with the rest of the industry - Somewhat ironically, it may be very much in your interests for Virgin to get the loan / bailout they are seeking. It would effectively force BA to do the same, and as mentioned above, this is the opportunity to enforce conditions on job retention & protection of T&Cs
It's clear even to the casual observer that BA's threats are an opportunistic attempt to dramatically worsen T's&C's across the board. They're banking on this working because:
1. The unions are pretty powerless in these circumstances - striking would be a minor inconvenience to BA at worst
2. The public, and politicians, are distracted and they won't face the strength of scrutiny that they might usually do if they attempted something like this
Frankly, there's little anyone can do about point 1 until there is a major recovery in air travel demand. In other words, the war (and I would take BA's letter as a declaration of war!) will be won or lost by the ability to get public and political support.
BA's one weakness here is that given a long enough downturn, they will require government support of some kind (above and beyond the furlough scheme). In fact, IAG have already blinked slightly and weakened their position by accepting the spanish government loan, highlighting their hypocrisy to the more observant MPs.
Government support will come with conditions, which may be the only route to protecting jobs and conditions, so it's crucial to have MPs advocating your side of the argument at that stage.
Direct appeals to MPs are definitely worthwhile - I'll be sending a letter myself in support - but in order to have any chance of a successful outcome, you'll need to win the support of the media and public in general. Pressure from the media in particular is probably the most powerful influence on today's politicians. Here's where you need to be very careful - pilots, BA pilots in particular, are not the easiest group for the 'man on the street' to sympathise with. Don't shoot me! IMO the responsibility and technical demands of the job justify the salary, not to mention the training costs and nasty hours. However, compared to many other careers which involve high levels of responsibility, academic ability and lengthy training (e.g. Engineering, Medicine, etc.), you have an objectively good deal. Again, that's not a criticism - well done for protecting it better than many industries - but it does mean that in order to appeal to the public sentiment, some humility is required. I'm not sure the whole 'home counties' soliloquy is quite going to hit the right notes!
I'd suggest the following might be constructive:
1. A very public offer from the unions of dramatically reduced salary (50%+?) & part time arrangements for perhaps 6 months in return for no forced redundancy. If BA's real motivation was to reduce staff costs to get through the crisis (it's obviously not!!), this would solve their problem. OTOH, their refusal of this offer would confirm beyond any doubt their nefarious motives. A big price to pay on the off chance they did accept but nothing compared to the job losses & T&C decimation suggested
2. Unity within the BA pilot community - bickering about who is being more selfish by keeping their job isn't going to help anyone - you're all getting rodgered at this rate!
3. Working with other departments - don't forget that CC, Engineering and others are going through the same as you at this point. I know the relationship has been a little acrimonious at times, but you're in this together, and will only be able to get out of it together. CC in particular may be a useful ally - their plight might be an easier sell to the tabloids.
4. Work with the rest of the industry - Somewhat ironically, it may be very much in your interests for Virgin to get the loan / bailout they are seeking. It would effectively force BA to do the same, and as mentioned above, this is the opportunity to enforce conditions on job retention & protection of T&Cs
