al446
You are talking a load of cobblers !!!!
First I do not work for RYR or BRK.
Second the company I do work for is about to hold a vote for BALPA recognition which will include ALL our pilots regardless of their affiliation to BALPA or not.
Now if one company can do that then it would be easy in RYR.
However BALPA do not want that vote to happen just in case they are out voted, which is the same in RYR.

Anyone promoting such a restrictive practice (BALPA members only) is usually trying to ensure a vote in their favour, by excluding a large proportion of the workforce.

In the past I have worked for BALPA companies and once served a term upon a company council.
I am now no longer a member, having seen the real way that they operate and the self interest shown by the council members.

Most people think that BALPA will help the workforce by some black art just by chanting the word "BALPA" this is not the case.
Representation will achieve little or nothing through a confrontational management, and any benefits obtained will take longer than some members will care to wait.

BALPA are looking for scalps to add to their totum pole and more money in their coffers, as they are a business and need to show profit like any other company.
The few BALPA have helped are far out numbered by those they have let down.

Day Dreamer
 

In certain circumstances your charge of cobblers may hold up, if that is so I will be first to acknowledge such. I certainly was not trying to maliciously influence the debate, if that is what you can call the bun fight I have been viewing over the past couple of weeks or so. As I state in other posts, I am not a pilot and no longer work in aviation, haven't done so for many years, but I do get a might teed off when I see horror stories or wild speculation such as I have seen from the likes of RSS, especially when I have seen the way unions work proactively with employers to ensure longevity of the company and their members' jobs.
If 50% of the pilot group were union members then a ballot would be held however if you have a look at Statutory right to union recognitionyou will see that the situation is more complicated. I accept that in certain circumstances all pilots who are employees would take part in the ballot, the nature of the contract between RYR and BRK pilots would have to be determined as they appear to be independent contractors who may be gone the next day with no recompense, perhaps even more reason for them to join a union. If they cannot be shown to be direct employees then they would have no part in the ballot. I emphasise, I have no idea of the true situation within RYR but that is greatly due to the distorted postings of the pro management peeps on here.
The main thrust of my previous post was to say to RSS that his much vaunted 'ballot' held at EMA etc was cobblers, toss, hot air. It has as much validity in law as the anal expulsions of MOL.
Please do not misunderstand me, I fly no flag for BALPA, I haven't since I knew that it had once been headed by that animated skull, Norman Tebbit. I think that pilots would be better represented by a larger union such as Unite but most of the right wingers (if PPrune is anything to go by) would rather take a pay cut or be boiled in oil before getting into bed with a load of lefties. Nor do I hold RYR in any great esteem, their fruit machine business model stinks.
Finally, any talk of bases being closed because MOL has thrown the teddy out of the pram should be taken with a pinch (cellar) of salt. Mr avaricous, and which CEO is not?, would be strung up by the dangly bits then spit roasted by his shareholders should he close profitable bases. Remeber the boast of RYR is that it is UK's largest airline, I think that would melt away if he closed UK bases.
Awaiting incoming.

Here we go then al446, cop this for "wild speculation".

10% of the unit are union members - excludes huge numbers of pilots - but that, of course, suits BALPA.

Then if 50% + 1 of the pilots are members of the union, even if they don't want recognition, the CAC can award recognition; hardly democratic.

Then your ballot is not a foregone conclusion either, not the IF qualification.

The if it does decide a ballot is in order recognition can be declared with with 40% of the union members respond and they get a majority.

All this talks about union members, not workers.

That isn't wild speculation or a horror story: it is from the website you linked to.

As day dreamer said, BALPA want a vote among the union members, not the workers which is why more and more of the bases are having their own ballots and telling BALPA HQ to withdraw the application.

100 per cent, I still haven't had an answer to my questions from either you or BALPA HQ: cut out the flannel about dignity and respect, tell the FR pilots precisely what the improvements will be and when.

We don't need the easyJet roster; ours is better. We don't need your staff travel, ours is better. We don't need crew food, it's rubbish anyway. We have a pension scheme, we get paid for car parking, medicals, loss of licence, uniform so we don't need that.

From The Real Slim Shady"

Well Slim, as a Captain (15 years plus),I pay less than £39 per month (before tax !), don't tell me you believe the £1000 quoted by the company in DOB and EW's rhetoric .......


You're so gullible ......

HPP

I used to believe all that rubbish about how Balpa was there to look after its members.

It took me three years on our company council to realise that belief was a complete and utter delusion.

As I have posted before Balpa does not have the resources to deliver on promise and is only interested in headline (thus revenue) grabbing opportunities or BA CC who (despite the strident denials) still mostly control Balpas agenda.

Balpa is only as good as the support you get from the vast majority of your pilot workforce. You havent a cats chance in hell of effective collective representation through Balpa even in the unlikely event you got recognition.
The reason is that, at best, there would always be a substantial number who would toe the company line and elevate two (richly deserved) digits to Balpa.

RSS
 

OK, let's take it line by line

Not exactly favouring BALPA unless, of course, you have not been as persuasive as you think.

Seems fair enough to me. You wouldn't be myopic would you? Or maybe you were confused when you wrote.

Once again, seems fair enough. I didn't draw this law up and it was hardly designed by the TUC but it is what we've got. Let's do the maths.
40% of the unit means 50% on a turnout of 80%, a level that is seen only in emerging democracies, eg first full participation vote in SA, or repressive states like Zimbabwe. I would say that that is a pretty high hurdle to jump but you seem to want to set the bar higher. As I have said in an earlier post, I do not think that BRK pilots would be included, they either contract for themselves or a company other RYR. Take legal advice, I've given you the link, they are good, I've used them.

Wrong, it talks about bargaining units. That is RYR contracted pilots but I am always willing to correct my stance if your legal eagle tells you absolutely that BRK guys should be included. It would appear to me from your postings that you wish to have a bargaining unit of 1, you. Otherwise everyone, so why not drag the contract cleaners into this?

Under whose auspices are these ballots carried out? Can it be shown that undue pressure has not been exerted? It seems about as valid as witchcraft but a bit more dangerous.

If you had used the eyedrops and read my post properly you would know my stance re BALPA and, if you read my previous posts in other forums you will observe that I have consistently said that I do not work in aviation and am a Unison steward, BALPA central have never contacted me. If the vote goes for recognition then it is up to FR pilots to organise within that union, elect spokespeople and promulgate their manifesto, have it approved by the members and then put it to management. I dont know of any union who has gone into a workplace with a manifesto in place, as said, that is in the hands of the organisation you put in place. I use'you' loosely.

So we are back to the bargaining unit of 1 - you. Do all the pilots echo your view? Oh, I forgot, you had a 'ballot'.

Keep on speculating.

Ok a lot of people talking complete crap here.

If there is a recognition vote initiated by the CAC, it will encompass 100% of the employees at the bases concerned. Nothing to do with BALPA membership or otherewise.

BALPA provide supporting evidence to the CAC which remains totally confidential.
RYR are forced by law to provide a complete employee list, RYR and BRK at the bases, every single one of these people will then be ballotted by the CAC.

Its not complex its not rocket science and since the invention of the CAC its how its always worked.

@T668 - Define 'employee', I thought I had covered this. However, it depends on the contract that exists between RYR and BRK pilots, as individual contractors they are free to walk away any time, if that is their contract. If they are direct employees of RYR with security of tenure as recognised in law then it is a different matter. Please research.

It will not be 100% of employees but 100% of the bargaining unit, in this case qualifying pilots. It is the same for CC and engineers, hence why I think having separate unions is stupid but if you want to remain apart, remain apart.

I thought the link I posted pretty well covered it or haven't you looked there?

When it comes down to law v opinion, law wins.

PS According to a letter I read from a rocket scientist in that scurrilous leftie rag "The Guardian", rocket science is quite easy, stuff propelant in tube, point at sky, light it and stand back. Control is the hard bit.

Am I correct in saying the bargaining unit is yet to be decided? As far as Im aware both the union and Ryanair have to put forward their case to the CAC regarding who they feel the bargaining unit consists of, as was the case in 2001? Ryanair/Balpa may well state that BRK pilots should be included if it would help either of their case. Please correct me if Im wrong.

Now onto a slightly different matter. Surely if the CAC have petitions from various bases (currently 5/10) where the majority of WORKERS, not just Balpa members, have voted against recognition, this MUST be taken into account? Could the CAC say recognition cannot apply at those bases?

Again, please correct me if I am wrong but if the majority of the pilots at various bases are voting against it and recognition somehow goes through, Balpa are effectively forcing themselves into bases that have categorically stated they do not want them. Is this not a tad hypocitical in that one of Balpas arguments is that we (the pilots) let FR management force their will on us?

I AM NOT TRYING TO START ANOTHER PRO/ANTI BALPA ARGUEMENT! So please no arsey comments, just informed replies... cheers

CommandB
 

Good questions. To reply to your last point first, hopefully I am not being arsey on here and I am with you on the pro/anti thing, I have stated my stance, or lack of, previously.

You may be correct re the bargaining unit, I have not read the full law, only precis, but suspect that it is direct RYR contract only. Brookfield are a contracting company, it says so on their website Brookfield Aviation - Providing Human Resource Solutions Worldwide
and as such they may withdraw from RYR at any time. At our place we have agency staff of equal responsibility status but they have no place within our industrial relations. That is why I advised RSS to go see a lawyer and meant it. If BRK guys are in dispute they are in dispute with BRK not RYR.

As far as I am aware there is no provision in UK law to vote against anything, only for. Unless it is a referendum. Hence -

That is why BALPA are running a petition on their website and requiring details be posted in confidence so that CAC can prove its voracity which is not true of the workplace 'ballots' being discussed on here.

You mention 5 of 10 bases having voted against. Leaving aside its validity (see above), if that translates into a majority of the bargaining unit, which takes us back to point 1 re composition of such, and they are not BRK then all is well and good for the anti camp and RSS may retain his dummy in his pram. If the results do not accurately reflect the intentions of 50% + 1 then the dummy gets airborn and it would trigger a ballot. Recognition, if won, would be accross the company and not on a base by base basis, it doesn't work like that in UK. There would be no hypocracy involved as 50% + 1 of the bargaining unit would have voted for it of their own free will.

Hope this helps.

AL446, many thanks for that. Cleared up a few cloudy issues! cheers :ok:

No problem CommandB.

As far as I can see, the only democratic way to deal with this now is the ballot.

The people who don't want recognition, either turn up and vote no or don't turn up. Those that do, then turn up and vote yes.

Its the only way that I can see a majority opinion at each base winning now.

If FR are confident that the pilots are happy with the current direct negotiation system, they should have nothing to fear. If BALPA think that enough people want recognition then they have nothing to fear.

Edited to say that either way I think the pilots are pretty screwed. If BALPA win then the next period will be fairly grim as FR follow through on their threats. If they don't, then when winter comes, FR have carte blanche to make cuts where they like. Either way it seems to me they lose.

Basically it is a choice between short term gain and long term loss, or short term loss and long term gain.

tricky.

Depends how long, the long term is.

To last 3 posts -

Please see one of my previous posts as to why I don't think so. There is a great of hot air being spouted on this thread, and I don't mean you guys. Remember MOL has a board to answer to and his decisions have to be justifiable, in commercial terms. He also has quite a shareholding which he will not want see go down the Swanee. For the moment my advice would be to do nothing. I will explain tomorrow, it is too late now.

management pilots in union
 

Question:If being in a union is such a bad thing andso career threatening,as some would have us believe, in ryanair.Why is it that all bar one of the senior pilot post including the head of training and chief pilot in ryanair are members of the Irish Airline Pilots Association?

To explain my earlier post -

The only body that can push for a ballot, providing they can demonstrate support, is BALPA, AFAIK FR can't request one. By virtue of BALPA running the petition on their site they already have 10% membership, would be pointless otherwise, but short of 50%. If I were making the decision I would not push for the ballot until I had 60%+ to allow for drop outs and company lickspittles giving support then voting against in the ballot. Clearly BALPA is not there yet but MOL has no idea how close. The best way he could ensure that the number is reached is to treat his pilots like !!!!! and see them log on. MOL would lose and what he has feared will come to pass. In short he's got to be nice to you but you know the mask will slip so BALPA will quietly dig away and gain support (or not) awaiting the economic upturn. I make no prediction on that one. Come the upturn, come the demands for more moolah and the campaign re-emerges.

For FR it is also good, they can run the business without having to look over their shoulder to see if BALPA is sneaking up on them, something I think they are bothered about otherwise the company placemen and brown noses would not be all over threads like this like a rash. FR also also has to keep you guys happy with an eye to the upturn as most of the BRK guys who are building hours will be off to secure pastures new & better T&Cs. The only flaw I can think of is that MOL plans to be gone by upturn so will be spiteful but, as posted before, he is answerable to a board who may remove him before he goes too far.

In my view MOL & friends are being short sighted and probably have a very 60s and 70s viewpoint of a bunch of nutters who call each other 'brother' and 'comrade' and would strike at the drop of a hat. He is wrong. Sir John Harvey Jones invited the unions in when he became chairman of ICI saying that if unions had not been invented the employers would have had to do so. He was right and ICI became a far better company on all measurable standards as opposed to when it only had staff associations. He would find that in representing the best interest of the pilots they also do so for the company and its success. In certai cases their is more management knowledge and experience in a union than there is in the company, that is why I think BALPA would be better off as part of Unite but that is up to you guys.

Sorry guys, I had a problem with the power supply to my lapatop and had to conserve the battery until the replacement arrived.

So to respond in some sort of sequence:

aldente

And you are so poorly paid if as a 15 yr Captain you are making less than the FO I flew with yesterday!! £3900 a month......are you kidding me?? Of course you are probably a turboprop Captain in a BALPA airline.
al446
And if you had taken the eyedrops you would have NB'd that the comment was directed at 100%- hundredpercent- not you. DOH!!!!

There is no point in arguing the toss over the interpretation of an Act of Parliament:when the case is ventilated before a Judge, or the CAC, it matters not how you, pushing your lacklustre case for Unite, or me, pushing my case for rejection of the BALPA application, care to trade arguments, but how the Court or Legislature interprets and applies the law.

Firstly, for someone who isn't a pilot, isn't a Ryanair pilot, and probably doesn't harbour an interest in becoming one, you have a great deal to say on an issue that you have no influence on. My bargaining unit was, if you had taken the time to read my earlier posts, always the BRK and RYR contract pilots: since the issue of recognition poses a massive question to the security of everyone's job, it strikes me as being just that the BRK should have a say too.

Are you completely delusional? The pilots organised their own in house ballots to determine whether or not they want BALPA to proceed with the application for their base; remember the BALPA spread bet, by applying individually for the 10 UK bases? Are you seriously suggesting that they do not have the right to express an opinion? Are you seriously suggesting that yo and your union lackeys are the only individuals blessed with the integrity to conduct a ballot? Are you denying the pilots the right to express an opinion?

It matters not on here whether I represent the views of my guinea pig, cat or hamster. What matters is that the majority of pilots expressed a preference for BALPA to withdraw their application: simples!

t66

Not quite me old: the legislation talks about union members, not workers. The first stages, which ca result in recognition, only deals with union members.

commandB

Regrettably not: the only solution is a Judicial Review.

Dim Repa

Being a union member and recognition are different issues.

From The Real Slim Shady

aldente


Slim, stop being such a jerk !!! I am actually a RYR Captain, on a permanent contract, STN based and over 5 years with the company.

My P60 showed a gross pay of just over £90,000 for the tax year 2008/9, my take home pay most month's is over £5000, yet I still only pay £39 per month to BALPA before tax.

PM me with an e-mail address and I'll send you a copy of my bank statement to prove it !

Money well spent I say ......


:ugh:

Apologies if this has already been posted:

Ryanair cricket protest : Stansted Airport News Stories

Ryanair cricket protest
13.07.09

The final day of the first Ashes Test at Cardiff was interrupted by a pitch invasion involving two protesters campaigning against the recruitment policies of Ryanair. John Foley and Anthony Lea took to the field during the 51st over, brandishing a banner decrying the budget airline for charging recruits for training, only to terminate their contracts.

Mr Foley halted play for several minutes while he was wrestled to the ground by four security guards, while Mr Lea broke the stumps at Cathedral Road End before he too was apprehended. Speaking after he was removed from the stadium, Mr Foley, 43, said the protest had been planned the previous evening after Ryanair terminated the employment contract of his daughter

£39 per month BALPA subs, you obviously haven't told them you've been promoted then! Shame on you.

Aldente,

"My P60 showed a gross pay of just over £90,000 for the tax year 2008/9, my take home pay most month's is over £5000"

Can certainly see why you are manning the barricades....

Can't believe that some people on here equate those sort of wages with slavery and working in sweat-shops.

Think that perspective is a kind of plastic window to some.

slim

As you well know, the BALPA subs are based on 1 % of BASIC salary, and as you also well know, basic salaries in Ryanair are well below the industry average (even lower for new Captains !), with something like 40 % of our income earned in sector pay (which does not form part of our basic pay).

And when the UK tax authorities have finished conducting their review of Ryanair sector pay over the next couple of months, and we end up with what is effectively a pay cut, doubtless you and your ERC cronies will just roll over and accept it just like everything else you have rubber stamped.

After all what else can you do ? .........


:)

PS Jenny B there is a lot more to this than money - are you suggesting that because we earn relatively high wages compared to many , we should not complain about any of our terms and conditions ?!

No merely saying that to equate what you do and earn should never be equated with slavery and Third World sweatshops as some would have it on any Ryanair thread.

From every thread on Ryanair would have thought that your wage was just spin from the management anyway, and everybody only earns £2.50 a week and an out of date packet of pickled onion Monster Munch whilst being whipped in the the galleys.

JennyB,

to those 5000 you should subtract car park, uniforms, hotels, loss of license, pension scheme, transportation to/from sims....and considering we fly more hours/year that any other airline in the business (up to the max legal limit of 900) I cannot blame some of us feeling treated like slaves if compared to other colleagues doing the same job.

Go and ask any BA/LH/AF/KL/IB/EZ etc. Capt what his net take home would be flying 900 hours/year and also ask him about his benefits.

See where modern slavery starts now?

Modern slavery?

If you ever had a plot I'm afraid you have lost it.

It's the total lack of perspective that some of you have that negates any genuine grievances you may have.

Modern slavery, good God

Vexed,

the problem of interpretation arises mainly due to the variation in wording from the Employment Act to the CAC website etc.

The Employment Act talks, if I remember, about union members, whereas the CAC site talks about workers: I posted a copy of the exact wording earlier.

My own preference would be for all the "workers", RYR and BRK, to be balloted, but even now, one of my colleagues, a BALPA member, tells me that the union have been asking the membership to vote for recognition, not the workers.

This is from the act, my emphasis, :

You can see where the confusion may arise.

Apparantly it's all about "Dignity and Respect" ! :yuk:

JennyB,

1- hardest working pilots in the industry
2- lowest T&C's in the industry if compared to productivity
3- lack of even the most basic benefits (if I don't arrange my own loss of license and should I damage my hearing because of an emergency descent while on duty then I'm on the streets without a penny and without perspective as you like to call it).
4- bullying management that closes bases from one day to the next and moves people and their families around Europe as they please without even the slightest support
5- more than half of the pilot population hired on BRK contracts (without the possibility of choosing a permanent one ) making their jobs subject to any ups and downs the industry (company) may have including allocated annual leave/months off/undetermined stby days/terminations etc without any rights/benefits/job security/legal protection/healthcare/tax advice not to mention the case of a female pilot forced to accept a BRK contract that may want to build a family and have children would remain without a salary,without a job,without healtcare (you are a woman Jenny so I'm trying to use issues that you would undertstand better since the practicalities of our job don't seem to be on your agenda) forcing any FR/BRK female pilots to effectively choose between their jobs and becoming broke mothers.

And all of this is happening in 2009 under the legal umbrella of the mighty EU laws.
Slavery was also perceived as legal and normal just a few decades ago.

Dannyalliga,

Please stop before you dig yourself even deeper.

The sad thing is that you genuinely do believe that you are a slave on £90,000 a year, working 5 days on 4 days off, and, once you reach your legal maximum of flying hours, unable to work until the clock is re-set.

Please go away and look up slavery in a dictionary or on google, you will find it just down from self-obsessed, perspective-free pilot.

...............and even further down from pilot-hating Ops bod? ;)


danny. I've no love for RYR management but you're the authors of your own misfortunes and those at other companies whose T&C's have suffered the knock-on effects (although some of us are immune, for now).

Without wishing to appear too blunt you bought your way into the job and now face the consequences. Dine with the devil and all that.

Not a pilot hater at all, but some do come out with some rubbish..

As you said yourself very pertinently:

"Without wishing to appear too blunt you bought your way into the job and now face the consequences. Dine with the devil and all that."

Which doesn't smack of forced labour to me, nor do the salaries, terms and conditions which you all seem to think are so heinous.

Jenny,

I might as well be one of those F/O's who spend most of their time in a base 1000nm from home, on a 5/3 roster (see new italian bases) of which 3 days SBY and 2 days of work, making about 2500 euros net (35% tax) for not even 50 hours/month to which you should subtract rent,bills,car park, hotels, loss of licence, healthcare, uniform...
I might be one of those to which a 2 weeks A/L has been allocated in the month preceeeding a month off leaving me with only 2000 euros for over 2 months.
I might be one of those VLC pilots who had to move house, family, kids, find schools, who lost their rent deposits and rush to a new allocated base in just a few days without ANY support whatsoever from the company.
I might be one of those F/O's whose command upgrade has been stopped or whose transfer request frozen due to a unilateral decision of the company in retaliation to union recognition reviving mass punishments in a perfect soviet/nazi/slavery style.

I might be one of the many stories present in FR and that you and all the company puppets and union busters don't want to hear.

Probably because hearing the truth hurts and scares those who manipulate the puppets.

Sweeping generalisation there, you might want to watch those. They leave you open to responses like....well, danny's last one. Ones with inconvenient facts and all that. Damn his eyes, eh? While the pay and conditions he quotes might be better than those of, say, an ops bod (many of whom get me through my days without a hitch) if you compare the personal investment that a pilot and dispatcher make in their careers you'll see why the former expect to earn more.

That said...... danny, sorry but many of you got into your present predicament by knowingly buying your way into a company run by shysters. While I have sympathy for anyone employed under false pretences the majority of RYR crew paid up and walked in eyes open.

True, in a way.
I might be a self sponsored cadet who at the age of 20 paid his way into an FR cockpit but I might as well be an aged Capt. who found himself having to take up this job because his airline went bust due to unfair competition of those who employ underpaid and badly treated eastern european F/A's, or desperate brasilian or russian pilots, who put half of their workforce under a BRK contract without any tax obligations saving on heathcare, pensions, training, insurances etc etc.

Many of us here are tired of the state of things and are looking for change, your comment might be pertinent in a way but it surely doesn't help the cause.

You're right, I'm not helping your cause but frankly I'm tired of trying to do so.

I've been banging on against job buying for years only to be shouted down again and again by people fresh out of flying school wanting to go straight to the RH seat of a big jet. Apparently I was/am "out of touch" with the way things are nowadays :rolleyes: Well now you're seeing the other half of just how those things are and while I'd dearly love to see O'Leary and his cohorts brought to task please don't suggest that this is anything other than your fight.

You all contributed to the situation when you bought your jobs, perhaps you can pull together and earn better T&C's. Don't expect too much help from outside the company though. The rest of us have watched SSTR's contribute to the demise of this profession for too long to rock our own boats. Selfish? Physician, heal thyself.

Or maybe like me you are an experienced pilot who joined Ryanair with his eyes wide open a number of years ago and is still happy working there?

Airlines T+C's are market driven, if you don't like it where you work, move on to somewhere 'better'.

JennyB talks more sense than anyone else on the thread.

Flintstone
I deal most days with job hunting newly qualified pilots, many would prefer not to pay for a type rating.
But
The old days are long gone, as are the days of Chief pilots knocking on the doors of the training schools looking for pilots.
Airlines are in the deepest doodoo ever, and since the accountants took over every facet of the business, cost cutting has been the name of the game.
Paying for a rating is a major way of saving costs, and mitigating risk.
The student carries both costing the airline little until qualified on type.
This is the way it is now, even the airlines not going down this route are considering it, along with reducing the hotel and allowances during training.
Many will now blame this on Ryanair MOL reducing costs and T&C's but I was in an airline offering SSTR's long before MOL decided to put his ideas into effect.
The bleating sheep of BALPA are trying to make people believe that the magic wand will be waved and the good old days will return if you just pay your 1% (For their Junkets).
The old days (God Bless Them) are now consigned to the graveyard where the likes of Dan Air, British Caledonian and Air Europe all good BALPA companies lie buried.
There are many out there who will pay for their ratings, and jump the que of the its immoral to pay brigade.
Thats called life !!!
Those who can and will put themselves in hoc, in this day and age will beat those who believe a job should come to them as they now have a new fATPL.

dannyalliga

A lot of what you say may be your perception of life, but can you actually substantiate your claims with facts ? from within the RYR community.
Or is it just the BRK pilots who are suffering ?
If its the BRK pilots they are NOT included in this BALPA debate even if they are members because they are considered as contractors.
So your statements have no bearing on the BALPA debate.

The only way forward is to include ALL Pilots operating for Ryanair contract or permanent.

Protect your jobs, and those who work with you "VOTE NO TO BALPA"

Flintstone,

"While the pay and conditions he quotes might be better than those of, say, an ops bod (many of whom get me through my days without a hitch) if you compare the personal investment that a pilot and dispatcher make in their careers you'll see why the former expect to earn more."

Still don't see your point to be honest, not comparing(or complaining) my wages with any pilots, but if somebody chooses to go into a job, not forced, and then earns £90,000 a year, and work a reasonable roster, then would hardly say it is slavery, forced labour in a salt mine or working in "the dark Satanic mills" as some may have it.

Now if Ryanair are running round pubs, getting unsuspecting pilots drunk, giving them the Queens shilling, coshing them over the head, and they then wake up in the left or right hand seat of a B737 about to take-off out of Stansted then I take it all back.