British Airways cabin crew: right to strike
Posted on Thursday 17 December, 2009
Filed Under Industrial relations
LIBBIE Escolme Schmidt – speaking as the author of a book documenting the too, too glamorous time she spent as a 1960s trolley dolly, you understand – thinks that striking British Airways cabin crew are ‘a disgrace to their profession’, and gets space in Britain’s biggest-circulation quality newspaper to tell them as much.
One line alone will give you a flavour of the piece: ‘For most of my career I felt guilty taking my wage, as it was such a fabulous experience.’ It presumably does not occur, either to Ms Escolme Schmidt or to the Daily Telegraph, that life probably just ain’t like that for the men and women working long-haul flights to huge numbers of mass market passengers.
Their basic wage is only £18,7oo a year, and even if it is bumped up to something like twice as much as a result of allowances, many of them will be finding it difficult to make ends meet. Given that BA chief executive Willie Walsh is on £735,000, few will feel that their wedge is overly generous.
Elsewhere, the Torygraph slips into union-bashing on auto-pilot, seriously trying to maintain that the strike is really down to boosting devious leftie Len McCluskey’s chances of becoming general secretary of Unite next year.
The logic here is that the British Airline Stewards and Stewardesses Association is a hitherto unsuspected bastion of class consciousness, with 92% of those voting backing McCluskey sufficiently strongly to lose a big chunk of a month’s salary, just to give him an edge in the contest. The story is more BS than BA.
Not to be outdone, the Daily Mail regales us with the tale of ‘the BA comrade in California: £50k a year union activist who lives in LA and hasn’t flown for a year’.
Only some way into the story does the reader discover that the reason BASSA activist Lizanne Malone hasn’t flown for a year is that she is recovering from osteoporosis. It’s called ‘sick leave’, guys. Get used to it.
The truth is, this dispute has got nothing to do with a sudden lurch into on the part of the lower orders, the machinations of the ex-T&G Broad Left, or the unfortunate necessity of allowing employees time off to recover from ill health, even if they are union reps. It has been caused by Walsh’s determination to slash jobs, cut pay, rip up working agreements, and ultimately smash the union.
If BA is indeed experiencing economic problems, the blame lies with management’s disastrously mishandled business strategy. Walsh should step down now. And take the rest of the board with him.
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18 Responses to “British Airways cabin crew: right to strike”
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Up the BA workers – BA is a basket case – but at least this way they’ll be securing the employment of workers for other airlines by flying BA’s reputation and finances right into the runway tarmac!
DOCTOR’S NOTE:
There ain’t no real cure for osteoporosis other than the one the Grim Reaper bestows.
In the early days of aviation the ‘air hostesses’ were actually qualified nurses – early paviation passengers often suffered from nosebleeds – and a glance at old photographs strongly suggests that they were recruited on the strength of their appalling plainness if not outright hideousness.
Can readers here say anything about flying BA that the ‘Telegraph’ readers haven’t?
Anyone who complains about BA cabin crews never flew on Aeroflot back in the USSR days; “Sit down!” barked Olga or Natasha before we were each given an orange – like a Christmas treat for poor children.
On the other hand, we were once inexplicably upgraded from Moscow to London – possibly because they liked the look of the pair of us; we were given doggie-bowls of Caspian caviar and lashings of Georgian brandy.
I see our unelected judiciary has been busy again.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/8418805.stm
Predictably, you avoid mentioning the total lack of desire on the part of the New Labour government over the last 12 years to repeal the Tory anti-union legislation of the 1980s that permitted BA management’s legal action against the strike.
As the BBC reports:
“There is something wrong with the law,” said Unite joint general secretary Derek Simpson.
And voting Labour in the next election won’t do a thing to change it.
There was a strike, I think about a decade ago, the last time BA changed all their contracts for the worse, so this hasn’t come out of the blue.
Most people on long-haul flights need a bit of time to recover from the experience, so it is not surprising that cabin crew don’t find their work schedules as luxurious as the media has presented them.
I would have thought a more plausible conspiracy theory would have the union deliberately messing up the ballot so they could talk left but act right.
How unusual for the tabloids to dig up the only airline workers prepared to diss the BA cabin crew strike. And they’ve long since cashed out, so that terms and conditions have ceased to be of relevance to them.
I thought the court striking down the Unite ballot was bloody appalling – and the judge made her own bias fairly apparent, as I’ve documented.
93% strike vote on an 80% turnout. Fuck the judges, bosses and UNITE bureaucrats. Isn’t it time for unofficial action?
A good article, Dave. But is the description of Len McClusky as a “devious leftie” your own assessment or your interpretation of what the Torygraph was saying – I may be a bit thick, but is wasn’t clear to me from your post.
For the record, McClusky is a left-reformist bureaucrat, but honest and – by his own lights – quite principled. He’s certainly the best candidate for Gen Sec next year. I suspect that Simpson’s public description of the strike tactics as “over the top” was motivated by a desire to damage McClusky and boost Bayliss.
George Woodcock the General Secretary of the TUC many years ago said, “The alternative to trade unionism is not non-unionism. It is state intervention.”
Looks like he was right.
The BBC compared the payrate at the different airlines one in the news last night. BA has the highest average take-home pay of around £17,500. Virgin’s is £15,000. I just thought, ‘Shouldn’t the Virgin staff be joining in the strike?’.
Dreadful News:
BA management have stolen the ARBEIT MACHT FREI sign from Auschwitz and plan to erect it over the tradespersons’ entrance at Heathrow.
Good post, and Jim puts his finger on the nerve about Simpson.
Only Channel Four last night he came across as, what one might kindly call incoherent.
To me it seems blatantly obvious that the use of devious leftie by Dave was a parody of the Torygraph’s inherent anti working class position.
As for the decision of the judge to rule in BA’s favour, let it be remembered that bourgeois ‘freedom’, ‘liberty’ and ‘democracy’ has it’s limits.
As for the decision of the judge to rule in BA’s favour, let it be remembered that bourgeois ‘freedom’, ‘liberty’ and ‘democracy’ has it’s limits.
Especially democracy.
Double especially when it comes to the judiciary.
Government once again is becoming ‘Big Brother’. Len McCluskey is a really decent, honest and trustworthy guy. I should know, I was brought up with him – he’s my cousin, and a more down to earth reliable guy you couldn’t wish to meet. God bless you Len and your love for the working man.
Thank you for the sensible critique. Me and my neighbour were just setting up to do some research about this. I am very grateful to see such great information being shared freely out there.
Greatings, http://www.davidosler.com to GoogleReader!
Thanks
Truden
Ms. Schmidt, of course, was working in a nationalised industry…