British Airways expected its dispute with cabin crew to be lengthy and prepared for it, a senior figure at the airline has revealed.
The battle over changes to work practices began in 2009 when the Unite union threatened walk-outs at Christmas, led to 22 days of strikes last spring, and now the union is preparing to announce a fresh strike ballot next week.
BA general manager for regulatory and political affairs Jim Forster told an audience of inbound tour operators at the UKinbound convention: “We knew this was going to be a long, drawn out affair. Willie Walsh made a lot of plans for it.”
Unite accused the airline of intransigence this week after being forced to call off an immediate threat of strikes when BA complained of irregularities in the most-recent union ballot – raising the prospect of summary dismissal for any crew who joined a strike on the basis of it.
Union general secretary Len McCluskey said BA had shown “no interest” in trying to reach a settlement after conciliation service Acas failed in a fortnight of attempts to arrange a meeting.
A new ballot raises the prospect of a strike over Easter and the weekend of the royal wedding at the end of April.
Forster warned: “A further strike is possible.” But he said: “We have the forces ready to support those cabin crew who want to come into work. All our long-haul flights to and from Heathrow will operate.”
He argued: “The union has not got majority support for this action – 2,500 crew have resigned from the union. Only 43% of our cabin crew voted for a strike. The offer on the table is extremely generous and we have urged Unite to reconsider it.”
Forster added: “BA could have gone bust two years ago. We had to cut costs. All other groups of staff agreed to different terms and conditions, but cabin crew did not. If we had not taken on the cabin crew, there would not have been a BA.”