BRITISH AIRWAYS flights will be disrupted for a third day today by a strike action by cabin crew, with no sign of talks to broker a solution.
Company chief executive Willie Walsh insisted that the airline had been able to carry 60 per cent of booked passengers and that it had been able to add flights to its expected schedules because of the number of cabin crew breaking the strike.
Unite’s joint general secretary, Tony Woodley, sought to bypass Mr Walsh and urged members of the British Airways board to become directly involved in the dispute and prevent the four-day action due from next weekend.
In an increasingly personal dispute, many of the cabin crew picketing Heathrow wore Willie Walsh face masks, with some showing him wearing a Hitler moustache, along with placards comparing his salary to theirs. The Conservative Party sought to secure political advantage from the dispute, given Labour’s links with Unite – which has given it £13 million over the last four years, and is now its largest donor, by a margin. In a new poster, the Conservatives attacked prime minister Gordon Brown for not becoming directly involved. Depicting Mr Brown in a cabin crew uniform, it declares “Gordon’s doing sweet BA”.
So far, the cabin crew are losing the PR battle. A new ICM poll for the BBC shows that only 25 per cent of people think the strike is justified. BA wants to freeze pay this year, cut cabin crew from 15 to 14 on long flights and put 3,000 workers on part-time.
During a day of claim and counter-claim, BA cancelled 1,100 of its 1,950 flights due out of the UK yesterday. Numerous Twitter and blog messages from passengers indicated that many of the flights that did leave did so with sharply reduced passenger numbers.
Mr Walsh, a former chief executive of Aer Lingus, has spent £20 million hiring 25 aircraft and crews from rivals such as Virgin and BMI and Mr Walsh’s rival from his Aer Lingus days, Ryanair. The airline flew 90 empty long-haul flights to ensure passengers were not stranded at destinations abroad, though some passengers in more exotic Pacific locations served only weekly may be stranded.
Despite renting aircraft to BA, Ryanair has urged passengers “to snap up” seats on 400 UK Ryanair flights by launching a “rescue fare” of £69.99 (one-way including taxes and charges) for BA passengers whose travel plans have been disrupted by BA’s strikes.
Mr Woodley attacked Mr Walsh’s “macho” management style and said it was time for BA chairman Martin Broughton and “sensible” directors to intervene. He said that despite “propaganda” from BA about the number of staff working during this weekend’s strike, he was certain that the vast majority of Unite members were taking industrial action.
“Contrary to the spin from the company about this strike collapsing, only nine cabin crew have broken ranks and 80 have gone sick,” he said.