British Airways strike begins

The union representing British Airways cabin crew has begun a five-day strike. However, the airline says it will be able to carry 70 per cent of passengers who have booked flights. Thousands of in-flight workers walked of the job this Monday to protest a cost cutting plan. This plan is going to be responsible for the elimination of roughly 1,700 jobs. The airline has a contingency plan in place that will allow it to move 7o per cent of its normal traffic using leased planes and other workers while putting customers on other airlines. However, even though the airline company has a contingency plan in place, more than half of the airline's flights out of London, Heathrow were cancelled Monday. This leaves many of the customers unsatisfied with British Airways, "I think the strikers are greedy, the way the econmy is. They should be happy to have a job", London traveller Maureen Lonergan said. The strike was supposed to begin on May 17 but was ruled invalid by Britain's High Court because the union did not follow the procedures when announcing the results of the vote to members. One of the union's key issues is the demand that the airline restore employee travel benefits that the airline suspended. The unions leader, Tony Woodley, said the dispute has turned personal because he believes the airline dislikes the cabin crew union. British Airways said it has accepted an invitation for more negotiations, and said it believes the union will also accept.


I believe that the cabin crew employees are taking their job for granted. During the economic times that we are in at the moment, they have to understand that British Airways has to start making cut backs. The first thing they would look into reducing is the cabin crew employees, because the airline itself does not need as many of them to operate efficiently. Also, by walking out like the cabin crew did, it hurt the reputation of British Airways. I believe it will make people think twice before flying with this airline company. I predict that this strike will come to a conclusion soon, because British Airways cannot go on with cancelling and postponing flights. If they let the strike go on for more than 2 weeks the will loose a great amount of money, and their reputation of being a major and reliable airline company will take a huge hit.


http://www.cbc.ca/consumer/story/2010/05/24/british-airways-strike.html