BA's Twelve Days of Christmas

On the twelve days of striking BA air crew gave to me

Twelve families sulking
Eleven babies screaming
Ten iPods blasting
Nine laddettes bitchin'
Eight bags a falling
Seven stewards all hiding
Six boards delaying
Five onion rings*
Four hours of sleep
Three fisty cuffs
Two smelly socks
And one million people delayed

Willie Walsh BA's Chief Executive has said:

"We are absolutely determined to do whatever we can to protect our customers from this appalling, unjustified decision from Unite. We do not want to see a million Christmases ruined."

The Union Unite say:

"Ruined Christmases will eventually be forgotten, certainly by next Christmas, but your terms and conditions are something you will have with you for the rest of your working life. BA must be made to see sense and it was reluctantly felt only 'audacious’ action would have any effect."

How they can determine that ruined Christmases will be forgotten that quickly is hard to understand. I'm sure that many people who actually have their Christmas ruined by not being able to go on the flight they have booked, and to find or avoid an alternative means of getting home will be far from pleased with the company that lets them down. In making future plans that customer experience is bound to be something they take into consideration when making a booking.

*After all they ran out of Turkey dinners days ago.

BA Staff Wish You a Misery Christmas Possibly

When I used to work for H. Samuels in London my December routine was easy. I worked along the Piccadilly line so on the 24th I would trundle my suitcase or carry my rucksack into work with me, then after the post drink work it would be on the tube to Heathrow to catch the flight I had booked. Normally this was the last flight just to be sure I would get to it on time; 8pm was pushing the drinking time a little too much. I would be returning on the first flight of the 27th and often straight back into work.

The range of flights from Heathrow was limited either British Midland or British Airways. I did fly both on occasion depending on price, but if I was doing that again this year and had a BA flight booked I would be well and truly depressed. I would be working all sorts of overtime hours, not getting out much outside of store opening hours, so to actually get around to finding an alternative I'd be stuck. The threat of a BA strike starting on 22nd December will be affecting a lot of people and potentially ruining a lot of Christmases. Of course they are timing this action to have the maximum impact, they want people to sit up and take notice and this is one of their busiest times of the year: therefore big impact.

I remember one particular Christmas Eve the weather was exceptionally bad. I arrived at Heathrow and the previous two Belfast flights were still on the ground and all three of us were delayed. Eventually we got off at about 11:30pm. But as we touched down in Belfast there was an announcement for customers waiting for the flight from East Midlands to go the info desk. As I trudged past they were being told that the flight they were expected loved ones off had been cancelled. It was bad enough for one flight load let alone an entire Airline's flight worth.

Is this Postal Strike Just an Excuse for a 3-Day Piss Up?

The reason I'm asking is because yesterday I passed the picket line at Sighthill depot and saw this on the right.

Today exactly 24 hours later I didn't see swarms of disgruntled postal workers looking for justice, fighting for their jobs, indeed I didn't even see one. No what I did see was this below.



Yeah an empty gazebo, a still warm oil drum the remains of their fire pictured in the main picture. But loads of empty beer and cider cans strewn across the whole area, not just at the entrance to the Royal Mail depot. Also startlingly there was not a sign of a single worker manning the picket line at the start of day 2.

Seeing as this is also the vehicle maintenance location for Edinburgh I suspect that even if the strike had of come to an end none of the workers would have been legally allowed to drive any of the vehicles anyway.

Therefore the question is rightly put, is this strike just an excuse for a 3-day piss up. Because I'm guessing there may be a few with hangovers this morning.

Morning Quickie on the Threatened Tube Strikes

It's been a long time since my daily commute was hit by a Tube strike having not lived in London since the mid 90s. However, I understand that the Underground Drivers are considering striking over the 1.5% pay rise that they have been offered. They are saying it is not in keeping with those in similar jobs.

Maybe they should look over their shoulder at those they are transporting, not so much the bankers, but the shop workers, administrators, call centre workers, whoever. Ask themselves how many of them, often on lower salary than the train drivers, even managed to get as big a raise as 1.5% last year and are expecting the same again next.

Water Strike

Staff at Scottish Water will be the next public sector workers to strike over pay when they walk out for 24 hours at midday.

An agreement equivalent to a 3% rise over 15 months was agreed in September backdated to April. While this is within the public sector guideline it is not keep up with inflation, the consumer price index was 4.5% in October (the EU average was 3.7%) down from 5.2% in September and the Retail Price Index was 4.2% for October down from 5.0%. The RPIX which excludes mortgage payments was at 4.7% for the same period.

So while the employers at Scottish Water have stuck to their government directive on pay increases it clearly is a case that public sector pay is not pushing inflation but is sadly falling behind on that score. Maybe Labour really need to redress this target figure.

So employees are continuing to be crushed by the increasing prices and by not having additional money come their annual pay reviews to even hope to catch up.

All Silent from Nats on Pay Front

You probably won't read much about this in the Scottish blogosphere as there only a few small voices of non-SNP out here. But you'll hear even less about this from the Scottish Government themselves in fact so far they have "said nothing at all" with regard to the public sector pay dispute.

As today's Scotsman points out there are two reasons for this, first is the one they would have you believe is the one they want to lay the firmly at the feet of Westminster, must particularly Alistair Darlings reticent, and increasingly indefensible stance, over the 2% cap on public sector pay increases. The second however is that even if they wanted to break the salary cap all local authorities in Scotland are hamstrung by the SNP called for, and taken up, freeze on council tax increases and would have to rely on Holyrood to provide extra funding to do so.

So while the SNP, if they were in opposition, would be up in arms demanding action for Scots struggling to make ends meet they cannae of will nae act to allow public sector workers employed by local authorities to have a fair inflation compensatory wage. So while low wages is an argument the Nats cannot win the Scotsman is expecting us to see them attack Westminster on the inflationary prices ignoring the fact it takes two to tango.

Meanwhile of course on Newsnight Scotland the other week all three of the Labour leadership candidates defended the right for a fair wage for the public sector workers. So whoever comes to lead them this weekend Labour in Scotland may well be supporting strike action this winter in opposition to their Westminster colleagues while the Nats will be siding with Gordon Brown and Mr Darling. Oh what a tangled web that could create this autumn.