BA cabin crew changes to save £80m
03.02.10
Changes to cabin crew working practices implemented by British Airways last year will save the airline more than £80m over 18 months, it told the High Court in London yesterday. Lawyers for the airline said at the start of a court action brought by the Unite union said: ‘If BA is ordered to reverse the changes, then its cost savings will be lost and it will be put to significant additional expense in unwinding them. Its business will face serious financial peril.’
Unite, which represents around 96% of the BA's 12,000 cabin crew, says the changes implemented November 16 are a breach of contract, whereas BA says that they do not affect individual crew members employment contracts.
After nine months of talks with the union, BA cut the number of cabin crew on long-haul flights from Heathrow Airport to 14 from 15 without agreement, which led to cabin crew voting to strike over the Christmas period. BA secured an injunction preventing 12 days of planned industrial action, but Unite began a fresh ballot last month, with industrial action expected next month unless the dispute is resolved.
The changes to crewing levels allowed BA to accept 1003 requests from cabin crew for voluntary redundancy and to grant 637 applications for part-time working, with thousands more in the pipeline, the airline's lawyers said.
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