Originally Posted by
Ancient Observer
On Cruz being stubborn.
Notice the words and feeling expressed in the two Press Notices.
BA sound angry. Annoyed. (Probably because their bonus payments will be impacted). Whoever wrote it, and whoever approved it have clearly lost their rags. Beyond intemperate. They should be fired.
BALPA sound the height of reasonableness and common sense..
Not really, this has been BA's stance and message tonality from the off.
That release does read a bit like a draft because, well, it probably is, readied however long ago, leading with the anger rather than the important facts in first para.
BA is annoyed. To some degree it should be. To another it should just pay its staff - but this it will see as difficult, because bend to the pilots and you'll have cabin crew (rightfully, given the wages) striking within months of that. Slippery slope.
The company is in a difficult position. Its PR message has to be one that reflects what the general public will feel, not the frequent flyers with more knowledge of the industry. It's the right line to take, PR wise, irrelevant of moral grounds.
BALPA's tactic is to prove what mayhem occurs within two days of striking, giving BA two weeks thereafter to reassess its position and call off the 27th. I commend BALPA for not hitting the summer holidays, as it could have. I also commend it for striking at the heart of BA's 100 year anniversary.
PR works both ways; the Union, unusually, has been more subtle about it in this instance, because it's a tarnish on the airline. No bank holiday sales, oh no, just headlines showing that, with this management at the helm, it's at its lowest point.
Shame it had to be this way. But the ball is in BA's court and it has the tools (read: cashflow) to fix this.