Unite appeals to Adonis on BA ‘stand-ins’

Tensions between Unite and British Airways have taken a new turn in the lead-up to Saturday’s planned strike as the union demands the government investigate how well BA has vetted the 1,000 volunteer cabin crew due to replace strikers in any walkout.

Unite has written to Lord Adonis, the transport secretary, urging him to make BA prove all steps have been taken to ensure the “fast-tracked stand-ins” have cleared national security checks in the UK and the airline’s destination countries.

“Unite has grave concerns that BA’s threat to break any lawful strike by deploying up to 1,000 fast-tracked, under-trained volunteers as crew during a dispute places not just our national carrier’s reputation for quality at risk, but will jeopardise the UK’s reputation as a place where the standards governing air passenger transport are respected and upheld,” the union letter said.

Because BA has had so much forewarning of the strike, it has been able to arrange more than 20 charter aircraft and crew, as well as nearly 6,000 volunteers, to help keep flights operating in the event of a strike. The airline says 1,000 volunteers have now been trained as cabin crew and more will be trained if industrial action is prolonged.

This is a small number compared with the 11,500 cabin crew BA has at its main base of Heathrow, however, and the airline only expects to be able to keep 43 per cent of its daily flights unaffected from Saturday, when a three-day stoppage is due to start. Another four-day strike is due to start from the following Saturday, March 27.

The union claimed it had learnt that strike-breaking crew would board flights as paying passengers and only start working as crew once in the air, thereby avoiding working visas.

A BA spokesman said this was not the case and all proper visas and security vetting had been carried out.

“We have clearly gone through all the security checks. We would not allow crew to fly if they were breaking the law, there is no doubt about that,” he said.

He also said crew would board in uniform and passengers would not notice any difference between volunteers and normal crew.

Unite again called on BA to table the offer to crew that it withdrew last week after the union announced strike dates in the dispute, which centres on BA’s move last year to remove at least one cabin crew position from most long-distance flights.

The cuts came as nearly 1,000 cabin crew took up the airline’s offer of voluntary redundancy. Another 3,000 went part-time. Under the offer it made last week, BA would have reinstated 184 positions. Unite wanted 700 jobs put back.