Conciliation talks have broken down between British Airways (BA) and the pilot union Balpa.
However, the union has not announced strike dates ” as it intended in the case of continued deadlock regarding staffing for the transatlantic OpenSkies subsidiary ” because if it does, the airline says it will apply for a court injunction.
”We felt it right and fair to give Balpa private notice that we have a valid legal claim against them before they took the disproportionate step of calling a strike,” said a BA spokesman. ”If strike dates are issued, we will act to protect our customers by applying for an injunction.
”We must explore every option to prevent the massive disruption a strike would cause.”
Balpa seems to have been taken by surprise by BA”s claim that the pilots cannot legally strike ” at the beginning of the talks with independent mediators last Monday, the union clearly stated its intention to call strikes if no agreement was reached within a week.
Today (10 March) a Balpa spokesman said: ”We are talking to lawyers to see what our position is.
”[During the talks] We said we would agree to lower pay for pilots for OpenSkies, but only to start with in order to get the service profitable. Once profitable, we would expect wages to eventually increase to BA pilot levels.
”They didn”t move enough, clearly, and we couldn”t reach agreement ” the conciliators agreed there was not a chance of agreement.”
He said it was ”interesting” that BA was offering 50% of flight crew vacancies to its pilots on OpenSkies aircraft on maintained wage levels, but ”that”s by the by.”
A BA spokesman said: ”OpenSkies is a new airline in a highly competitive market from Continental Europe to the US, and the terms and conditions for its staff must reflect that. Balpa says that terms and conditions for OpenSkies pilots must match those at BA as soon as the airline becomes profitable. This would generate cost and complexity that the new carrier could not sustain.
”OpenSkies would not be viable - restricting our ability as a company to compete by setting up a European business and putting at risk the creation of 350 new jobs.
”We are disappointed that Balpa has chosen to walk away from the talks. We believe the opportunity remains to reach a peaceful resolution and lift the threat of strikes.”