The Socialist 8 February 2007

BLAIR MUST GO!

Sold to big business

Can the Left reclaim Labour?

Merseyside Campaign for a new workers' party

Website of the Campaign for a New Workers' Party

Interview with Mark Serwotka: "This is just the beginning of the campaign"

Welsh strikers close down Assembly

Anger at union leaders' timidity

Manchester nurses strike against health cuts

Change the system not the climate!

Bush's bio-fuel bull

Has Manchester struck it lucky?

Camden council blames cuts on 'spending gap'

Don't privatise social housing!

Tenants pay when things go wrong

Coventry - a victory for determination

Rising anger and discontent in Europe

Darfur - another failure of Western 'conflict resolution'

Sri Lanka: Keep up the protests

The writing on the Chinese wall

Stop the Valentine's Day pay massacre !

Striking back at the privateers

Corus deal threatens new cost-cutting

Cabin crew angry over BA deal

May Day greetings

Previous issues, etc

Print this issue




Link to this page: http://www.socialistparty.org.uk/issue/473/2050

Google search the site	Printable version	email to friend

Home | The Socialist 8 February 2007 | Join the Socialist Party

Subscribe | Donate | Bookshop

Cabin crew angry over BA deal

A WORKER at British Airways (BA) at Heathrow told the socialist his opinion of last week's deal for cabin crew negotiated by TGWU general secretary Tony Woodley and BA chief executive Willie Walsh. "The deal was the worst possible reason for calling off the planned three day strike which would have brought BA to its knees and forced far more from them than was agreed.

"The so called 4.6% pay increase is effectively a pay cut. It operates from 1 February instead of being backdated to last October. In effect they have only eight months of the increases with four months getting no increase at all. On top of that the workers will have to pay 5% more of their wages into their pensions for no benefit whatsoever. In fact that's a 5% wage cut.

"The 'agreement' on the sick leave policy was a red herring that was made up by the management in the first place. The cabin crew was one part of the TGWU in BA that the rank and file still controlled and that is why there is so much anger amongst them".

According to The Independent, a planned mass meeting of the cabin crew with Tony Woodley has had to be postponed till next week to "allow tempers to cool"