BA set for peace deal with workforce

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British Airways (BA) had hoped that Wednesday night would be the end to talks with its staff’s main trade union hoping that they would agree to the job losses of 3,500 employees among other measures. However talks finished with no agreement and BA were set to return Thursday for further discussions.

If an agreement is not met between the two, there could be a vote on strike action which would cause chaos during the summer months. The unions are thought to want the changes only on a temporarily basis until BA is in a stronger position after the recession is over. However BA are said to want the conditions permanent.

In talks earlier this month BA had asked its 40,000 staff if they would consider working for free, less hours or take some un-paid leave to help the company out. Around 7,000 staff responded positively with 800 willing to work for free. Willie Walsh, chief executive of BA and some non-executive directors also offered to work for free in the month of July. This coupled with the employees who volunteered their efforts is expected to save the company millions of pounds.

Unions said that the staff were bullied into making the choice of pay cuts and the like, a charge that BA later denied.

Thanks to www.telegraph.co.uk for the above quotes, for more information on this story please visit their website.

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