BA BOSS Walsh’s war on the Unite trade union was stepped up yesterday when he turned down a Unite offer to suspend the strike actions by BA cabin crew due to start this Saturday.
The Tony Woodley offer was to suspend all strike actions, if BA would return its withdrawn final offer to the table.
Unite originally had said that it was willing to put the offer to an indicative ballot, and would cancel the strikes if the ballot result supported the BA position.
Yesterday Woodley simply offered to suspend the strike action, that is to surrender, if the final offer was put back on the table.
Walsh is so intent on clobbering the unions that he refused to do this. He cannot wait to use the strikebreakers that he has organised.
A spokesperson for British Airways dismissed the latest move by the union as a stalling tactic.
A Unite spokesperson yesterday morning reiterated: ‘Unite is ready to meet BA. But the company needs to put its offer of last week back on the table. If BA thinks that strikes are going to be avoided with a worse offer, the company is conning the travelling public.
‘The company is still trying to bully and bludgeon its way through this. We need a serious approach to addressing cabin crew’s concerns.
‘Our representatives on the ground are confident the strike will have overwhelming support among cabin crew, despite the company’s bullying and harassment, which risks poisoning the atmosphere on BA flights for years to come.’
Earlier, the union had reacted to the publication by BA of its strike-breaking flights schedule, saying: ‘BA should enter this schedule for the Booker Prize for fiction. It is an accomplished work of fantasy.’
Tony Woodley, repeated: ‘Put the offer back on the table and we’ll look sensibly at suspending the strikes’. He added: ‘At the moment they don’t want to consult, they want war.’
All workers must support the cabin crew. If strikebreakers are used, the whole of Unite must stop and the TUC must be forced to call a general strike.
