BA wins court bid to stop Christmas strikes
Updated on 17 December 2009
The Unite union calls it "a disgraceful day for democracy" after its 92 per cent ballot for strike action by British Airways cabin crew is ruled illegal.
British Airways has won High Court injunction preventing cabin crews from striking for 12 days from next Tuesday.
The court agreed with the airline that Unite's strike ballot was illegal because employees taking redundancy had been included. And it said a Christmas strike would be more damaging to BA and passengers than any other time.
Mrs Justice Cox granted the order to BA after the airline challenged the union Unite's ballot of its 12,500 cabin crew members because, they argued, the process contained "serious and substantial irregularities".
The company's QC, Bruce Carr, argued that the strike would deprive "literally millions of people of a happy Christmas".
The result stunned the joint head of the Unite union, Derek Simpson. Unite said it will hold a fresh ballot unless the dispute is resolved.
Economics correspondent Faisal Islam said: "This was a startling verdict at the High Court from Mrs Justice Cox, one that was completely unexpected. Whilst BA's million passengers and its management will be celebrating a trouble-free Christmas, the truth is it was won on a complete technicality."
The problem was that up to 1,000 of the 13,000 balloted were leaving BA under a voluntary redundancy programme and were not eligible to vote.
Unite say this was an accidental oversight but the High Court reviewed the union's website forums and mass text messages and saw no clear instructions to members that they must not vote if they were leaving.
Mrs Justice Cox said: "That would have been a practicable and reasonable step for the union to take but it was not taken, despite the opportunity to do so."
The dispute centres over an alleged lack of consultation on changes to the likes of cabin service numbers and that is still the subject of a separate high court hearing next year. But the union's push for early crippling strikes appears to have backfired.
In a statement British Airways said it was delighted for its customers and suggested that those customers had made very clear their opposition to what it called old-style union militancy.
For some BA passengers it appears a high court judge really has saved Christmas.
