More holiday families face misery

TWO unions have threatened chaos for millions of holidaymakers in the Battle of Heathrow.

The GMB and Amicus said they would ballot more than 1,000 members on further industrial action following the walkout by British Airways check-in staff which brought five days of misery. Strikes could hit the Bank Holiday weekend of 23-25 August, one of the busiest times of the year.

And they could spread to Gatwick, which escaped last weekend's action that ruined thousands of holidays on the first days of the school summer break.

Fears are growing that the unions intend to play a damaging game of brinkmanship with BA which could bring the company to its knees and even kill it off. The dispute is over a swipe-card system which BA wants check-in staff to use as they sign in.

It says there is nothing sinister about the plan, which would make it far easier to check how many workers are at the terminal at any one time. But the company line is not believed by check-in staff, of whom 74% are women and a large proportion of them mothers. They fear the system could be used to send them home without pay during quiet periods. At the moment, they are paid for a complete shift even if not required to do the full hours.

Unofficial action at Heathrow on Friday and Saturday cost BA an estimated £40m and brought some of the worst chaos ever seen at a British airport. Hundreds of distraught flights were cancelled as families packed Terminal Four. Marquees were erected and coffee and sandwiches handed out.

But what the passengers really wanted, information, was in pitifully short supply. By Wednesday, flights were at last running normally. The airline went ahead at noon with its introduction of the swipe card system, but held back from disciplining workers who refused to co-operate.

Unions and management were meeting at the conciliation service Acas last night to try to settle the dispute. In view of the Acas talks the Transport and General, one of the three unions involved, decided not to ballot its members over industrial action. But before even giving negotiations a chance to begin, the GMB and Amicus announced their ballots.

'This is back to industrial relations of another era,' said one analyst. 'How could something so simple be causing so much damage? The workforce should be careful. If it wants to press the self-destruct button, then it should continue to do what it is doing. It could be signing BA's death warrant.'

While further strikes would give BA's public image a battering, the effect on staff morale would be equally damaging. The company desperately needs the backing of its workers to push through a renewal programme.

BA moved back into profit last year after suffering a £200m loss the year before. But the airline has been severely hit by the Iraq war and fear over the Sars virus, and has predicted an ' uncertain' first quarter of this financial year. It also has a £1.2bn black hole in its pension fund.

Traditionally, the Transport and General has held sway at the airports. It has had good relations with BA bosses in recent years. But the GMB now claims to have 900 BA staff as members at Heathrow and Gatwick - all of whom have refused to sign up to the new system.

Many of the staff who walked out last week were young women with children - previously non-union workers not typically associated with wildcat strikes. Officially, the GMB did not back the unofficial action, but it was sympathetic to the general feeling among workers.

BA insiders have even claimed that rogue elements within the union may have been behind Friday's walkout. Chief executive Rod Eddington has made that clear BA's long-term survival is at stake and is unlikely to give an inch to wildcat action or, for that matter, legitimate walkouts.

But staff feelings over BA's 'intransigence' are running high and many rank-and-file members are in no mood to compromise. Ed Blissett, a regional official of the GMB, said: 'Our members are extremely angry over this.' National officer Allan Black said Eddington is 'sleepwalking into a nightmare dispute'.