BA boss hits back: Alex Cruz defends plans to axe 12,000 jobs – and vows to bolster airline for survival
The boss of British Airways today launches an impassioned defence of his plans to axe 12,000 jobs and cut the salaries of pilots, cabin crew and other staff.
Writing in The Mail on Sunday, Alex Cruz hits back at the stinging criticisms he has faced from MPs and trade union officials over the past seven days.
He accused unions of ‘scaremongering’ and described criticisms levelled by MPs as ‘partial and parochial’.
In a tailspin: BA boss Alex Cruz has hit back at the stinging criticisms he has faced from MPs and trade union officials over the past seven days
The MoS can reveal that Tory MP and Transport Select Committee chairman Huw Merriman is lobbying the Treasury to ban companies such as BA from announcing redundancies while their staff are on furlough and the taxpayer is funding their wages.
Merriman said he will this week ask for a meeting with Rishi Sunak to ask the Chancellor to close the ‘loophole’ in the Government’s job retention scheme and force BA to wait until later in the year before proceeding with any redundancy plans.
Meanwhile, unions have accused Cruz of exploiting the Covid-19 crisis to enact a ‘fire and rehire’ strategy.
They claim that BA is exaggerating its cash crisis and using the pandemic as cover to bring back the bulk of employees on reduced terms and conditions.
In an escalation of the increasingly acrimonious row, Cruz rejects all the allegations, explaining that BA will ’emerge from the Covid-19 crisis a much smaller airline’ laden with ‘hundreds of millions of pounds of new debt’ which will ‘swallow’ its revenues.
He writes: ‘To suggest we are focused on anything but our immediate survival in the short term, plus a sustainable and competitive re-emergence for the longer term, is not true.
‘Like other companies facing job losses, I do not want to deprive my people of their livelihoods.
‘It is painful to contemplate the scale of the change we need to make because I know we have the best people in the business. I will do everything in my power to ensure that British Airways can survive and sustain the maximum number of jobs in line with the new reality of a changed airline industry and a severely weakened global economy.’
Cruz also hits out at the Government’s ‘irrational’ 14-day quarantine for passengers arriving in the UK from other countries, which he says has dealt a ‘hammer blow’ to BA’s plans to get flying again in July.
BA’s parent company IAG is suing the Government over the laws, which were introduced last Monday. The row with unions shows no prospect of ending, despite the minimum consultation period for redundancies ending tomorrow.
The dispute has become focused on whether BA was correct to issue a so-called Section 188 notice, which begins formal redundancy proceedings.
The GMB union claims BA ‘reneged’ on an agreement in April not to issue the notice, which details all the legal information required for formal consultations with employees and unions. GMB and Unite are refusing to engage in consultation talks and insist that BA withdraws the notice.
Balpa, which represents BA’s 4,300 pilots, last night threatened to pull out of talks, describing Cruz’s approach to redundancies as ‘tantamount to putting a gun to people’s heads’.
In response, Cruz says: ‘We will not step back from our legal obligations on consulting our employees.’