FLIGHT International, A August 1970

189
AI R T R AN S P O R T
British Uni ted strike averted
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T W A S SOME OF British United A irways' customers who had
the most uncertain time last week, wondering whether they
would arrive this week for flights that did not exist. Not
for the first time Mr A lan Bristow, BUA managing director,
made the threatened closure of the airline a feature of his
negotiations with the trade unions, who were preparing to call
a strike last Monday. T he underlying issue in the dispute was
the unions* insistence on parity of pay and conditions with
BO A C. It has been boiling up for some time in BUA ; it was
always one of the unions' chief grounds for complaint against
the independent sector of the air transport industry, and one
of the main reasons why they have been campaigning for a
go-ahead for BO A C's proposed acquisition of BUA , blocked
by the last Government. T he threatened strike action was
widely seen as an attempt by the unions to influence the fate
of the proposed second-force airline, and to revive the possi-
bility of BUA 's sale to BO A C. But the signs were that Mr
Bristow was not bluffing; British & Commonwealth S hipping,
owners of BUA , may well have been contemplating a closure,
having failed to sell the airline.
But Caledonian A irways, which has displayed a more
meticulous approach to industrial relations in the past than
has BUA , having been apparently free of unrest, and which
has just appointed a former Labour junior minister as indus-
trial relations consultant, took a lot of the steam out of the
unions' quarrel with BUA last week. In the event of the pro-
posed takeover by Caledonian of BUA , the airline said, there
would be no redundancy; there would be negotiations aimed
at ensuring that pay and conditions in the second-force airline
were comparable with those in the two corporations for com-
parable jobs, and Caledonian would apply for membership of
the National Joint Council. T he offer was made in a letter
from the chairman of Caledonian, Mr Adam T homson, to the
chairman of the NJC.
A mass meeting of BUA employees planned for July 30 was
postponed, but many of the employeesestimates ranged
from 1,000 to 1,500 {the BUA total work force is over
3,000)turned up just the same, and voted by a handsome
majority to abandon the strike and to accept the management's
offer, which was for an immediate interim 10s a week and
eventual parity with BO A C basic pay rates (but not produc-
tivity payments). T he latter was expected to add some 1.3
million to the BUA annual wages bill. In the event the
unions could do little but tag along behind the employees and
call off the strike.
S tatistics Report Icao's statistics division, proposed at a recent
meeting that as from next year a programme of regular collec-
tion of statistics relating to non-scheduled air transport should
be initiated. T he organisation's secretariat is to be requested
to study the possibility of collating origin-and-destination data
from passenger ticket coupons.
Development for Hunt? A 6 million development plan for
Hum Airport, Bournemouth, over the next ten years has been
proposed by consultants for the Board of Trade and local
authorities. A proposal to make S outhampton A irport a
regional airport for central southern England was rejected, as
were four other sites in the S outhampton area. T he consultants
were Sir Frederick Snow & Partners and A lan Hamilton &
A ssociates.
Noise Limit T he Netherlands Minister of Transport has pro-
posed legislative action to control aircraft noise. Proposals
include provision for noise certification of aircraft, the deter-
mination of maximum permissible noise limits, and the estab-
lishment of zones around airports within which building will
be prohibited or closely controlled.
One of the two Aeroflot An-I2s which made an unexpected diversion to
Heathrow Airport, London, on July lb while en route to Hullavingtan to
pick up the S oviet aerobatic team. London area traffic was badly
disrupted and communications were hindered by language difficulties.
Although in civil colours, both aircraft appeared to be the military
version of the An-12
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