BAA airport staff vote for strike action

Strings

Putting my socialist hat on if you can call it that, I think fair play to those who are striking. BAA and its parent company are making a good profits and therefore can afford to pay more than the 1.5% wage increase they are offering.

I dont like strikes as a rule, but fair enough in this case

Blacklight

Strings wrote: »

Putting my socialist hat on if you can call it that, I think fair play to those who are striking. BAA and its parent company are making a good profits and therefore can afford to pay more than the 1.5% wage increase they are offering.

I dont like strikes as a rule, but fair enough in this case

I know what you're saying, but the company has a responsibility to demonstrate growth to its investors. That's the whole point of being in business, not to act as a charity to its employees when times are hard. I don't believe the ruthless fat cats are opressing the slaves and want them to go hungry.

As far as I can see the people at the top are doing everything they can to protect everyone's jobs. If they gave away what little profit they had there would be no business to get up to go to work at.

Procrastinator333

Generali wrote: »

Isn't it a bit more complicated than that though? I think they're a wholly owned subsidiary of Ferrovial so the assets and especially the liabilities on the balance sheet can be changed to suit the needs of the parent company.

I'm not disagreeing as such, just saying that the liabilities side of the balance sheet needs to be treated with caution as the parent can decide to roll over intercompany debt or just turn it into equity. At least that's what I believe from my very basic accounting* knowledge.





*Not false modesty, if anything I'm bragging!

The 3 min skim review I did is never going to be the most probing. They are part of a larger group, but there isn't a lot of i/company debt in there. I went a bit further down the report and page 22 is a detailed note on borrwings.

There is £1.6bn of i/company in the short term, so ignore that and it makes it look a bit healthier.

But still, there are £260m short term loans due for renewal this year, £3bn of syndicated borrowings > 12 months and another £5.5bn of secured bonds > 12 months. Most of the debt is external.

Also, there is €1bn up for refinancing in 2012 and that is currently at 3.975%, as every other borrowing line costs more, I reckon that will take a hike at refinancing time.

I guess the other way to think about it is if someone bought it outright, paid of all the debts, they would have assets with a value of £12.5bn.

Strip out all the interest costs and they made £220m.

£220m on £12.5bn. Not great.

They only managed a 2.2% growth in turnover. If they don't keep costs seriously under control, they will go further backwards.

Again, I have probably spent no more than 10 minutes looking at those accounts, but first impressions are a company that is in trouble in terms of profitability and may have to call on the parent to help with financing.

They are being so tight with the payrise, because much more and it more than wipes out the increased revenue they have generated.

That does look like the sort of company in which employees should just take it on the chin - but I would also expect the board to lead by example and freeze all pay rises etc for themselves.

Procrastinator333

They don't give much on the gorup as a whole, but the group made a loss in the first 6 months of the year too. Net result, £165m loss.

http://www.ferrovial.com/recursos/doc/Sala_de_prensa/resultados/2010/18484_2972972010164443.pdf

FTBFun

Strings wrote: »

Putting my socialist hat on if you can call it that, I think fair play to those who are striking. BAA and its parent company are making a good profits and therefore can afford to pay more than the 1.5% wage increase they are offering.

I dont like strikes as a rule, but fair enough in this case

That doesn't actually appear to be the case.

ILW

Strings wrote: »

Putting my socialist hat on if you can call it that, I think fair play to those who are striking. BAA and its parent company are making a good profits and therefore can afford to pay more than the 1.5% wage increase they are offering.

I dont like strikes as a rule, but fair enough in this case

Why is it that workers expect a pay rise if a company is making a profit, bet seldom seem to accept a pay cut if a company makes a loss? This is mainly regarding large unionised workforces.

Spartacus_Mills

ILW wrote: »

Why is it that workers expect a pay rise if a company is making a profit, bet seldom seem to accept a pay cut if a company makes a loss? This is mainly regarding large unionised workforces.

Plenty of workers have taken pay cuts to support companies and gone onto reduced hours. I have worked for three that did exactly that.

In this case they accepted no rise last year. In real terms a cut. I do not believe workers are entitled to a rise year on year but by the same token I do not see why efforts to help in the lean years are not rewarded when things improve.

stevsand

drc wrote: »

The BA turkeys have voted for Christmas...

You don't even know what company is involved, there are some bumpers on this board.

stueyhants

I can understand the workers issues and their desire for wage growth somewhere similiar to inflation. However strike action affecting the general public is not acceptable. Work to rule and not doing anything beyond their contract should be the first action.

If a shop like Currys strike I can choose to buy from another shop. Whereas when an airport stikes what real choice do people have. Certain services should be prevented from striking. People are free to move to another better paid job if they so wish.

ILW

stueyhants wrote: »

I can understand the workers issues and their desire for wage growth somewhere similiar to inflation. However strike action affecting the general public is not acceptable. Work to rule and not doing anything beyond their contract should be the first action.

If a shop like Currys strike I can choose to buy from another shop. Whereas when an airport stikes what real choice do people have. Certain services should be prevented from striking. People are free to move to another better paid job if they so wish.

Thats probably why the staff at Currys never go on strike.