by René Lavanchy
UNIONS representing BAA staff have reacted with anger after an executive reportedly said the company had a strategy of sidelining unions at Heathrow Airport.
The comments of Veronica Kumar, head of people and change at Heathrow’s new Terminal Five, appeared this week as the company prepares to open the £4.3 billion terminal at the end of March.
In an interview for Human Resources magazine, Kumar is quoted as saying that the “nirvana state” for BAA is to be non-unionised, and that they sought to bypass union representatives and offer terms of employment directly to staff.
Unions are predictably upset at the comments, which one officer called an “open mouth and disengage brain” statement.
Brendan Gold, Unite’s national aviation secretary, said: “The comments were extremely stupid and speaking with people from the Heathrow branch, their biggest concern is that it reflects views of more senior managers in the HR department.
“The management have said she was speaking out of turn and I think that’s entirely correct.” His members deserved a full written explanation, he added.
The article, which describes how Ms Kumar has worked on implementing new staffing procedures and rotas for T5 for several years, quotes her as saying: “We solved it by asking ‘what is our nirvana state?’ – which was to be non-unionised, to deploy [British Airways] staff to BAA processes and vice versa – and then worked backwards to find what was an acceptable level of change.”
She adds that “We didn’t want unions giving their version of the ‘change’ story to staff”, before explaining how the company decided to communicate with staff directly to “excite” them about the new procedures. The approach “pissed off the unions at first”, but paid off. “It’s difficult for unions to say employees are appalled by the changes when we can show that hundreds want to take up the new jobs.”
BAA insists Ms Kumar was misquoted, and that the comments do not express their views. Ian Critchley, head of employee relations, said: “We will be writing to the publication in question to raise our very serious concerns about the misquotation of our staff member.
“The unions at Heathrow have a very important role in our business and we are currently working constructively with them.”
Human Resources editor Sian Harrington told Tribune she was standing by the story, and that Peter Crush, the deputy editor who conducted the interview, had shorthand notes. “We’ve got it all in a notebook”, she insisted.
Ed Blissett, GMB London regional secretary, said: “These are extremely unwise comments. The move to T5 will be fraught with many difficulties as it is. For someone working for BAA, making these inflammatory comments is extremely foolish and borders on recklessness. It’s the type of comment that could easily spark industrial action.”
The new terminal, which has been under construction for over five years, will employ over 1,000 staff. 700 security staff – heavily unionised – will patrol the building.
Unions and their staff were unwilling to discuss the latest dispute due to the “political” implications of a threat to the terminal’s operation. Mr Gold said discussions with BAA were proceeding smoothly.
