The head of the trade union Unite has warned BA that it plans to move towards industrial action against the airline "with immediate effect". Unite and BA have been at loggerheads for several weeks. In April, BA owner IAG warned it could cut up to 12,000 jobs due to the impact of coronavirus. Staff were warned that if agreement was not reached, they would be handed their notice and re-hired on new contracts. BA said it was disappointed by Unite's criticism. For many long-serving staff, BA's plan would involve significant pay cuts, as well as changes to terms and conditions. Unite - which represents thousands of BA employees including cabin crew, engineers and maintenance staff - has accused the airline of operating a 'fire and rehire policy'. In a letter to BA's CE Alex Cruz, Unite general secretary Len McCluskey accuses Cruz of "arrogance" in his dealings with the union. McCluskey says: "You have now published a timetable to fire and rehire thousands of your workforce on 7 August. We will work every hour between now and then to convince you not to do so. You can take this letter as our commitment to do that. However, you can also take this as an intention to defend our members by moving towards industrial action with immediate effect". British Airways said the lockdown and halt in travel "is the biggest challenge the airline and our industry has ever faced". "It is disappointing that a company doing everything it can to save jobs is being singled out by Unite for national criticism, when jobs are being lost across the country in every industry," it said in a statement responding to Unite's letter.<br/>
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BA has slashed the price of return flights to destinations in Europe to GBP1 under its loyalty scheme as airlines seek to rescue Summer holidays. The airline, Britain’s biggest, has offered the deals to its executive club members of which there are an estimated 10 million worldwide. They include popular destinations like Nice, where the slump in demand from the Covid-19 pandemic has led to nearly all flights to the French resort have availability through August. British Airways has offered 100,000 “reward” seats at reduced rates across its short haul network, with a number priced at only GBP1 and up to 18,000 loyalty or “Avios” points. Vienna, Amsterdam and Nice have the most availability. Ryanair and Easyjet have also cut prices - with some one-way flights available for under GBP10 - as the airlines fight to revive the holiday market after seeing flights cut by as much as 99 per cent during the pandemic and subsequent introduction of the UK’s 14-day quarantine. <br/>
IAG is close an agreement to halve the price of its planned E1b acquisition of Spanish rival Air Europa, newspaper Cinco Dias reported on Tuesday. Air Europa’s price tag would be lowered to E500m to 600m, the newspaper said. The new terms of deal could be announced this week, Cinco Dias added. With the acquisition of Air Europa, IAG intends to increase its routes to Latin America and the Caribbean. Since the deal was announced in November, the airline industry has been battling its biggest ever crisis due the impact from the COVID-19 crisis.<br/>
Demand has been weaker than Aer Lingus expected five or six weeks ago amid continued coronavirus restrictions and opposition to international travel in Ireland, CE Sean Doyle said Monday. While most of the neighbouring United Kingdom is allowing travel to around 50 countries, Ireland has just 15 on its approved list and is demanding travellers from countries including Britain, Spain and the United States to quarantine. The government also continues to advise residents against all non-essential travel, even to approved destinations. “If we look at the wider demand, it is not recovering the way we would have hoped maybe five or six weeks ago .... The narrative around travel has been negative in the period,” said Doyle. Ireland’s success in attracting multinational foreign direct investment, which Doyle said was around five times higher than the European average, could be damaged. “We have built our economic model on being open for business, on being a global economy. I do think that we are taking that for granted at the minute and not understanding the consequences for that sector... if we don’t enable connectivity,” said Doyle, who was speaking at an Irish parliamentary committee.<br/>