British Prime Minister Gordon Brown on Monday condemned a planned strike by British Airways (BA) cabin crew, putting himself on a collision course with his main union backers weeks before an election.
Brown, who is battling to maintain Labour’s 13-year-grip on power in an election expected on May 6, said the seven-day strike was “unjustified and deplorable” and should be cancelled.
The Unite union that has called the strike is the largest financial backer of Brown’s Labour party and its political director, Charlie Whelan, was once Brown’s spokesman.
“It’s the wrong time, it’s unjustified, it’s deplorable, we should not have a strike. It’s not in the company’s interest, it’s not in the workers’ interest and it’s certainly not in the national interest,” Brown told BBC Radio.
“I hope that this strike will be called off,” he said in an interview on the Woman’s Hour program.
Most BA cabin crew plan a three-day strike starting on Saturday, followed by a four-day walkout from March 27, jeopardizing Easter holiday plans for travelers.
BA on Monday said it aimed to fly about 45,000 customers a day during the first stoppage, roughly 60 percent of those booked to fly on those days, with short haul services at London’s Heathrow and Gatwick airports likely to be worst hit.
It also said the majority of flights spanning the second strike period would remain in the schedule and that it would provide an update after the first strike period had ended.
BA has trained other staff to fill in as cabin crew during the strike, and has said it will hire 22 fully-crewed planes from charter companies to help run flights from Heathrow.
Unite last week said it was £10 million (US$15 million) away from reaching a settlement with BA — half the amount analysts say BA would lose per day if the strikes go ahead.
The opposition Conservatives, their opinion poll lead shrinking in recent surveys, accused Brown of hypocrisy. Transport Secretary Andrew Adonis, however, said that attempts to politicize the dispute would make it harder to resolve.
“This is an industrial dispute, not a political dispute,” Adonis told the upper House of Lords. Adonis said on Sunday that the strike threatened BA’s existence.
People can preregister to receive their NT$10,000 (US$325) cash distributed from the central government on Nov. 5 after President William Lai (賴清德) yesterday signed the Special Budget for Strengthening Economic, Social and National Security Resilience, the Executive Yuan told a news conference last night. The special budget, passed by the Legislative Yuan on Friday last week with a cash handout budget of NT$236 billion, was officially submitted to the Executive Yuan and the Presidential Office yesterday afternoon. People can register through the official Web site at https://10000.gov.tw to have the funds deposited into their bank accounts, withdraw the funds at automated teller
PEACE AND STABILITY: Maintaining the cross-strait ‘status quo’ has long been the government’s position, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said Taiwan is committed to maintaining the cross-strait “status quo” and seeks no escalation of tensions, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) said yesterday, rebutting a Time magazine opinion piece that described President William Lai (賴清德) as a “reckless leader.” The article, titled “The US Must Beware of Taiwan’s Reckless Leader,” was written by Lyle Goldstein, director of the Asia Program at the Washington-based Defense Priorities think tank. Goldstein wrote that Taiwan is “the world’s most dangerous flashpoint” amid ongoing conflicts in the Middle East and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. He said that the situation in the Taiwan Strait has become less stable
REASSURANCE: The US said Taiwan’s interests would not be harmed during the talk and that it remains steadfast in its support for the nation, the foreign minister said US President Donald Trump on Friday said he would bring up Taiwan with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) during a meeting on the sidelines of the APEC Summit in South Korea this week. “I will be talking about Taiwan [with Xi],” Trump told reporters before he departed for his trip to Asia, adding that he had “a lot of respect for Taiwan.” “We have a lot to talk about with President Xi, and he has a lot to talk about with us. I think we’ll have a good meeting,” Trump said. Taiwan has long been a contentious issue between the US and China.
FRESH LOOK: A committee would gather expert and public input on the themes and visual motifs that would appear on the notes, the central bank governor said The central bank has launched a comprehensive redesign of New Taiwan dollar banknotes to enhance anti-counterfeiting measures, improve accessibility and align the bills with global sustainability standards, Governor Yang Chin-long (楊金龍) told a meeting of the legislature’s Finance Committee yesterday. The overhaul would affect all five denominations — NT$100, NT$200, NT$500, NT$1,000 and NT$2,000 notes — but not coins, Yang said. It would be the first major update to the banknotes in 24 years, as the current series, introduced in 2001, has remained in circulation amid rapid advances in printing technology and security standards. “Updating the notes is essential to safeguard the integrity
RSS