LAST MONTH we predicted that a High Court injunction - blocking the 12-day Christmas by British Airways cabin crew – would probably only delay the strike to the New Year.

Now it looks like a strike could be called for Easter.

Trade Unionists will recall that late last year, BA originally won its legal challenge against Unite after Mrs. Justice Cox ruled that union leaders had breached rules in organising a ballot for the strike.

Although a stunning 90% of workers endorsed the strike, BA management had discovered that about 900 had been allowed to vote who should not have been.  Thus Unite had broken the law by including members of staff that no longer worked for the airline.

This meant that the pre-Christmas strike had to be called off.  At the time Solidarity noted that “this may turn out to be a hollow victory for BA.  The background to the strike runs deep – it includes disputes over job cuts, pay cuts, the ripping up of working agreements and Chief Executive Willie Walsh’s Macho-style of management.”

Since then, nothing seems to have changed.  BA’s Macho-style of management still seems to be to the fore.  For instance, BA is now threatening to remove travel privileges from any staff who take part in any industrial action.

And industrial action could be just around the corner – a fresh ballot for strike action begins this Monday.

At the moment, it is too early to say which way workers will vote.  However, the warning about removing travel privileges – contained in a letter from Bill Francis, BA's head of cabin crew – can only inflame the situation.

In the letter, Mr. Francis states that strikers could be punished because the travel perk was a "non-contractual benefit granted at the company's discretion".  However, many BA workers feel that company have wanted to get rid of this perk for ages.  They are simply using BA’s bad financial position – and any potential strike – as an excuse for this.