British Airways’ caterer axes over 2,000 staff – leaving just 300 workers to make in-flight meals
BRITISH Airways’ caterer is axing 2,134 staff, leaving just 300 workers to make in-flight meals.
Do&Co announced the redundancies just a couple of months into a ten-year contract with BA.
The jobs will go at its 172,000 sq ft new purpose-built headquarters at Heathrow airport.
The Austrian company has been hit by the Covid-19 downturn in passenger numbers.
In a letter to staff, it says: “In most cases we have seen a reduction in workload in excess of 85 per cent across all contracts, including British Airways.”
“The proposed redundancies may affect up to 2134 employees across roles defined as either manual, clerical, culinary, managerial or technical out of a total of 2434 employees.”
Unite regional officer Shereen Higginson said: “When passengers board their planes, they expect meals and drinks, which are provided by an invisible army of aviation caterers.
“But now about 3,000 of them out of a total Heathrow catering workforce of 4,500 are facing the axe as key catering companies refuse to look to the long-term when the aviation and tourism sectors take-off again in the post-pandemic economy.
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“What we find even more disturbing is that we can see that managements are using Covid-19 as a smokescreen to cut long-standing employment terms and conditions.
“These catering firms already pay our members desperately low wages and refuse to pay the London living wage, currently £10.75 an hour.
"There is now the suggestion that some workers do part-time work for just 16 hours per week – which is not financially feasible for our members as west London has a high cost of living."
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