BAA averts strike

Ground staff offered 2 pct rise plus one-off payment



LONDON, Aug 17 (Reuters) - British airport operator BAA offered ground staff a 2 percent pay rise plus a one-off payment of at least 500 pounds ($781), averting strikes which had threatened to close major UK airports, the Unite union said.
Unite said on Tuesday it would recommend its members at BAA -- which include security staff, firemen and engineers -- accept the pay settlement reached on Monday following nine hours of talks. [ID:nLDE67F1RQ]
The deal is an increase on BAA's previous offer of a 1 percent rise plus an extra 0.5 percent conditional on changes to sickness agreements.
"The negotiations were tough but Unite has delivered a fair offer for BAA staff," Unite national officers Brian Boyd and Brendan Gold said in a statement.
The threatened walkout by ground staff would likely have shut BAA's six British airports, which include Heathrow and Stansted in London, disrupting the plans of thousands of travellers at the height of the holiday season.
BAA apologised to passengers for uncertainty caused by the dispute, which followed strikes by airline cabin crew and disruption from the spread of ash from an erupting volcano in Iceland this year.
"We believe this is a fair offer for staff in what remains a difficult economic environment for the aviation industry," a spokeswoman for BAA said.
"All parties brought a constructive approach to negotiations and we are sorry for the uncertainty ahead of yesterday's discussions."
Unite said that under the deal staff would get a 2 percent pay rise effective from the start of 2010, and arrangements to sick pay would remain unchanged.
BAA, owned by Spanish group Ferrovial (FER1.MC), had angered union members by withdrawing a 450 pound payment conditional on BAA's hitting earnings targets -- which it missed by 3 percent.
But the union said BAA had now agreed to lump-sum payments of between 500 and 900 pounds, linked to the earnings performance of each airport, to be paid in two installments.
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