British Airways and replace them with agency staff; it is estimated that the strike cost British Airways £30 million and caused disruption to 100,000 passengers. In October 2006, BA became involved in a civil rights dispute when a Christian employee was forbidden to wear a necklace bearing the cross, a religious symbol. BA's practice of forbidding such symbols has been publicly questioned by British politicians such as the former Home Secretary John Reid and the former Foreign Secretary Jack Straw. Relations have been turbulent between BA and Unite. In 2007, cabin crew threatened strike action over salary changes to be imposed by
British European Airways July 2002, independent UK regional airline Jersey European Airways (JEA) revived the by then long-dormant "British European" name by adopting it as its new trading name to reflect JEA's UK-wide expansion and growing partnership with Air France. This also included the prefixing of all JEA flights with the former BEA two-letter, IATA airline identification code BE, which continued in use when JEA rebranded as "Flybe" on 18 July 2002. British European Airways British European Airways (BEA), formally British European Airways Corporation, was a British airline which existed from 1946 until 1974. BEA operated to Europe, North Africa and the Middle