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As you will know, British Airways are in the middle of long-running industrial action with the union UNITE over pay and conditions for their cabin crew. The dispute has threatened to affect those who rely on BA for their holiday plans or business arrangements with rolling strikes promised by the union, backed up by votes from their members. However, the situation has taken a turn in the last couple of days with the end of a court case over the issue.

The court case which BA brought against the union revolves around whether or not strike action is legal. BA affirm that it isn’t while UNITE claim that any attempt to block the strikes would cause the whole ‘right to strike’ system to founder and fail. Ultimately, with both sides playing hard ball, it was always going to come down to a technicality – and what a technicality!

BA have won the case on the grounds that the members of UNITE who were balloted were not informed of ’spoiled ballots’ as is supposed to happen. This rule has negated the legality of the ballot and therefore the strikes can not go ahead based on its outcome.

But the best bit? The total number of spoiled ballots was 11. Yup, 11 spoiled ballots in amongst tens of thousands valid ones.