A fresh round of strikes by British Airways cabin crew are set to go ahead on Monday after the High Court overturned a ban on industrial action.

The ruling follows an injunction granted to BA last Monday ruling that the Unite union had not reported results of its strike ballot correctly to members.

However Unite appealed against the decision, and the panel of senior judges including the Lord Chief Justice, ruled 2-1 in favour of overturning the injunction.

Strikes are now free to go ahead, and the first could start as early as next week.

Unite joint leader Derek Simpson said: “This is not a moment for being triumphant. We shouldn’t have been in this process. The case brought by BA was trivial and, in my opinion, irresponsible.”

He added that cabin crew would not go on strike before Monday, when a five-day strike was due to begin.

BA said it was disappointed for our customers that the appeal had been upheld.

“We will implement our contingency plan to keep British Airways flying,” the company said in a statement. “Unite’s strikes have failed twice and they will fail again.”

The first strike had been scheduled to begin on Tuesday, ending on 22 May, with the three further five-day stoppages to begin on 24 May, 30 May and 5 June.

Despite the ruling in favour of BA on Monday, flights have been disrupted this week with the airline unable to reinstate all services.