Union: Aer Lingus being privatised for cost of four jets

The Government is part-privatising Aer Lingus for the price of four wide-bodied jets, it was claimed today.

SIPTU has issued notice of industrial action if its members’ concerns over job security, pensions deficits and share ownership are not addressed.

Its national industrial secretary Michael Halpenny said the estimated return from the sale would be between €300m and €400m, which was the price of four wide-bodied jets.

“So effective ownership and control is being handed over for less than one quarter of the company’s capital needs (€1.6bn), or four planes,” he said.

The Oireachtas Joint Committee on Transport heard that although SIPTU was opposed to the part-privatisation in principle, it would go along with it if its concerns were addressed.

Mr Halpenny said workers at Aer Lingus were sceptical about the Government’s plan to retain a ’golden share’ of the airline, a minority stake with enough voting rights to influence major decisions.

“Goldman Sachs, the consultants engaged by the Government, warned there were legal complications around this,” he said.

Aer Lingus workers own 14.9% of the company through the Employee Share Ownership Trust (ESOT) but are concerned that this stake will be diluted by the issuing of more shares.

Mr Halpenny pointed out that Aer Lingus had made average annual profits of €80m for the last four years and that since 2001, the number of staff had halved from 7,000 to 3,500.

He said the primary concern of the 1,600 SIPTU members at Aer Lingus was the security of their jobs.

“Obviously, our position is that we don’t believe there’s any need for privatisation.

"Whether it’s about a race to the bottom, we don’t know, but you can quite clearly see that there is a fear among our members about that,” he said.