Unions to learn of outsourcing plan today

AER LINGUS will today tell unions that hundreds of staff need to be outsourced as part of its €100 million cost-saving programme.

The airline’s board has cleared the way for management’s sweeping changes in almost every aspect of its operations.

In the air, it is likely Aer Lingus will want to replace Irish-based transatlantic cabin crew with their cheaper US equivalent.

On the ground SIPTU will be told that Aer Lingus wants to replace 1,500 of its members, including baggage handlers, check-in staff and catering staff in Dublin, Cork and Shannon with cheaper outsourced labour from companies such as Servisair.

Any attempt to invoke such a proposal will almost certainly lead to strike action, grounding the airline along with thousands of passengers.

At a union’s south-west delegate conference in Tralee at the weekend, SIPTU president Jack O’Connor said: “We will have to ensure we mount the stiffest resistance possible to what is supposed to be proposed,” he said. “Cutting workers’ wages will not save that airline. What will save it is the direction and leadership that is given in terms of what is happening in the industry at the present time. Anyone who suggests that by cutting workers’ wages you can save Aer Lingus is talking nonsense.”

Mr O’Connor said it was ironic that against the background of billions of euro to bail out bankers at the taxpayers’ expense, taxpaying Aer Lingus workers were “being fed to the wolves”.

“I accept there are problems to be faced up to in the aviation sector and I believe it is quite within the competence of the employees represented by their unions and the management to work their way through that.

“Rates of pay and conditions of employment are being driven through the floorboards. There is a necessity now on the part of the authorities to step in and do something about that — to pass legislation to allow for the establishment of fair employment rules that would create a threshold of decency in that industry. If it is possible to change the laws for bankers it should be possible to change the law for taxpayers and workers.”

They also discussed the union’s response to any new vote on the Lisbon treaty.

He said the union was prepared to sign on for democracy but only if the right of collective bargaining was granted to workers.

“If that isn’t recognised and applied we will not support it at any time. It remains to be seen whether the present pay proposal is ratified or not and the degree to which what is envisaged in the text of the proposal actually becomes a reality in law next June.”